![]() ![]() He also refers to other songs that describe rocks, with lyrics like: "I got a home in that rock," "Lead me to the rock that is higher than I," and "I ran to the rock to hide my face." As Baldwin continues to play with variations on this symbol, it becomes clear that this rock is, for him, his inheritance as an African American.ĭiscussing Uncle Tom's Cabin in "Everybody's Protest Novel," Baldwin writes that the novel "achieves a bright, almost lurid significance, like the light from a fire which consumes a witch." The fire of a witch-burning is used as a way of describing the over-sentimentality of certain protest novels. This refers to the popular 18th-century Christian hymn "The Rock of Ages" which begins: "Rock of Ages, cleft for me, / Let me hide myself in Thee." Baldwin builds on this image by describing this rock as something that must be broken with tools. The book's "Preface" relies on the religious symbol of the Rock of Ages. ![]() Baldwin's association of blackness and beauty here anticipates the important 1960s slogan "black is beautiful." Rock of Ages (Symbol) Baldwin argues that these stereotypes have seeped into everyday language, as in the phrase "as black as hell." Baldwin works to bring a different meaning to blackness, as when he describes the dark skin of his late father. In the movies and novels Baldwin analyzes, he reveals the associations between color and certain stereotypes. ![]() One recurring motif that Baldwin analyzes is the idea that blackness is connected to evil and negative forces in the world. ![]()
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