James Baldwin was a pivotal figure of the twentieth century, an influential author, intellectual, and activist who led a celebrated public life— and whose words, image, and persona remain current in our culture today. Yet it is the private, vulnerable, and messier Baldwin—the man behind that image —who is the focus of this book. Magdalena J. Zaborowska draws on Baldwin’s archives and material legacy— from his unpublished papers to his books to his house in France—to offer a fresh look at the writer’s understated and obscured private life. She offers a fresh understanding of his life and works as seen through his close relationships and complicated private life.
Professor Zaborowska is professor and chair of the Department of American Culture and professor in the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies at the University of Michigan. She received her undergraduate degree from Warsaw University, Poland and her Ph.D., University of Oregon. She has taught and been a Distinguished Visiting Professor at several universities in the United States and abroad. She has several published works on James Baldwin including Me and My House: James Baldwin’s Last Decade in Paris and James Baldwin’s Turkish Decade: Erotics of Style. Her work can also be seen in an online exhibit devoted to Baldwin’s house in France at the National Museum of African American History and Culture / Smithsonian in Washington DC.
