NATIVE SONS(ISBN=)

　　James Baldwin was beginning to be recognized as the most
brilliant black writer of his generation when his first book of
essays, Notes of a Native Son, established his reputation in 1955.
No one was more pleased by the book’s reception than Baldwin’s high
school friend Sol Stein. A rising New York editor, novelist, and
playwright, Stein had suggested that Baldwin do the book and coaxed
his old friend through the long and sometimes agonizing process of
putting the volume together and seeing it into print. Now, in this
fascinating new book, Sol Stein documents the story of his intense
creative partnership with Baldwin through newly uncovered letters,
photos, in*ions, and an illuminating memoir of the friendship
that resulted in one of the classics of American literature.
Included in this book are the two works they created together–the
story “Dark Runner” and the play Equal in Paris, both published
here for the first time.
　　Though a world of difference separated them–Baldwin was black and
gay, living in self-imposed exile in Europe; Stein was Jewish and
married, with a growing family to support–the two men shared the
same fundamental passion. Nothing mattered more to either of them
than telling and writing the truth, which was not always welcome.
As Stein wrote Baldwin in a long, heartfelt letter, “You are the
only friend with whom I feel comfortable about all three: heart,
head, and writing.” In this extraordinary book, Stein unfolds how
that shared passion played out in the months surrounding the
creation and publication of Baldwin’s Notes of a Native Son, in
which Baldwin’s main themes are illuminated.
　　A literary event published to honor the eightieth anniversary of
James Baldwin’s birth, Native Sons is a celebration of one of the
most fruitful and influential friendships in American
letters.
　　From the Hardcover edition.

　　For over three decades, Sol Stein edited and published some of
the leading writers of the Twentieth century, including James
Baldwin, Dylan Thomas, W. H. Auden, and Lionel Trilling. A
prize-winning playwright and the author of nine novels, as well as
nonfiction books, screenplays, and TV dramas, Stein lives in New
York.
　　Born in 1924, James Baldwin made a name for himself with his
first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain in 1953. His legendary
Notes of a Native Son appeared two years later, and he went on to
publish fiction, poetry, plays, and essays that profoundly
influenced the literature of Twentieth-century America. Baldwin
died in France in 1987.
　　From the Hardcover edition.