To transcend the sterile categories of "Negro-ness," whether those enforced by the white world or those erected defensively by Negroes, became Baldwin's central concern as a writer. He wanted, as he says in "Nobody Knows My Name," his brilliant new collection of essays, "to prevent myself from becoming merely a Negro; or, even, merely a Negro writer."…

Freedom cannot always be willed into existence; and that is why, as Baldwin went on to write two accomplished novels and a book of still more accomplished essays, he was forced to improvise a protest of his own: nonpolitical in character, spoken more in the voice of anguish than revolt, and concerned less with the melodrama of discrimination than the moral consequences of living under an irremovable stigma.

This highly personal protest Baldwin has released through a masterly use of the informal essay. Writing with both strength and delicacy, he has made the essay into a form that brings together vivid reporting, personal recollection and speculative thought….

[Especially] noteworthy are three essays on Richard Wright, which range in tone from disturbed affection to disturbing malice and reflect Baldwin's struggle to achieve some personal equilibrium as writer and Negro by discovering his true feelings toward the older man….

One great merit of his essays is their honesty in reflecting his own doubts and aggressions, and in recording his torturous efforts to find some peace in the relations between James Baldwin the lonely writer and James Baldwin the man who suffers as a Negro….

I have only one complaint to register against "Nobody Knows My Name." Partly because his work relies so heavily on a continuous scrutiny of his own responses, Baldwin succumbs at times to what Thorstein Veblen might have called the pose of conspicuous sincerity. In the essays on Wright and especially in a piece on Norman Mailer, the effort to expose the whole of his feelings slips occasionally into a mere attitude, and the confessional stance reveals some vanities of its own.

These are small blemishes on a splendid book. James Baldwin is a skillful writer, a man of fine intelligence and a true companion in the desire to make life human.