Jimmy's Faith

Christopher W. Hunt is Assistant Professor of Religion at Colorado College.

Preface viii Introduction 1 1 Jimmy's Queer "Threshing-Floor": Transformation and the Role of Disidentification in Baldwin's Fiction 17 2 Jimmy's Communion: Race, Peoplehood, and the Tone of (Black) Community 44 3 Jimmy's Eschaton: Hope in "the New Jerusalem" 74 4 Jimmy's "Man": The Problem of Sexism in Baldwin's Literature 102 5 Jimmy's (A)Theology: Toward a Black Agnostic Mysticism 130 Coda 149 Acknowledgments 153 Notes 157 Bibliography 213 Index 221

. . .[A] thoughtful, nuanced, and insightful examination of Baldwin at the intersection of his religious upbringing and his queerness.-- "Choice Reviews" In Jimmy's Faith, Christopher Hunt ushers us nearer the molten, challenging, and transfiguring core of Baldwin's life and art than we've been before. Touching with nuance and precision upon several of Baldwin's most crucial works across genres, these brilliantly intersectional readings do more than reveal, they redeem.---Ed Pavlic, author of Who Can Afford to Improvise? James Baldwin and Black Music, the Lyric and the Listeners? Some discuss Baldwin's queerness, some his religious background or his criticisms of religiosity; still others separate his queerness from the 'serious work' of calling out white supremacy. Jimmy's Faith refuses these separations, demonstrating that we do not know James Baldwin if we do not consider seriously - and simultaneously - his queerness, his Blackness, and his agnosticism.---Ashon Crawley, author The Lonely Letters and Blackpentecostal Breath: The Aesthetics of Possibility