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The Cross of Redemption

Uncollected Writings
by James Baldwin
The Cross of Redemption: Uncollected Writings. Pantheon. Aug. 2010. c.320p. ed. by Randall Kenan. ISBN 978-0-307-37882-8. $26.95. LIT
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"An omnigatherum" of the ideas Baldwin "revisited most often," this compilation edited by Kenan (English, Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; The Fire This Time) is intended to serve as a companion to the Library of America's James Baldwin: Collected Essays. The essays and speeches included range widely over literature, politics, and the arts, covering such diverse topics as "The Artist's Struggle for Integrity," "The Uses of the Blues," and "Blacks and Jews." There are profiles of actor Sidney Poitier and of boxers Floyd Patterson and Sonny Liston, followed by a selection of letters, some forewords and afterwords, and reviews. Among these pieces are a foreword to Black Panther leader Bobby Seale's A Lonely Rage (1978) and a letter to Angela Davis in prison, signs perhaps of Baldwin's increasing radicalization. Underlying all of these writings is Baldwin's indictment of America for its hypocritical attitude on race.
VERDICT These previously published writings, gleaned for the most part from a variety of periodical sources, have a more powerful resonance when read together in book form. A useful addition for African American scholars.
Reviewed by William Gargan, Brooklyn Coll. Lib., CUNY , Aug 01, 2010
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