James Baldwin Greatest American Writer of the 20th Century

''The paradox of education is precisely this—that as one begins to become conscious one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated.''

James A. Baldwin

lets explore

Baldwin's novels and plays fictionalize fundamental personal questions and dilemmas amid complex social and psychological pressures thwarting the equitable integration of not only blacks, but also of gay and bis*xual men, while depicting some internalized obstacles to such individuals' quests for acceptance.

SUBJECT...

James Baldwin Greatest American Writer of the 20th Century

and our BIA, 'whiteMan' steveAdam would like to focus on what?........

Baldwin's novels and plays fictionalize fundamental personal questions and dilemmas amid complex social and psychological pressures thwarting the equitable integration of not only blacks, but also of gay and bis*xual men, while depicting some internalized obstacles to such individuals' quests for acceptance.
Saturday, December 19th 2015 at 7:09PM
Steve Williams | delete | block member

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I would like to CLEAR UP this BIA 'whiteMan' steveAdam ....... s*xuality issue..............

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The History, Scholarship and Science of the AfricanAsian male/female FROM slaverAmericana 1492- 1864(1964)

There was GENERATIONAL rape of male/femaleAfricanAsians by europeanMale/Female......AND no Family Sanctioning for the African Asian Slave...maleORfemale.........did cause Mental and Physical DYSFUNCTION

Toward the End of Mr. James A. Baldwin's life.....he wrote....................

''Only white Americans can consider ..........,'' he said. ''Once I found myself on the other side of the ocean, I could see where I came from very clearly, and I could see that I carried myself, which is my home, with me. You can never escape that.

I am the grandson of a slave, and I am a writer. I must deal with both.''

Christianity has operated with an unmitigated arrogance and cruelty — necessarily, since a religion ordinarily imposes on those who have discovered the true faith the spiritual duty of liberating the infidels.

''I had to deal with what hurt me most. I had to deal, above all, with my father. He was my model. I learned a lot from him. Nobody's ever frightened me since.''

He died in the arms of his long time friend, literary partner and assistant Cynthia Packard.

SUBJECT

James A. Baldwin

lets explore

Rage is a strong word. Rage is counterproductive.

SUBJECT...

James Baldwin Greatest American Writer of the 20th Century

''The paradox of education is precisely this—that as one begins to become conscious one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated.''

James A. Baldwin

lets explore

Saturday, December 19th 2015 at 6:41PM
robert powell | delete

*******THAT is my writing

but steveAdam, selfProfessed 'whiteMan' wants to ADD falsely to my words of EDUCATION for hisRage?

Leave BIA, an African American Family Site,

I am in Rage of your Stereotypically Misconceived..counterproductive...racistlyIgnorant Commentary......

Let's explore.

"If injustice does not fill you with rage, then perhaps you should ask yourself why."

Define injustice, Robert

/*
I certainly do agree with the analogy of Brother James' place in the literary halls of forever as well as his pro-active participation in the 'Civil Rights Movement.' His personal issues do reflect the hurt and rage of many as we continue to pull ourselves out of this quagmire of injustice, mis-education, blindness, and oppression...

Oh yes, there certainly is a most profound level of RAGE to be had!
*/

SUBJECT...

James Baldwin Greatest American Writer of the 20th Century

Thank You Dr. Boulware for that great perspective........on the comments of James A. Baldwin

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but our BIA, 'whiteMan' steveAdam asks.....

"....Define injustice, Robert...."

Monday, December 21st 2015 at 3:43PM
Steve Williams | delete | block member

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James Baldwin....... author of that comment....wrote about the injustice of racism and gives the readers the sense of...... "effect racism has on the psyche of people, both black and white. ...

The world changes according to the way people see it, and if you alter, even by a millimeter, the way ... people look at reality, then you can change it."

THEN in.......James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son

“It began to seem that one would have to hold in the mind forever two ideas which seemed to be in opposition.

The first idea was acceptance, the acceptance, totally without rancor, of life as it is, and men as they are: in the light of this idea, it goes without saying that injustice is a commonplace.

But this did not mean that one could be complacent, for the second idea was of equal power: that one must never, in one's own life, accept these injustices as commonplace but must fight them with all one's strength.

This fight begins, however, in the heart and it now had been laid to my charge to keep my own heart free of hatred and despair. ........”

Thank you Robert, I will start there.

yes steveAdam.......Lets Explore......and thinking of YOU

.....Going to Meet the Man

“The sons of the masters were roaming the world, looking for arms to hold them. And the arms that might have held them--could not forgive.”

“After departure, only invisible things are left, perhaps the life of the world is held together by invisible chains of memory and loss and love. So many things, so many people, depart! And we can only repossess them in our minds.”

......James A. Baldwin

Absolutely, The Fire Next Time was indeed a Masterpiece!!

Thank you agnes.....To Read is to know James Baldwin

Notes of a Native Son, Go Tell It on the Mountain, Just Above My Head ,Blues for Mister Charlie ,If Beale Street Could Talk, Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone, One Day When I Was Lost,Nobody Knows My Name, The Evidence of Things Not Seen....etc.......etal ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

BACK to The Fire Next Time.....

“The American Negro has the great advantage of having never believed the collection of myths to which white Americans cling:

that their ancestors were all freedom-loving heroes,
that they were born in the greatest country the world has ever seen, or
that Americans are invincible in battle and wise in peace,
that Americans have always dealt honorably with Mexicans and Indians and all other neighbors or inferiors,
that American men are the world's most direct and virile,
that American women are pure.

Negroes know far more about white Americans than that; it can almost be said, in fact, that they know about white Americans what parents—or, anyway, mothers—know about their children, and that they very often regard white Americans that way.

And perhaps this attitude, held in spite of what they know and have endured, helps to explain why Negroes, on the whole, and until lately, have allowed themselves to feel so little hatred. The tendency has really been, insofar as this was possible, to dismiss white people as the slightly mad victims of their own brainwashing.”

¯ James Baldwin

Your crown has been bought and paid for. All you must do is put it on.

Baldwin’s struggle to expose the illusory nature of the white Christian god while continuing to embrace the vivacious black culture so deeply informed by its misguided pursuit of that god.

...these churches are absolutely meaningless and almost blasphemous…more social club than spiritual institution…the Christian church in this country has never, as far as I know, been Christian.


- James Baldwin

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"...these churches are absolutely meaningless and almost blasphemous…more social club than spiritual institution…the Christian church in this country has never, as far as I know, been Christian."

I would most certainly agree and concur with that profoundly bold and true statement.
*/

“Whatever goes up must come down.” And here we are, at the center of the arc, trapped in the gaudiest, most valuable, and most improbable water wheel the world has ever seen. Everything now, we must assume, is in our hands; we have no right to assume otherwise. If we—and now I mean the relatively conscious whites and the relatively conscious blacks, who must, like lovers, insist on, or create, the consciousness of the others—do not falter in our duty now,

we may be able, handful that we are, to end the racial nightmare, and achieve our country, and change the history of the world.

If we do not now dare everything, the fulfillment of that prophecy, re-created from the Bible in song by a slave, is upon us:

God gave Noah the rainbow sign, No more water, the fire next time! ♦

- James Baldwin

“Words like freedom, justice, democracy are not common concepts; on the contrary, they are rare. People are not born knowing what these are. It takes enormous and, above all, individual effort to arrive at the respect for other people that these words imply.”


¯James Baldwin

Democracy is one of the biggest frauds ever perpetrated.

James Baldwin

“Democracy should not mean the leveling of everyone to the lowest common denominator. It should mean the possibility of everyone being able to raise himself to a certain level of excellence.”

----- His fierce belief in the promise of freedom and equality that are fundamental to democratic life with an equally forceful conviction that Americans will not begin to realize those promises until we come to terms with the long story of slavery, segregation, native genocide, and empire of which we are ALL a part.

"I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.

This innocent country set you down in a ghetto in which, in fact, it intended that you should perish… You were born into a society which spelled out with brutal clarity, and in as many ways as possible, that you were a worthless human being. You were not expected to aspire to excellence: you were expected to make peace with mediocrity."


James A. Baldwin

/*
Hear, Hear! Brother Imam Robert Powell!

"SANKOFA the MAAFA!"

In Love and Peace,

'G'
*/

But the state of Israel was not created for the salvation of the Jews; it was created for the salvation of the Western interests. This is what is becoming clear (I must say that it was always clear to me). The Palestinians have been paying for the British colonial policy of "divide and rule" and for Europe's guilty Christian conscience for more than thirty years.

Finally: there is absolutely--repeat: absolutely--no hope of establishing peace in what Europe so arrogantly calls the Middle East (how in the world would Europe know? having so dismally failed to find a passage to India) without dealing with the Palestinians. The collapse of the Shah of Iran not only revealed the depth of the pious Carter's concern for "human rights," it also revealed who supplied oil to Israel, and to whom Israel supplied arms. It happened to be, to spell it out, white South Africa.

James A. Baldwin

James Baldwin wrote

"Jews and Palestinians know of broken promises."

........ the state of Israel was not created for the salvation of the Jews; it was created for the salvation of the Western interests. This is what is becoming clear (I must say that it was always clear to me).

The Palestinians have been paying for the British colonial policy of "divide and rule" and for Europe's guilty Christian conscience for more than thirty years.

Finally:

there is absolutely--repeat: absolutely--no hope of establishing peace in what Europe so arrogantly calls the Middle East (how in the world would Europe know? having so dismally failed to find a passage to India) without dealing with the Palestinians.

James Baldwin in his essay “Journey to Atlanta”

---------- Influenced February 10, 2016.....New York Times Pulitzer Prize winning WRITER

Charles M. Blow

"....But then I am reminded that the idea that black folks are infantile and must be told what to do and what to think is not confined by ideological barriers. The ideological difference is that one side prefers punishment and the other pity, and neither is a thing in which most black folks delight......"

******************************the 2016 Comments that influenced the Great 21st Century Writer Charles Blow

“Our people” have functioned in this country for nearly a century as political weapons, the trump card up the enemies’ sleeve; anything promised Negroes at election time is also a threat leveled at the opposition; in the struggle for mastery the Negro is the pawn.

“Of all Americans, Negroes distrust politicians most, or, more accurately, they have been best trained to expect nothing from them; more than other Americans, they are always aware of the enormous gap between election promises and their daily lives. It is true that the promises excite them, but this is not because they are taken as proof of good intentions.

They are the proof of something more concrete than intentions: that the Negro situation is not static, that changes have occurred, and are occurring and will occur — this, in spite of the daily, dead-end monotony. It is this daily, dead-end monotony, though, as well as the wise desire not to be betrayed by too much hoping, which causes them to look on politicians with such an extraordinarily disenchanted eye.

This fatalistic indifference is something that drives the optimistic American liberal quite mad; he is prone, in his more exasperated moments, to refer to Negroes as political children, an appellation not entirely just.

Negro liberals, being consulted, assure us that this is something that will disappear with “education,” a vast, all-purpose term, conjuring up visions of sunlit housing projects, stacks of copybooks and a race of well-soaped, dark-skinned people who never slur their R’s. Actually, this is not so much political irresponsibility as the product of experience, experience which no amount of education can quite efface.“

James A. Baldwin

In times like these....when I have to listen to so CALLED 'whiteBlack'leaders'.

...I guess I like to read and listen to Leaders that have an understanding of American Life.......

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'I am what time, circumstance, history, have made of me...but I am also, much more than that. So are we all."

James A. Baldwin

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...James Baldwin on Police........In “Report from Occupied Territory,” Baldwin writes

the police are simply the hired enemies of this population. They are present to keep the Negro

in his place and to protect white business interests.....

They are, moreover—even in a country which makes the very grave error of equating ignorance

with simplicity—quite stunningly ignorant; since they know they are hated, they are always afraid.

One cannot possibly arrive at a more surefire formula for cruelty......

.....police-generated crime statistics are notoriously unreliable. Police departments can suppress

certain crimes by reclassifying them, usually by down-grading them to something less serious..

....crime statistics present a chicken-and-egg problem.

To a large degree, they reflect police activity than actually existing crime.

SUBJECT...

James Baldwin Greatest American Writer of the 20th Century

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Why Mr. Baldwin LEFT America at height of intellectual successes.......

.....Christianity in 1940s America was Jim Crow and Mass Incarceration

A little of his Life that he SHARED as LEAVING....

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......Baldwin followed his stepfather's shadow into the religious life.

However, he became dissatisfied with the ministry, considering it hypocritical and racist,

and ultimately left the church despite his father's expectation that he should become a preacher.

The difficulties in his life, including his stepfather's abuse, led Baldwin to seek solace in religion.

At the age of 14 he attended meetings of the Pentecostal Church and, during a euphoric meeting,

he converted and became a junior minister.

....at the Fireside Pentecostal Assembly, he was drawing larger crowds than his stepfather had done..

At 17, however, Baldwin came to view Christianity as based on false premises and later regarded his

time in the pulpit as a way of overcoming his personal crises of gender identity...

....Baldwin visited Elijah Muhammad, leader of the Nation of Islam, who inquired about Baldwin's religion.

He answered, "I left the church 20 years ago and haven't joined anything since." Elijah asked,

"And what are you now?" Baldwin explained, "Now? Nothing. I'm a writer. I like doing things alone.."

SUBJECT...

James Baldwin Greatest American Writer of the 20th Century

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As we American Families begin the countdown to Iconic Human Rights Leaders and American History

..Let us remember this History of GREAT American Literature and his "Fire Next Time"...

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Ta-Nehisi Coates

--I may soon include him in my Literary halls of fame..to fill the 2022 "intellectual void" in Culture

AS

By now, the designation of The Atlantic’s Ta-Nehisi Coates as heir to — or the “next,” or “today’s”

— James Baldwin feels inevitable: Coates himself, in what amounted to an origin story for his new book,

Between the World and Me, described rereading Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time

and calling his editor to ask whether anyone dared to write that way anymore.

--Toni Morrison had anointed the writer..having filled the "intellectual void" left behind by Baldwin.

NEVER cared for purple toniToniToni........

....BUT this is Nice......

— “We are beautiful people/with african imagination/full of masks and dances and swelling chants

/ with african eyes, and noses, and arms, / though we sprawl in grey chains in a place / full of winters,

/ when what we want is sun”

— are direct ancestors to lines like these, from Coates’s description of the Yard at Howard:

“There were the scions of Nigerian aristocrats in their business suits giving dap to bald-

headed Qs in purple windbreakers and tan Timbs. There were the high-yellow progeny of

AME preachers debating the clerics of Ausar-Set.

There were California girls turned Muslim, born anew, in hijab and long skirt......"

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The prose and poets of 1999--->2021 were the gangster/rappers/rapers of Decency

..Let us MARVEL our youth 2022 with a revitalization of the History of Intellectual Greatness

/*

"The History, Scholarship and Science of the AfricanAsian male/female FROM slaverAmericana 1492- 1864(1964)

There was GENERATIONAL rape of male/femaleAfricanAsians by europeanMale/Female......AND no Family Sanctioning for the African Asian Slave...maleORfemale.........did cause Mental and Physical DYSFUNCTION

Toward the End of Mr. James A. Baldwin's life.....he wrote....................

''Only white Americans can consider ..........,'' he said. ''Once I found myself on the other side of the ocean, I could see where I came from very clearly, and I could see that I carried myself, which is my home, with me. You can never escape that.

I am the grandson of a slave, and I am a writer. I must deal with both.''

Christianity has operated with an unmitigated arrogance and cruelty — necessarily, since a religion ordinarily imposes on those who have discovered the true faith the spiritual duty of liberating the infidels!"

...AMEN!

"G"

*/

I again thank you for a scholarly writing....Dr. Gregory Boulware

..you are a published author with unique Subject matter...thanks for responding on my 'attempt'

I have tried with my blogs on Writing Greatness of 20-21st century to highlight the APEX of

African American Art and Culture...baldwin, hughes, wright, ellison, hurston etal....

..My writing style tries to incorporate those Authors with a spice of eeCummings..

Thanks for the enlighting writing of Dr. Gregory Boulware also

/*

Many Thanks My Brother! I feel that you have done a masterful job at your published offerings to mankind!

Thank You Mualim Robert Powell! ...Keep em coming!

In Peace & Blessings,

"G"

*/

*Mualim“ Interesting!

/*

Greetings My Good Brother "Pastor Ron Gray!"

I've failed to state greetings of "Happy New Year" to You and Our Brother "Mualim / Teacher - Brother Robert Powell!"

May 'Allah,' 'Yah,' 'Jehovah,' "The Most High!" ('Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh, Elohim') Grant Peace and Blessings on Us, One and All!

"G"

*/