James Baldwin

Baldwin, James (1924–87), African-American novelist, essayist, and playwright much of whose work deals with racial themes. His novel Go Tell It on the Mountain (1953) was based on his Harlem adolescence, while Another Country (1962) deals with sexual and racial identity. His best-known essays are collected in Notes of a Native Son (1955) and The Fire Next Time (1963). His book, The Evidence of Things Not Seen, about the Atlanta child murders (1985) is one of his most controversial works.