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A review by tenten
Going to Meet the Man by James Baldwin
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
many thoughts. i had to let them marinate for a bit. obviously a five star read cus this is Baldwin but i was quite blown away. i've read "Sonny's Blues" before and it was amazing but i never got around to reading more short stories by him.
first thing: he is so good at writing homoeroticism and repressed gay sadness. sheesh. "The Outing" was so good and honestly i didn't expect the gayness so it was a pleasant surprise. with that one and "The Rockpile," i believe Baldwin drew from his own childhood and his strained relationship with his father (like Johnny, he was the eldest son, from his mom's previous 'days in sin' and his father had some resentment towards him for that) so the emotions in those two really felt real.
second thing: there were passages in this book that legit made me think, "why do people even still write about Black-white race relations in the US? everything that could be said has already been said by Baldwin or Morrison." and i know that sounds mean but like. truly. a lot of writing about race in the US that has come out in the past, like, 15 years just feels elementary to me because a lot of it has already been said and better. sorry ðŸ˜
between "Come out the Wilderness" and If Beale Street Could Talk, his representation of women doesn't WOW me so far. it's not bad but it's not perfect. "write what you know" was definitely Baldwin's strong suit...though Going to Meet the Man, which is in the perspective of a racist white deputy sheriff during the Civil Rights movement, was really powerful, so it really just might be that his women needed work. with the exception of the wife in "Going to Meet the Man," they're all quite neurotic and their interior lives are almost exclusively taken up by the men in their lives.
fave stories:
- The Outing
- The Man Child
- Sonny's Blues
- This Morning, This Evening, So Soon
truly always itching to read more from him!
first thing: he is so good at writing homoeroticism and repressed gay sadness. sheesh. "The Outing" was so good and honestly i didn't expect the gayness so it was a pleasant surprise. with that one and "The Rockpile," i believe Baldwin drew from his own childhood and his strained relationship with his father (like Johnny, he was the eldest son, from his mom's previous 'days in sin' and his father had some resentment towards him for that) so the emotions in those two really felt real.
second thing: there were passages in this book that legit made me think, "why do people even still write about Black-white race relations in the US? everything that could be said has already been said by Baldwin or Morrison." and i know that sounds mean but like. truly. a lot of writing about race in the US that has come out in the past, like, 15 years just feels elementary to me because a lot of it has already been said and better. sorry ðŸ˜
between "Come out the Wilderness" and If Beale Street Could Talk, his representation of women doesn't WOW me so far. it's not bad but it's not perfect. "write what you know" was definitely Baldwin's strong suit...though Going to Meet the Man, which is in the perspective of a racist white deputy sheriff during the Civil Rights movement, was really powerful, so it really just might be that his women needed work. with the exception of the wife in "Going to Meet the Man," they're all quite neurotic and their interior lives are almost exclusively taken up by the men in their lives.
fave stories:
- The Outing
- The Man Child
- Sonny's Blues
- This Morning, This Evening, So Soon
truly always itching to read more from him!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Hate crime, and Racism