1 00:00:02,366 --> 00:00:05,000 AMNA NAWAZ: This month, the legendary writer and activist James Baldwin would have turned 100 years old. 2 00:00:07,066 --> 00:00:10,866 Baldwin is best known for his novels and essays and as a moral voice addressing race, 3 00:00:12,966 --> 00:00:16,500 sexuality and the very fabric of American democracy. Nearly 40 years after his death, 4 00:00:17,666 --> 00:00:19,533 his words are more relevant than ever. 5 00:00:19,533 --> 00:00:24,066 Jeffrey Brown looks at his enduring legacy for our series Art in Action, 6 00:00:24,066 --> 00:00:29,066 exploring the intersection of art and democracy, and our ongoing Canvas coverage. 7 00:00:30,466 --> 00:00:32,433 JAMES BALDWIN, Writer: The inequality suffered by the 8 00:00:32,433 --> 00:00:36,033 American Negro population of the United States has hindered the American dream. 9 00:00:36,033 --> 00:00:41,000 JEFFREY BROWN: James Baldwin, novelist, essayist, civil rights activist, public intellectual, 10 00:00:42,900 --> 00:00:46,600 here debating William F. Buckley Jr. at the University of Cambridge in 1965. 11 00:00:48,733 --> 00:00:52,033 EDDIE GLAUDE JR., Princeton University: He's engaged in this ongoing work of self-creation, 12 00:00:52,033 --> 00:00:57,000 in this sustained reflection on the power of the American idea. 13 00:00:58,733 --> 00:01:02,800 He's bringing the full weight of his intellect to bear on this project. 14 00:01:02,800 --> 00:01:05,800 JEFFREY BROWN: Eddie Glaude Jr. is a professor of African American 15 00:01:05,800 --> 00:01:10,800 studies at Princeton University and author of the 2020 book "Begin Again: 16 00:01:12,266 --> 00:01:15,400 James Baldwin's America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own." 17 00:01:15,400 --> 00:01:18,133 EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: I think, if you read Baldwin closely, 18 00:01:18,133 --> 00:01:23,133 there is this underlying idea that we have yet to discover who we are, right, 19 00:01:25,500 --> 00:01:30,000 because the ghosts of the past in so many ways, not only blind us, but they have us by the throat. 20 00:01:31,900 --> 00:01:36,433 JEFFREY BROWN: James Arthur Baldwin was born in Harlem in 1924 and raised there 21 00:01:36,433 --> 00:01:41,433 by his mother and stepfather, a Baptist preacher. The oldest of nine children, 22 00:01:42,900 --> 00:01:46,233 he excelled in school and served as a junior minister. 23 00:01:46,233 --> 00:01:51,200 A man on the margins, Black and queer, he spent years of his life abroad, much of it in France, 24 00:01:53,133 --> 00:01:57,333 beginning at age 24. He wrote novels, including "Go Tell It on the Mountain," 25 00:01:59,333 --> 00:02:03,033 an autobiographical book about growing up in Harlem, and "Giovanni's Room" about a 26 00:02:05,166 --> 00:02:08,333 tormented love affair between two men living in Paris, and powerful essays exploring race 27 00:02:10,333 --> 00:02:14,433 and American identity, including "Notes of a Native Son" and "The Fire Next Time." 28 00:02:16,333 --> 00:02:18,433 EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: He's one of the greatest essayists we have ever produced, 29 00:02:18,433 --> 00:02:22,233 the world has ever produced I think, and his subject is us. But his vantage point, 30 00:02:24,666 --> 00:02:29,666 it's not that of a victim. His vantage point is from those who've had to bear 31 00:02:31,466 --> 00:02:36,433 the burden of America's refusal to look itself squarely in the face. 32 00:02:36,433 --> 00:02:40,866 JEFFREY BROWN: He was also a playwright and poet, an activist who marched and spoke out 33 00:02:40,866 --> 00:02:45,866 for civil rights, including on television, here on "The Dick Cavett Show" in 1969. 34 00:02:48,300 --> 00:02:51,733 JAMES BALDWIN: And the word Negro in this country really is designed, finally, to disguise the fact 35 00:02:53,666 --> 00:02:56,766 that one is talking about another man, a man like you, who wants what you want. 36 00:02:56,766 --> 00:03:00,200 And insofar as the American public wants to think there has been progress, 37 00:03:00,200 --> 00:03:05,100 they overlook one very simple thing. I don't want to be given anything 38 00:03:08,100 --> 00:03:12,566 by you. I just want you to leave me alone, so I can do it myself. 39 00:03:12,566 --> 00:03:17,566 JEFFREY BROWN: Baldwin died in 1987, but he's remained a powerful cultural presence, 40 00:03:18,800 --> 00:03:20,366 one that's only grown in the past decade. 41 00:03:20,366 --> 00:03:25,000 JAMES BALDWIN: There are days - - this is one of them -- when 42 00:03:25,000 --> 00:03:30,000 you wonder what your role is in this country and what your future is in it. 43 00:03:32,800 --> 00:03:37,466 JEFFREY BROWN: In the 2016 documentary "I Am Not Your Negro," director Raoul Peck 44 00:03:37,466 --> 00:03:40,966 drew from Baldwin's own words. As he told me then: 45 00:03:40,966 --> 00:03:45,733 RAOUL PECK, Director: He was already a classic, and he wrote those things 40, 50 46 00:03:45,733 --> 00:03:50,733 years ago. And watching the film, you think that he would have -- he wrote that in the morning, 47 00:03:52,833 --> 00:03:57,833 the morning before watching the film, because those words are so accurate, they are so prescient 48 00:04:00,733 --> 00:04:05,533 and so impactful, that you can't do it better. 49 00:04:05,533 --> 00:04:10,533 JEFFREY BROWN: In 2018, Baldwin's 1974 novel "If Beale Street Could Talk" was 50 00:04:11,733 --> 00:04:14,033 adapted by Oscar-winning director Barry Jenkins. 51 00:04:14,033 --> 00:04:19,033 BARRY JENKINS, Director: Whether I had won eight Oscars or no Oscars, it's James damn Baldwin, 52 00:04:20,800 --> 00:04:23,400 you know? It's James Baldwin. That's pressure enough, in and of itself, 53 00:04:23,400 --> 00:04:27,733 because I wanted to honor his legacy in the way that I thought it should be honored. 54 00:04:27,733 --> 00:04:32,266 JEFFREY BROWN: And now a celebration of the centennial of his birth, including an exhibition 55 00:04:32,266 --> 00:04:37,266 at the National Portrait Gallery called This Morning, This Evening, So Soon: James Baldwin 56 00:04:39,566 --> 00:04:43,066 and the Voices of Queer Resistance, which takes its name from a short story he published in 1960, 57 00:04:44,900 --> 00:04:49,633 another at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture titled Jimmy: 58 00:04:49,633 --> 00:04:54,633 Gods Black Revolutionary Mouth, presenting Baldwin's archive of personal papers. 59 00:04:57,000 --> 00:05:00,733 There's a new album by singer-songwriter and bassist Meshell Ndegeocello called No More Water: 60 00:05:02,866 --> 00:05:07,400 The Gospel of James Baldwin, and reissues of seminal works with new introductions and artwork. 61 00:05:15,533 --> 00:05:18,833 CREE MYLES, Host, "The Baldwin 100": What is the best lesson you have learned being 62 00:05:18,833 --> 00:05:22,300 in the spiritual community that you are in with James Baldwin? 63 00:05:22,300 --> 00:05:24,600 JEFFREY BROWN: Along with a podcast, 64 00:05:24,600 --> 00:05:28,700 "The Baldwin 100," in which host Cree Myles talks with contemporary writers and thinkers. 65 00:05:30,633 --> 00:05:35,066 What is his relevance today, especially when you think about younger people, 66 00:05:36,100 --> 00:05:38,400 younger readers, younger citizens? 67 00:05:38,400 --> 00:05:42,900 CREE MYLES: Despite the time that has passed, his amount of truth is still relatively radical. When 68 00:05:44,833 --> 00:05:48,200 I think about his novels and "Giovanni's Room," and we're thinking about the ways 69 00:05:50,266 --> 00:05:53,266 that he grappled with, like, sexuality, those are things were still coming to terms with. 70 00:05:54,366 --> 00:05:55,900 JEFFREY BROWN: Acclaimed Irish novelist 71 00:05:55,900 --> 00:05:58,066 Colm Toibin contributed the new book "On James Baldwin." 72 00:05:58,066 --> 00:06:01,466 COLM TOIBIN, Author, "On James Baldwin": I'm interested in him as, I suppose, 73 00:06:01,466 --> 00:06:06,466 someone who really found ways of dealing with individuality versus community, 74 00:06:08,900 --> 00:06:10,800 with being an artist in a difficult time. 75 00:06:10,800 --> 00:06:14,600 But more than anything, more than anything, he wrote well. 76 00:06:14,600 --> 00:06:18,200 JEFFREY BROWN: Toibin saw connections to his own upbringing and told us how 77 00:06:18,200 --> 00:06:21,266 Baldwin has influenced him as writer and man. 78 00:06:21,266 --> 00:06:26,266 COLM TOIBIN: It's a question of engaging with this great intelligence and with the sensuous 79 00:06:28,300 --> 00:06:31,500 intelligence, with someone sort of thinking brilliantly and glittering sort of way. 80 00:06:31,500 --> 00:06:36,500 But it is also, of course, developing strategies, which he did in relation to his family, in 81 00:06:38,566 --> 00:06:41,933 relation to Harlem, in relation to Black America, in relation to exile, in relation to attempting 82 00:06:41,933 --> 00:06:46,933 to being an artist in a time of flux, and also in a way of being a gay artist, a homosexual 83 00:06:49,066 --> 00:06:53,266 artist coming out of a world which is very conservative and very religious, and attempting 84 00:06:53,266 --> 00:06:58,266 also to build strategies around that that give you energy, rather than ones that take you down. 85 00:06:59,566 --> 00:07:01,566 JEFFREY BROWN: One deeply resonant thread through 86 00:07:01,566 --> 00:07:05,833 all the commemorations, Baldwin's focus on the fragility of democracy itself. 87 00:07:08,266 --> 00:07:11,100 EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: Baldwin's exposing the lie that is the source of the suffering, that defines this 88 00:07:13,466 --> 00:07:17,600 fragile project, it seems to me. He's committed to democracy. He's committed to America. After all, 89 00:07:19,733 --> 00:07:24,733 we are deeply American. But, by virtue of that commitment, he has to relentlessly critique it. 90 00:07:26,900 --> 00:07:30,233 JAMES BALDWIN: It comes as a great shock to discover the country, 91 00:07:30,233 --> 00:07:35,233 which is your birthplace and to which you owe your life and your identity, 92 00:07:37,000 --> 00:07:40,800 has not, in its whole system of reality, evolved any place for you. 93 00:07:42,866 --> 00:07:46,433 JEFFREY BROWN: A commitment, as Glaude puts it, to the complex experiment called America. 94 00:07:46,433 --> 00:07:49,033 For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Jeffrey Brown.