The Evidence of Things Not Seen: Reissued Edition

James Baldwin

Jan 2023 · Sold by Henry Holt and Company

About this ebook

Over twenty-two months in 1979 and 1981 nearly two dozen children were unspeakably murdered in Atlanta despite national attention and outcry; they were all Black. James Baldwin investigated these murders, the Black administration in Atlanta, and Wayne Williams, the Black man tried for the crimes. Because there was only evidence to convict Williams for the murders of two men, the children's cases were closed, offering no justice to the families or the country. Baldwin's incisive analysis implicates the failures of integration as the guilt party, arguing, "There could be no more devastating proof of this assault than the slaughter of the children."

As Stacey Abrams writes in her foreword, "The humanity of black children, of black men and women, of black lives, has ever been a conundrum for America. Forty years on, Baldwin's writing reminds us that we have never resolved the core query: Do black lives matter? Unequivocally, the moral answer is yes, but James Baldwin refuses such rhetorical comfort." In this, his last book, by excavating American race relations Baldwin exposes the hard-to-face ingrained issues and demands that we all reckon with them.

About the author

James Baldwin’s celebrated works of fiction include Go Tell It on the Mountain, Giovanni’s Room, Another Country, Tell Me How Long the Train’s Been Gone, If Beale Street Could Talk, Just Above My Head, and the short story collection Going to Meet the Man. He was also the author of a book of poetry, Jimmy’s Blues; two dramatic works, Blues for Mister Charlie and The Amen Corner; and many works of nonfiction, including Nobody Knows My Name, The Fire Next Time, and Notes of a Native Son. Born in Harlem in 1924, he lived for many years in France, where he died in 1987.