Baldwin's language from his first writings has been distinguished. Precise, well-ordered, very sophisticated, it could describe extreme experiences with chill casualness, and apparently trivial experiences with a simple but effective use of extreme language that conveyed the underlying importance of the apparently trivial….

The material of Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone is not sensational in itself. In a particular and important way, violence is ever present and very important in the book, but there is no relishing of it, no gory details….

The author of Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone is concerned with what moves his people. He is able to show us what moves them, on the very deepest levels. The fear and hate and the profound love that move his characters will also, I believe, be "moving" to any reader. Baldwin avoids melodrama, but he seizes again and again on the simple basic human relations of child and parent, male and female, friend and lover, that give us whatever our hearts have of human emotion. (p. 67)

Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone is a masterpiece by one of the best living writers in America. Which is not to say, naturally, that it will comfort or cheer you much. Very often, unless you are much different from me, the book will move you to tears. (p. 69)