'These essays...live and grow in the mind' - James Campbell, "Independent". Baldwin's early essays have been described as 'an unequaled meditation on what it means to be black in America'. This rich and stimulating collection contains "Fifth Avenue, Uptown: a Letter from Harlem", polemical pieces on the tragedies inflicted by racial segregation and a poignant account of his first journey to 'the Old Country', the Southern states. Yet equally compelling are his "Notes for a Hypothetical Novel" and personal reflections on being American, on other major artists - Ingmar Bergman and Andre Gide, Norman Mailer and Richard Wright - and on the first great conference of African Writers and Artists in Paris.