Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher Growing up in white suburban America in the 80's, I thought I knew some things about South Africa. Mostly I was taught that there was something called "apartheid" there and that it was bad (though I was not taught that Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher both did what they could … Continue reading Something Nelson Mandela Taught Me about The United States
Author: jb
The Overstory – A Study in White Environmentalism
White environmentalism is a thing. I know I'm not the first to say that, but as I read over The Overstory, Richard Powers' in some ways majestic, and in other ways, deeply problematic 2018 environmental epic of trees, I got a clearer and clearer picture of what white environmentalism is and what some of its problems are. … Continue reading The Overstory – A Study in White Environmentalism
James Baldwin – The Evidence of Things Not Seen
This is - I believe anyway - the last book James Baldwin wrote and published before his death. There are lots of other incomplete manuscripts and unpublished materials, but this is a full essay. It's about a series of murders of black children in Atlanta in the early 1980's. Its foremost project is to problematize … Continue reading James Baldwin – The Evidence of Things Not Seen
The Amen Corner
I missed reading this the first time through. I was trying to stick to chronological order but since this play wasn't included in the Library of America volumes (neither is Blues for Mr. Charlie) I'm coming back to it now. I don't have that much to say about it. In the edition I found, there's … Continue reading The Amen Corner
Just Above My Head
This is Baldwin's final novel, and also his longest, by far. It is a multi-generational saga, the most crucial stage of which unfolds during the 1950's and 60's. Its narrator Hall Montana reports at the outset he has just lost his brother Arthur, and it sends him into a depression. Baldwin uses the processing of … Continue reading Just Above My Head
The Devil Finds Work
The Devil Finds Work is the last book-length piece of nonfiction (Baldwin calls it an "essay") that Baldwin wrote, and though it's similar to some earlier pieces in its focus on Baldwin's autobiography, and obviously addresses similar themes, it picks a new point of departure: the movies. The sweep of this book is captured really well … Continue reading The Devil Finds Work
If Beale Street Could Talk
When a student told me last year that If Beale Street Could Talk - James Baldwin's 1974 novel which I had not read at the time - was being made into a movie, I was sort of nonplussed. There were other better choices, I thought (even though I hadn't read this one). Why not Giovanni's Room … Continue reading If Beale Street Could Talk
No Name in the Street
It is not true that people become liars without knowing it. A liar always knows he is lying, and that is why liars travel in packs: in order to be reassured that the judgment day will never come for them (James Baldwin, No Name In the Street, 1972). This is the best book by James Baldwin … Continue reading No Name in the Street
James Baldwin – Tell Me How Long the Train’s Been Gone
Though Baldwin wrote about his own life a lot, Baldwin's 1968 novel Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone seems like the closest he came to writing a full-length autobiography. It's written in the first person and as his biographer David Leeming notes, a lot of the micro- and macro-level details of protagonist Leo Proudhammer's … Continue reading James Baldwin – Tell Me How Long the Train’s Been Gone
What I’ve Learned Bringing Kendrick Lamar into my Classroom
[This post is part of a broader project I'm calling "Pop Culture Pedagogy" where I write about ways pop culture finds its way into my classroom] When Kendrick Lamar won a Pulitzer Prize today, I think more than a few people probably dismissed it as somehow the committee trying to be trendy but that … Continue reading What I’ve Learned Bringing Kendrick Lamar into my Classroom
Original Positions 