James Baldwin

James Baldwin, one of the most prominent figures in American literature, moved to Paris on Armistice Day, November 11,1948. He was only 24 when he became part of a group of black expat American writers that included Chester Himes, Richard Wright, whom Baldwin considered his literary mentor, and Ollie Harrington. Although he did not speak French at the time he had, however, read the classics and watched the films of Marcel Carné giving him enough information about France and the French to help him adjust. It was as an expatriate in France that helped Baldwin find his voice as an author. Baldwin, the eldest of nine children, was born in 1924 into a poor family in Harlem, New York. Yet despite the miserable quality of the public schools he attended Baldwin managed to become an excellent student and matured into a voracious reader. Spirituality, and his exposure to the Pentecostal Church, played and important role in the development of the young novelist. However, he soon became disillusioned with the church rejecting its teachings although biblical themes are plentiful in his work. And notably the religious anguish of the character John Grimes in Go Tell It On The Mountain (1953) are chiefly autobiographical. Go Tell it on the Mountain was the first novel Baldwin wrote in Paris. This book established Baldwin as one of the leading commentators on the condition of black people in the United States and from this point his novels began working at a personal level, exploring issues of identity, family, sexuality, and social injustice. Baldwin then became a literary and political star both in Paris and the United States. Baldwin’s fondness for France and the French was unlike the affection most expatriates felt for the country and its people. While many American expats fancied the ways of the French, Baldwin appreciated that the French left him completely alone. ‘’This total indifference came as a great relief and, even as a mark of respect’’ he said. ‘’There will always be a kind of love story between myself and that odd, unpredictable collection of bourgeois chauvinists who call themselves la France’’ For about twenty years Baldwin was a prominent presence on the Paris intellectual scene and spoke at many cultural events and political meetings regularly The French accepted Baldwin as one of theirs and awarded him the Legion of Honor in 1985. When he died in Saint Paul, December 1987 – the French press and TV treated him as an honorary citizen of the country he had never called home. Christiann Anderson is the co-author of Paris Reflections: Walks through African American Paris (McDonald & Woodward, 2002.) and writes a column on Living Single in Paris for The Paris Woman Journal and Cafe de la Soul (www.pariswoman.com—www.cafedelasoul.com)