If Beale Street Could Talk

“Well. We are certainly in it now, and it may get worse. It will certainly—and now something almost as hard to catch as a whisper in a crowded place, as light and as definite as a spider’s web, strikes below my ribs, stunning and astonishing my heart—get worse” (122)

If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin

If Beale Street Could Talk tells the tale of a young New York couple, Tish and Fonny, whose short engagement is interrupted when Fonny is incarcerated, accused of raping a Puerto Rican woman living in New York. Though published in 1974, Beale Street is kindred to another book I’ve reviewed and which was published just this year, An American Marriage, a similarity which evinces how little has changed in the racist carceral state that is the U.S.A. Both Beale Street and American Marriage are stories of a young black man wrongfully sent to prison for a rape he didn’t commit; both are stories of flashback—to the time before imprisonment—and aftermath—what happens inside and outside of the prison as the shocks of imprisonment reverberate through each and every character. In each novel, the imprisoned young man’s lover is one of the central characters through whom these shocks shake.

While Beale Street deserves reviewing on its own merit, not simply in comparison to American Marriage, the more modern novel does provide a lens through which to critique the older one. In American Marriage, author Tayari Jones chooses to clearly demarcate the alternating narrators: the reader knows when a section is narrated by Celestial or Roy or Andre, and each character is fully developed. Even though we might find ourselves frustrated by Celestial’s solipsism or Roy’s entitlement, the characters are clearly more than devices to push forward the plot. More to the point, Celestial is not just an eye through which to see Roy.

This is the fault line of If Beale Street Could Talk. For, while Tish is the book’s ostensible protagonist and narrator, the apparent centrality of this female character is undercut both by Baldwin’s failure to develop Tish fully as a character unto herself and by the way the narrative constantly drifts away from Tish, as if it would really rather be somewhere else but keeps remembering that Tish is, after all, supposed to be the main character. Baldwin is a brilliant writer: it takes no time at all to cathect onto Tish as a reader, to feel invested her and her way of seeing the world-- until the novel gives away that this is really just Baldwin’s brilliance, and he’d rather be looking at the story through Tish’s eyes than looking through Tish’s eyes, seeing the world fully as she would, colored by her individual bias, emotion, and character. Instead, Tish is sentimental when necessary, crass when necessary, daring or devoted or independent when necessary. She is even disembodied when necessary: inexplicably displaced to narrate moments for which she couldn’t possibly be present or to explain the emotions or motivations of other characters that it seems unlikely she’d actually know.

As Stacia Brown writes pointedly in her review: “Though I'm still reticent to concede that Tish's narrative voice is evidence that Baldwin harbored "bizarre woman-hating ideas," [my note: citing a June Jordan essay] it's clear that Tish, despite being the sole narrator, is not Baldwin's main objective. He cares far more for what Tish is willing to sacrifice or endure for Fonny.” While Brown points out that this is related to the fact that “If Beale Street Could Talk belongs to a collection of literature that seeks to humanize black men, through their relationships with parents, lovers, siblings, and children..,” it is not too much to ask of this collection of literature that it not showcase the humanity of black men at the expense of black women or black genderqueer people.

Indeed, another troubling aspect of Beale Street is the fact that it also revolves around attempting to persuade Fonny’s accuser that it wasn’t actually Fonny who raped her, that she is mistaken in her claim. One of the passages of the book most striking to me occurs in Puerto Rico, where Tish’s mother has gone to attempt to persuade Mrs. Victoria Rogers, the young, impoverished, sex worker who is Fonny’s accuser, to retract her accusation:

“You saw him in the police lineup. That’s the first time you saw him. And the only time.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“Because I’ve known him all his life.”

“Hah!” says Victoria, and tries to move away. Tears rise in the dark, defeated eyes. “If you knew how many women I’ve heard say that. They didn’t see him—when I saw him—when he came to me! They never see that….” The tears begin to roll down her face. “You might have known a nice little boy, and he might be a nice man—with you! But you don’t know the man who did—who did—what he did to me!” (169)

As readers, we are assured that Fonny is innocent. But in real life, I know I would have a hard time believing a man was innocent of rape or assault just because women who knew him said he was a nice guy.

Brown’s summation of Baldwin’s effort is eloquently put, and it’s with her observation that I’ll end: “Baldwin may have believed the wronged party in this narrative was singular and obvious—Fonny, of course—but he succeed instead in creating a much messier story, one in which misogyny and racism intersect, where false accusations and minimization of real crime stem from the same patriarchal messaging.”

Subjects this book includes that some readers may be sensitive to: rape, suicide, incarceration, racism, misogyny.