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Jared Handler English 101 Bypassing the Truth About Reality Often authors in literature tend to avoid situations in everyday life which portray controversial issues. Many authors avoid the reality and truth about what is really taking place in the world, because its frightening for many people to cope with the truth. Because in most cases, the truth hurts. In the essays Notes of a Native Son and Here be Dragons Baldwin allows the reader the opportunity to actually view what problems society is facing among its people. Baldwins views are influenced by how, he himself was depicted on for being a black homosexual. In his writings, he displays how people of normal status view others who are different, in a freakish and negative way.
He points out how people are unwilling to make an attempt to know a person for who they are, because they are too quick to judge one on their external appearance and obvious In the essay Notes of a Native Son, Baldwin shows how his father represents an extremely stubborn man, set in his ways, unwilling to change. He could be chilling in the pulpit and indescribably cruel in his personal life and he was certainly the most bitter man I have ever met (56). Its obvious to me how Baldwins father was definitely a mean man, full of hatred and animosity towards everyone, especially whites. His blackness had been the cause of much humiliation in his life, which fixed cynical boundaries. In my minds eye I could see him, sitting at the window, locked up in his terrors; hating and fearing every living soul including his children who had betrayed him, too, by reaching toward the world who had despised him (58). Hatred, which could destroy so much, never failed to destroy the man who hated and this was an immutable law (71).
And in Baldwins fathers case it never failed to destroy him either. Also in Notes of a Native Son, Baldwin describes his own experience with this dread, chronic disease of the victim. There is not a Negro alive who does not have this range in his blood-one has the choice, merely, of living with it consciously or surrendering to it. This is a message to society that if one is conscious of the disease, or hatred, then they have the power to change for the better. He had made this choice for himself when in 1942, working in New Jersey at age 18, he hurled a water pitcher at a waitress who had refused to serve him. He had realized from that point on, that his life was in danger, that is why he felt it in his own heart.
It now had been laid to my charge to keep my own heart free of hatred and despair (71). This intimation made my heart heavy and, now that my father was irrecoverable, I wished that he had been beside me so that I could have searched his face for the answers which only the future would give me In the essay Here be Dragons, Baldwins major point to the reader was to show how everyone in society was androgynous. At first, I was afraid to admit to myself that was an androgynous human being. And tried to avoid all possible traits and characteristics that I might share with a female. I realized, in English class, when everyone was reading their free writing works that I wouldnt be considered different and unusual if I make note of my feminine characteristics. The ability to realize that I was androgynous in many ways was the coming to grips with reality and truth, that many tend to avoid.
Baldwin points out that there is a man in every woman and a woman in every man. The hermaphrodite, therefore, may make his / her in side shows or brothels, whereas the merely androgynous are running banks or filling stations or maternity wards, churches, armies or countries (278). Hermaphrodites and Androgynous people are very similar and yet looked upon as being one freakish, and the other normal. Baldwin points out The American ideal, then, of sexuality appears to be rooted in the American ideal of masculinity (279). This ideal has created cowboys and Indians, good guys and bad guys, punks and studs, tough guys and softies, butch and faggot, black and white (279). This means that if the American boy didnt grow up into the ideal of masculinity, then he would be looked at as abnormal and freakish.
The human imagination Baldwin writes, is perpetually required to examine, control, and redefine reality, of which we must assume ourselves to be the center and the key. Nature and revelation are perpetually challenging each other; this relentless tension is one of the keys to human history and to what is known as the human condition (279). Freaks are called freaks and are treated as they are treated - into the main, abominably - because they are human beings who cause to echo, deep within us, our most profound terrors and desires (289). People do not want to judge a person by who they are, but by what they look like.
Because, what is normal for that freak, is unfortunately considered sacrilegious to American culture and In the movie The Price of the Ticket an autobiography about James Baldwin it helps people who viewed it, to really comprehend the type of person James Baldwin was. He tried to make a connection between the books he read and the life he lived. He was able to gain information and different outlooks about society which he could relate to in his strong opinions and views. He claims writing was my great conciliation. Baldwin used Paris and France to enable him to discover his identity, which was freedom to do whatever his heart desires. I love a few and a few woman, and a few people love me, thats what saved my life.
James brother David says James was a young man who left and an old man who returned. And it had nothing to do with age. Which means the amount of knowledge and smarts which he must have gained from his experiences in In James Baldwins autobiographical notes it is revealed how one person wants so much to make change in American society. Baldwins early exposure to evangelism had religious language exerted a lasting influence on his prose, especially on his essays with their powerful and moving cadences, their remarkable balance of reason and passion, and their tone of moral urgency (459).
Baldwins essays should be used as models for people in American society, to help them realize what actually is going on. Again and again we find within Baldwins early work a steady movement back and forth between the carefully reasoned analysis of cultural and social phenomena and the poignant assertion of Baldwins identity as a black, as a homosexual, and as an artist in the light of the social conditions he depicts (459). This makes his opinions on issues a lot stronger then anyone else, coming from such a background. Baldwin predicted a future of racial violence in America unless its people began the long and arduous task of social and political transformation (461).
This means one has to be conscious of the problems society faces and be willing to make an attempt to change for the better. Its extremely transparent to people after reading Baldwins works of literature that the main objective of his writings was to make the reader come to grips with the reality about what main problems society faces in the world. To enable the reader to foresee what the future withholds if reality, such as racism, is recognized rather then overlooked. Its important to Baldwin to educate the reader, and make him accustomed to the prejudices which society unfortunately labels people with.
Baldwin would not classify himself as being a black or gay writer. He was about being open to love, no matter what color or gender a person was. In his writings Baldwin drastically demonstrates the necessity of recognizing our sins, not just racism and gender preferences, but our refusal to really know other humans, to accept differences, and to love. Works Cited Away, Robert. Ten on Ten. Boston: Bedford Books of St.
Martins Press, 1992. The Price of the Ticket (video) 1990 Bibliography:
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Research essay sample on Native Son James Baldwin
