Novelist, essayist, and playwright James Baldwin...
was born on August 2, 1924, in New York City. The eldest of nine children, Baldwin grew up in poverty-stricken Harlem, where his father was a preacher. Between the ages of 14 and 16 Baldwin himself preached at a small revivalist church, the Fireside Pentecostal. His first and most critically acclaimed novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain (1953), was inspired by his experiences there. Baldwin was heavily influenced by his Harlem middle school French teacher, famed poet Countee Cullen. Cullen, who obtained his master's degree from Harvard University, was a leader of the Harlem Renaissance, a flourishing of artistic expression that emerged from the community of Harlem in New York City in the 1920s, also known as the New Negro Movement. Cullen devoted himself to the education of children in the last period of his life, and concentrated on teaching and writing children's books. He opened up a new world of literary and artistic possibilities for black youth in Harlem, including James Baldwin. Baldwin moved to Paris in 1948, where he remained for the next eight years. During this time he created some of his most famous work, including the essay collection Notes of a Native Son (1955) and the novel Giovanni's Room (1956), where Baldwin explores the broad issues of race, sexuality, and identity. His work Nobody Knows My Name (1961) deals more explicitly with the subject of race relations in the United States.
An active participant in the civil rights movement in the 1950s, Baldwin lived in later years in both the U.S. and France, where he died in 1987.
- Search on Harlem in American Life Histories, 1936-1940 to find stories and reminiscences of the community of James Baldwin's youth, including some written by another author whose work addresses the themes of race and identity, Ralph Ellison.
- Prosperity and Thrift, 1921-1929 contains a number of items from 1924, the year James Baldwin was born. Among these are an issue of four journals published in the New York area: The Messenger, published by A. Philip Randolph and Chandler Owen, The Forum, Atlantic Monthly, and The Villager.
- Read the Today in History features on poets Langston Hughes and James Weldon Johnson, leading figures in the Harlem Renaissance. Also see the feature on the multi-talented Zora Neal Hurston. Search the Today in History Archive on poet or writer for additional American authors.
- Creative Americans: Portraits by Van Vechten, 1932-1964 showcases the photographs of Carl Van Vechten, one of the first critics to recognize and celebrate the writers of the Harlem Renaissance. Browse the Occupational Index under the headings Poets or Authors for images of writers including Arna Bontemps, Zora Neale Hurston, and Richard Wright.
- Learn more about the issues that informed Baldwin's writing. Search on race relations in the following collections:
- See The Harlem Renaissance and the Flowering of Creativity, a section within the American Memory exhibition African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship. Also available is the African-American Mosaic: A Library of Congress Resource Guide for the Study of Black History and Culture, the first Library-wide resource guide to the institution's African-American collections including books, periodicals, prints, photographs, music, film, and recorded sound covering 500 years of history.
