The Fire This Time edited by Jesmyn Ward

August 2nd is the birthdate of author and activist James Baldwin.  Published on that date this year was a new collection of essays and poems edited by Jesmyn Ward:  The Fire This Time.  Subtitled “A New Generation Speaks about Race,” these writings are in part a response to Baldwin’s own 1963 work, The Fire Next Time. 

Jesmyn Ward, National Book Award winning author of Salvage the Bones, has gathered commentary from over a dozen authors, including Isabel Wilkerson and Edwidge Danticat. Ward sorted the selections into three parts (Legacy, Reckoning and Jubilee) and offers an informative introduction to explain her thinking and provide background about Baldwin.  Many of the essays refer to him and to his work for civil and gay rights; they are also contemporary – with references to Trayvon Martin, Voter ID laws, and Sandra Bland, thus continuing the important conversation about race in this country.  Ward describes the book as one “that would gather new voices in one place, in a lasting, physical form, and provide a forum for those writers to dissent, to call to account, to witness, to reckon.” 

The Fire This Time received starred reviews from Booklist and Publishers Weekly.  And Jesmyn Ward was recently interviewed on NPR.