On The Interracial Sexuality In Another Country

James Baldwin has been considered one of the greatest American writers of the twentieth century. Among all the subjects he concerns, his racial and sexual politics are most striking.In his third novel, Another Country, Baldwin makes an intensive study of interracial sexuality by elaborately characterizing two interracial couples. Confined by racism, the two couples keep in a state of agony and confusion during their sexual love. As a result, one couple ends up with the white woman's insanity and the black man's suicide, and as for the other, though their love gets developed to some extent, their future remains uncertain. The uncertainty in the interracial sexuality and in some other minor sexuality brings people to a better understanding of how the very existence of rigid categories of race and sex in American cultures has ruined the prospect of a harmonious society. However, on the whole, in spite of their confusion, the interracial couples as well as other characters do not go to extremes as characters in black protest novels usually do. Instead, with the hope for racial reconciliation, they struggle to find better solutions to the social problems.After a careful study of Another Country, with the related historical and cultural background as well as Baldwin's other works, this thesis draws a conclusion as follows: Baldwin gives equal consideration to the tense racial contradiction while dealing with the sexual prejudices. And he tries to link them to probe into the universal humanity. While doing so, Baldwin aims at extricating both the black and the white from their confusion, and promoting the racial reconciliation. While dealing with the interracial sexuality, though he gets confused most of the time, Baldwin does not give up his attempt on racial reconciliation. The black writer Baldwin, full of love and social responsibility, has a strong humanist solicitude for his fellow men in the novel.In Another Country, Baldwin interweaves his personal experiences of different periods of his time with those of his characters. Therefore, by means of the study of the interracial sexuality, Baldwin's own confusion on the racial problem and his love for his people can be collected, which will contribute to the comprehensive understanding of Baldwin.