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  • James Baldwin and Toni Morrison: Comparative Critical and Theoretical Essays
  • Rachel Lister (bio)
James Baldwin and Toni Morrison: Comparative Critical and Theoretical Essays. 2006. Revised Edition. Ed. Lovalerie King and Lynn Orilla Scott. New York: Palgrave, 2009. 352 pages. $80.00 cloth; $28.00 paper.

After the death of James Baldwin in 1987, Toni Morrison paid tribute to his voice and vision. Her eulogy takes the form of a direct address to Baldwin, but it reads as part of an ongoing dialogue in a relationship where the exchange of language is paramount. While this dialogue has not gone unnoticed by critics, the most detailed comparative readings of these two writers have appeared usually within the confines of essays and articles. In James Baldwin and Toni Morrison: Comparative Critical and Theoretical Essays, the first book-length study of this literary dialogue, Lovalerie King and Lynn Orilla Scott offer an unprecedented range of approaches and lines of inquiry, making it essential reading for scholars.

In the introduction to this 2009 revised edition of the 2006 publication, King sets the tone for the collection. She immediately emphasizes the "reciprocal" nature of this "literary relationship." While some of the essays in this collection consider work by Baldwin that predates Morrison's first novel, the readings sustain King's assertion that "the literary influence was not a one-way street" (5). As a whole, the collection aims to reach beyond the frameworks that have shaped critical approaches to both writers in the past; while Baldwin has been viewed within the immediate "context of 'protest'" or as a "progenitor of black, gay writing," Morrison has been read first and foremost as a black woman writer or as a novelist engaged in "postmodernist and/or poststructuralist modes of inquiry." King brings us up to date in her introduction, alerting us to the work of twenty-first-century scholars that recognizes both writers' "transnational significance" (1).

The scope of this collection is impressive, covering novels, short stories, works of nonfiction, and, in the case of Baldwin, poetry and drama. D. Quentin Miller considers various incarnations of the Stagger Lee figure in Morrison's Song of Solomon(1977) and three texts by Baldwin: a poem, a play, and a novel. Of Morrison's novels, Jazz(1992) and Beloved(1987) receive the most attention. Four essays focus primarily on Beloved, Morrison's most analyzed text, and engagement with this novel continues across the collection. There are no essays on Sula(1974), Tar Baby(1981), or [End Page 196] Love(2003). Paradise(1999) features prominently in only one essay: Keith Byerman's comparison of preacher figures in the works of both writers.

The collection is organized to form a series of dialogues on particular genres, texts, or themes. One gains a sense of a developing "conversation" between Baldwin and Morrison on a range of subjects, from the functions of art to the politics of race, gender, and sexuality (4). Repeatedly, the readings testify to the importance of love in the work of both writers; in her comparison of their revisionist principles, Michelle H. Phillips identifies "authentic and productive love" as the "foundation for change" driving both writers' projects (79).

Some of the essays take shared thematic concerns as their starting point for conceptual readings, while others point to a direct exchange of ideas between the writers. The broader readings do not compromise on textual detail, however, offering fruitful comparisons between specific moments, settings, and images. In her wide-ranging reading of bebop and race in Jazzand Baldwin's Another Country(1962), Keren Omry hears "echoes" of Dorcas's epiphany in the "haunting" cadences of Baldwin's saxophonist (27). Carol E. Henderson explores corporeality and spirituality in Belovedand Baldwin's Go Tell It on the Mountain(1953), finding parallels between the functions of "the Clearing" and "the threshing floor" (151).

Readings of texts that have received less critical attention are particularly welcome. Trudier Harris offers an incisive comparison of "Recitatif," Morrison's only short story to date, with Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues." The collection also features two readings of the nonfiction of Baldwin and Morrison. Richard Schur examines how both writers use the essay form to acknowledge...

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