Vintage Baldwin

These essays are fantastic, and the book is worth owning for the first couple alone, especially "My Dungeon Shook". I am giving this book to a friend to help him understand 'the black experience'.

Baldwin saved my life. In my mid thrities I began to read Baldwin. I started with Tell Me How Long the Train Been's Gone. I have read everything he has ever written-plays, critical essays, novels. I buy multiple copies to be sure I have them to give to people who visit me and pay attention to my library. I have a first edition of The Fire Next Time. He should be mandatory reading in America in High Schools and Colleges. He obviously writes about race in America, but beyond that he speaks to the actualization of the individual, the moral imperative of our times. His voice sings and resonates truth in a way that often stops you dead and you must re-read a phrase or a passage again and again to absorb the brilliance of his ability to articulate what we know deeply, without our own poetry to express deep longing, pain and passion. He is an author's author. For the simplist of stories I recommend, If Beale Street Could Talk. For social expose I suggest Nobody Knows my Name. If you have never read Baldwin, I must say, if not not know then when? Until America comes to terms with the reality of the identity of the black man in our culture we will never be free, or be able to know ourselves.

Of the 8 selections featured in this reader, I found 2 to be beyond comparison. "Sonny's Blues" and "Another Country."Sonny's Blues had simply an *amazing* opening--one of those opening paragraphs that fully pulls you right in. The story itself was very simplistic and...well, just good.Also, I really enjoyed Another Country for the pure progression of events. It took place as a larger story (which it is), yet was self-contained within its own right.As far as the other selections go, I found it rather hit and miss. The first few were rather short and enjoyable. Others seemed redundant in their message.