Abstract
The proliferation of projects spotlighting the ever-vital contributions of James Baldwin and Lorraine Hansberry has been a source of optimism and inspiration amid all the angst, grief, and other ugly feelings the past few years have wrought. From the spellbinding reworking of Hansberry's Les Blancs at London's National Theatre in 2016 to the equally affecting revival of Baldwin's The Amen Corner at the Shakespeare Theatre Company in 2020, theatre-goers, in particular, have been afforded rich opportunities to experience the vastness of Baldwin and Hansberry's dramaturgical imaginations. Exhibitions like Twice Militant: Lorraine Hansberry's Letters to The Ladder, which was on view at the Brooklyn Museum from November 2013 to March 2014, and God Made My Face: A Collective Portrait of James Baldwin, which David Zwirner presented from January through February 2019, have served to shed additional light on the revolutionary work and complex interior lives of these pathbreaking black, queer writers.