Giovanni’s Room

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Giovanni’s Room is James Baldwin’s ground-breaking second novel, which established him as one of the great American writers of his time. David, a young American in 1950s Paris, is waiting for his fiancée to return from vacation in Spain. But when he meets Giovanni, a handsome Italian barman, the two men are drawn into an intense affair. After three months David’s fiancée returns and, denying his true nature, he rejects Giovanni for a ‘safe’ future as a married man. His decision eventually brings tragedy.

Filled with passion, regret and longing, this story of a fated love triangle has become a landmark of gay writing. James Baldwin caused outrage as a Black author writing about white homosexuals, yet for him the issues of race, sexuality and personal freedom were eternally intertwined.

Baldwin, James

On the Loose

Mary Flanagan on James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

To compensate for this structural flaw, I went to Athens and had the adventure I wanted to have. Then I nipped back to Rome, found a seedy pensione and holed up there until he arrived. For two days I...