The Fire Next Time

Recommended by Meira Levinson, Juliana W. and William Foss Thompson Professor of Education and Society

The book contains two essays, the first of which is a gorgeous, heart-rending, shake-you-to-the-core letter from James Baldwin to his 15-year-old nephew, “My Dungeon Shook: Letter to My Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Emancipation.” In profoundly intimate prose, it condemns not only white Americans’ racism against Black Americans, but also their/our professions of “innocence” about the existence and effects of such racism. Tragically, the book holds up as well now, more than 50 years on, as it did at its initial publication.