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Work #1605 · Late

No Name in the Street

James Baldwin
1972 · English
Memoir-essay · African-American essayism / mid-century US political writing

Baldwin's 1972 'No Name in the Street' — late-Baldwin reflection on the close of the civil-rights era

Attribute Fingerprint

Rows where works disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid is shown.

Attribute No Name in the Street (Late)
Time · Extent Finite
Time · Ontological Status Substantival
Time · Grain Continuous
Time · Freedom Non-Deterministic
Time · Traversability Linear
Time · Dimensionality One
Time · Direction Uni-directional
Space · Extent Finite
Space · Ontological Status Substantival
Space · Curvature Flat
Space · Dimensionality Three
Space · Locality Local
Matter · Extent Finite
Matter · Ontological Status Substantival
Matter · Conservation Conserved
Matter · Dimensionality Three
Matter · Locality Local
Observer · Time Instance Single
Observer · Space Instance Single
Observer · Knowledge Extent Immediate
Observer · Knowledge Retainment Partial
Observer · Physicality Both
Observer · Agency Active
Observer · Number Plural
Observer · Metaphysical Agency Impersonal
Observer · Moral Authority Reason
Observer · Theological Method
Energy · Extent Finite
Energy · Ontological Status Substantival
Energy · Conservation Conserved
Energy · Dispersibility Irreversible
Information · Ontological Status Substantival
Information · Cosmic Conservation Conserved
Information · Personal Conservation Conserved
Information · Granularity Continuous

Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence

What each work's passages reveal about its stance on each of the six dimensions.

Time

No Name in the Street

1972 publication. Baldwin was 48, four years after the King assassination and one year after his move to St-Paul-de-Vence.

Space

No Name in the Street

St-Paul-de-Vence (composition) / American memory (subject). The geographical distance between Baldwin's residence and his subject-matter is itself thematic.

Matter

No Name in the Street

Memoir-essay (~200 pages). Form is essayistic-reflective, with autobiographical and political registers interwoven.

Observer

No Name in the Street

Late Baldwin. The observer-essayist is the established American essayist at a moment of transition from the high-civil-rights-movement-prophetic register of 'The Fire Next Time' (1963) to a more meditative, elegiac register.

Energy

No Name in the Street

Elegiac-political energies. The book combines mourning (for the murdered civil-rights leaders) with continuing political-analytical reflection.

Information

No Name in the Street

Single memoir. The personal-political integration is the book's distinctive informational structure.

Internal Tensions

Where each work's argument pulls against itself.

No Name in the Street

Late-Baldwin reflection on the close of the civil-rights era. The book has been continuously read in subsequent African-American political-philosophical scholarship; Ta-Nehisi Coates and Eddie Glaude Jr. have cited it as the principal source for Baldwin's late political consciousness.