Recently, I read through James Baldwin’s classic essay, “The Fire Next Time”. To be clear, this is neither a formal review nor a decisive critique. I write what comes to mind as I reflect on the ideas presented.
These are some of my thoughts:
“Know whence you came. If you know whence you came, there is really no limit to where you can go.”
There’s something radically humbling in the way Baldwin illustrates his youth. Despite being explicitly particular to the American “negro” experience of his times, the wandering between career paths amongst worries of social acceptance, feels awfully relatable.
Central to his youth, and certainly to African American communities (even today) is Christianity, and in particular, the church. A point that is made clear from start to finish is the idea that issues of racism, religious beliefs, social class—all of the above, if you will—are undeniably interconnected. Intersectionality, I think this is called.
There’s a sort of love-hate (perhaps love-hate isn’t the right term) relationship in regards to the beliefs central to the black church. If black people are destined to arrive at heaven by virtue of sustaining the trials of God (in the form of oppression by white people), then what is to happen to the white population? Do they attend heaven? Is heaven yet another black “ghetto”?
“But what was the point, the purpose, of my salvation if it did not permit me to behave with love toward others, no matter how they behaved toward me?”
An idea that I find central to the thinking of this essay is the separate but equal doctrine. Some argue, and perhaps rightly, that separate is an antonym of equal. Baldwin, I must assume, would not have particularly agreed with this. Separate and equal is surely possible, though probabilistically unlikely and practically near-impossible. The notion of “separate” harbors, by its very nature, an unequal sentiment.
“The paradox—and a fearful paradox it is—is that the American Negro can have no future anywhere, on any continent, as long as he is unwilling to accept his past.”
“unwilling to accept his past”…certainly a powerful indictment. One of the many realities of that must be faced, as cited by Baldwin, is the fact that there is no African American nation-state. One of the many precautions that must be adhered to, as argued by Baldwin, is that there can, and perhaps should, never be one.
Barring some very specific topics, I am persuaded to believe that the general proposals that the essay sets forth remain heavily relevant to the racial, social, and political affairs of America today. Works of these sort make me wonder how writers, speakers, thinkers of the past would respond to the events of today.
