Four-year-old TJ spends his days on his lively Harlem block playing with his best friends WT and Blinky and running errands for neighbors. As he comes of age as a "Little Man" with big dreams, TJ faces a world of grown-up adventures and realities. Baldwin's only children's book, Little Man, Little Man celebrates and explores the challenges and joys of black childhood.

Now available for the first time in forty years, this new edition of Little Man, Little Man-which retains the charming original illustrations by French artist Yoran Cazac-includes a foreword by Baldwin's nephew Tejan "TJ" Karefa-Smart and an afterword by his niece Aisha Karefa-Smart, with an introduction by two Baldwin scholars. In it we not only see life in 1970s Harlem from a black child's perspective, but we also gain a fuller appreciation of the genius of one of America's greatest writers.

 

There are 120 pages in this book. This book was published 2018 by Duke University Press .

Yoran Cazac (1938-2005) was a French artist who first gained attention for his abstract paintings in Paris in the 1960s. He moved to Rome, where he became the protege of the painter Balthus, director of the French Academy. Cazac met Baldwin in Paris in 1959 through their mutual friend, painter Beauford Delaney. They rekindled their friendship in the 1970s, when Baldwin asked Cazac to provide the illustrations for Little Man, Little Man . Baldwin contributed an essay for the catalog of Cazac's 1977 exhibition at the Chateau de Maintenon. Cazac's final solo exhibition was held at the Kiron Gallery in Paris in 2003. Aisha Karefa-Smart, James Baldwin's niece, is an author who lives in Washington, D. C. Jennifer DeVere Brody is Professor of Theater and Performance Studies at Stanford University. Nicholas Boggs is Clinical Assistant Professor of English at New York University.

This book has the following chapters: Acknowledgments
Foreword / Tejan Karefa-Smart
Introduction / Nicholas Boggs and Jennifer DeVere Brody
Little Man, Little Man
Afterword / Aisha Karefa-Smart