How James Baldwin’s life & legacy can help us navigate the problems of today
effusive letter addressed to James Baldwin in September of 1961, Martin Luther King, Jr. praises Baldwin for his voice and a monumental essay collection. “I have just finished reading Nobody Knows My Name, and I simply want to thank you for it,” King writes. “Your honesty and courage in telling the truth to white Americans, even if it hurts, is most impressive.
I have been tremendously helped by reading the book, and I know that it will serve to broaden my understanding on the whole meaning of our struggle.”A post shared by @barriershistorySubscribe to Native Son’s newsletter for more news, information, and conversations about Black gay and queer everything.By the time King sent Baldwin, his elder by five years, that letter in 1961, King had already visited India to study Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violence.
He had already resigned from the pastorate at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church to focus on civil rights activism full-time. He had moved to Atlanta to lead the Southern Christian Leadership Conference efforts and take on the co-pastor role at the Ebenezer Baptist Church beside his father.
King had been arrested for participating in a sit-in at a restaurant in Atlanta and sentenced to four months in jail before John and Robert Kennedy intervened on behalf of his release.King knew much about the machinations of white racists when he wrote Baldwin.
