About this title: Rufus, a black artist, falls in love with a white woman, but becomes enraged by the world's response to their affair, eventually driving his beloved mad and committing suicide himself. The title refers to exile, racism, and sexual love.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Dell
Date Published: 1963-06-01
Description: Good. MMPB. CLEAN AND SOLID. VERY, VERY SLIGHT SPINE TILT. NORMAL READING WEAR. SPINE CREASES. SMALL CHUNK OUT OF TOP FRONT COVER. SMALL BOTTOM TEAR TO FRONT COVER. Items may or may not have the same cover art as displayed for this item on this site. If you need a specific cover please inquire first. Vinyl is visually graded according to Goldmine. Because of our volume we just don't have time to play test every album, however we would gladly play test any album and it's often a great idea to ... read more
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: A Dell Book
Description: Fair. No Jacket. First Several Pages Missing/First Page Is Beginning Of Chapter One, Corners/Edges Bumped, Spine Creased/Slanted, Text Is Unmarked, Good Reading Copy. read more
Description: Good. 0440302005 Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
Description: Good. Book shows minor use. Cover and Binding have minimal wear and the pages have only minimal creases. A tradition of southern quality and service. All books guaranteed at the Atlanta Book Company. read more
Edition: Third Printing, Dec. 1971
Binding: Mass-market paperback
Publisher: Dell, New York
Date Published: 1971
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Interior very good, stiff and unmarked. Cover worn/separating at spine ends. 1 1/2 in tear on front cover. 366 p. 18 cm. read more
Description: Fair. 0679744711 NOTE PLEASE READ BEFORE PURCHASE! ! MUCH Earlier smaller reading copy only paperback same content exactly-Aside from newer introduction/afterward, the original text has never changed, OLDER Used Condition with cover discoloration, though book is holding together well for it's age, and has tons of age tan. Different cover, No writing or Highlighting, some spine creases, sold for content. read more
Binding: Mass-market paperback
Publisher: Laurel Press
Date Published: 1985
ISBN-13:9780440302001ISBN:0440302005
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Good copy. Binding is tight, pages are clean. Cover is nice with minor edgewear and some creasing to spine. Mass market (rack) paperback. Glued binding. Audience: General/trade. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Dial Books, N. Y.
Date Published: 1962
Description: Cover Art. Good in Fair jacket. Hard Back. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. X-Library with normal flaws.........The hard cover and the jacket has shelf wear...The jacket has a price clip and moisture stain.....Yellowing pages...............We are very careful when we list our books, but sometimes something minor may get by.. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Dell Publishing
Date Published: 1968
Description: Good. -16th Printing--366 pgs. Interior-Nice overall condition. The paperback cover has only light signs of use. -Publish Place: New York-Size: 12mo-over 6¾"-7¾" tall. read more
"The first time I read this book, I was living in a foreign country and speaking another language. I thought it was an extraordinary book. Then, I moved to the US and while in graduate school in NYC, I read it again, this second reading became a revelation and a tale of the several Americas here in the US. James Baldwin is still the most relevant African-American author of the discourse about sexual identity in America today."
"Wow. Just... wow. Kind of weird-my reaction is not declare Another Country a new favorite, I just didn't love it in that way. And yet, and yet, it penetrated deeply, perhaps more deeply than some books I do consider my favorite...
Perhaps this has to do with how perplexing Baldwin is as an author-it takes a while, almost too much effort to get into the story, and then suddenly, unexpectedly you're in an ever-tightening vice, not sure how the hell Baldwin got you there before you even managed to notice. He certainly has a way with words, beautiful, almost aggressively lyrical without ever being showy; but what his words do have is weight, an almost unbearable density that in some passages seem to weigh so heavily upon the skin, as if their sole purpose is to rip to shreds any layers of resistance, pick apart any and every last defense...
Really, I suppose that's as good a description as any of what Baldwin does to his characters; he flays them alive so their intangible insides-their hopes, fears, secrets, contradictions, prejudices, dreams-are splayed unceremoniously upon dirty Greenwich Village sidewalks and greasy tables in the smoky corners of dive bars for each other to see, to gawk at, to pick ruthlessly at, to take up and wield like weapons to destroy each other, to bind each other closer than ever before...
And to take it one step further-the title kind of demands as much-the same could be said about Baldwin's general examination of America: mercilessly yet lovingly (the oh-so-thin line separating love from hate is a reoccurring preoccupation throughout the book) ripping the American psyche apart. Granted, his focus on a very particular group, mid-to-late 50's Greenwich Village, certainly one of the most socially progressive enclaves in society at that time. But that's almost what makes Baldwin's exposé so very painful-he's unearthing and then brutally exposing the most hidden prejudices of the particular kind (regarding race, gender, class, sexuality) that liberals and artistic types like to think they've managed to exorcise and escape from. Baldwin's indictment of white liberal guilt can be particularly agonizing...
Kind of hopeless (the constant refrain at our first bookclub discussion: "it's amazing how so little has changed..."), but oh, so very necessary. Anybody who claims we live in a post-racial, post-anything era here in America needs to be promptly slapped upside the head with this book.
"Perhaps such secrets, the secrets of everyone, were only expressed when the person laboriously dragged them into the light of the world, imposed them on the world, and made them a part of the world's experience. Without this effort, the secret place was merely a dungeon in which the person perished; without this effort, indeed, the entire world would be an uninhabitable darkness; and she saw, with a dreadful reluctance, why this effort was so rare.""
"This is the best American novel I've read in years. Race, class, gender, and sexual orientation are examined through the prism of sexual politics among a group of writer/musician friends in Greenwich Village circa 1956 (I guessed the date based on an allusion to Doris Day's "Love Me Or Leave Me"). Everyone should read this book. As always happens in differing approaches to race/class relations, everyone is right in what they say, even when they contradict each other. There are no right answers, not even just trying to love everyone unconditionally. This novel contains some of the most insightful passages regarding the process of becoming a practicing homosexual. It also contains the fire of rage about race that with my fluid personality became too infectious. I've been dealing with a lot of my own identity issues in the past year. The final chapter was one of the most beautiful I have encountered in years. I re-read it and cried. It was filled with hope for a minor character, but I had difficulty feeling that hope after everything that had come before. This is a staggering work. However, don't read it if you are currently having relationship problems, as there are many arguments in the book that will worm their way into your own arguments in real life."
"Here are thoughts I wrote down when I first read this:
"About 100 pages left on the James Baldwin.. all this reading about love and sex has got me in a damn weird mood. I'm thinking, first of all, that I have never connected with anyone in the way that he's describing..in the sense of feeling somebody's moods as they speak, or noting when atmosphere changes with a group of people. Or maybe I do, but the terms are so thoroughly modern that it's just incomparable."
"Finished Another Country. Painful and illuminating."
"Despite the fact that his character dies quite early in the narrative, I was really struck by the way Rufus haunts the entire book in Another Country. Each of the other characters thinks that they have a handle on his identity-his reason for acting the way he did, whether that was his alcoholism (although everyone seems like an alcoholic in this book), his violence toward Leona, his act of suicide-but I still couldn't shake the feeling that nobody got it. I think that Baldwin, intentionally or not, writes in such a way that we have to question everyone's motives when they attempt to encompass Rufus, even his own sister. This skepticism that the reader must maintain through the reading doesn't necessarily invalidate the "readings" of any of the characters; Ida's analysis of race relations is no less potent or accurate, but I think we must still continue with the sense that it was not only Rufus' blackness that caused him to eventually kill himself. Indeed, she rejects parts of his sexual identity when Vivaldo attempts to tell her about Rufus' relationship with Eric.""
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