pip’s Reviews > Early Novels & Stories: Go Tell It on the Mountain / Giovanni’s Room / Another Country / Going to Meet the Man > Status Update

Finished “Another Country”. I’m moving on to a collection of Baldwin’s short stories, one of which is “Sonny’s Blues” and I’m looking forward to rereading it.

“There also appeared in his face a certain fear. It was this fear which Eric sometimes despaired or conquering, in Yves, or in himself. It was the fear of making a total commitment, a vow: it was the fear of being loved” (560).

I LOVE this paragraph from Another Country (on page 519):

Her face would now be, forever, more mysterious and impenetrable than the face of any stranger. Strangers’ faces hold no secrets because the imagination does not invest them with any. But the face of a lover is an unknown precisely because it is invested with so much of oneself. It is a mystery, containing, like all mysteries, the possibility of torment.

Just finished Giovanni’s Room and god DAMN that was a hard read. Extremely well written but emotionally it was rough.

I just finished “Go Tell It on the Mountain” and it was incredible. When each characters backstory was given I was immediately invested and needed to know what happened next. Baldwin does a great job explaining each characters motivations in such a way that the reader can’t help but understand their perspective even if one doesn’t agree with their actions.