Never before available, the unexpurgated last interview with James Baldwin. "I w
as not born to be what someone said I was. I was not born to be defined by someo
ne else, but by myself, and myself only." When, in the fall of 1987, the poet Qu
incy Troupe traveled to the south of France to interview James Baldwin, Baldwin'
s brother David told him to ask Baldwin about everything--Baldwin was critically
ill and David knew that this might be the writer's last chance to speak at leng
th about his life and work.
The result is one of the most eloquent and revelat
ory interviews of Baldwin's career, a conversation that ranges widely over such
topics as his childhood in Harlem, his close friendship with Miles Davis, his re
lationship with writers like Toni Morrison and Richard Wright, his years in Fran
ce, and his ever-incisive thoughts on the history of race relations and the Afri
can-American experience.
Also collected here are significant interviews from o
ther moments in Baldwin's life, including an in-depth interview conducted by Stu
ds Terkel shortly after the publication of "Nobody Knows My Name." These intervi
ews showcase, above all, Baldwin's fearlessness and integrity as a writer, think
er, and individual, as well as the profound struggles he faced along the way.
