My Dungeon Shook

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Overview

My Dungeon Shook is a short essay by James Baldwin, written as a letter to his nephew and namesake on the hundredth anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation. It first appeared in 1962 and was then collected in The Fire Next Time in 1963. Baldwin tells the young man that he was born into a society that told him he was worth less, that this was untrue, and that the burden of understanding and change falls heavily on those who have been wronged. It is an essay about dignity, history and love.

Context

Baldwin was born in Harlem in 1924 and wrote novels, essays and plays about race in America. In 1962 the civil rights movement was growing and the country was marking a century since the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. Baldwin lived much of his life in France and returned to take part in the movement. The letter belongs to a period of public argument about whether American society would change.