Analysis Of Previous Condition By James Baldwin

In James Baldwin’s short story, Previous Condition, Baldwin portrays the life of a young black man. Peter (the main character), lives in a period in which everyone is aware of who they are and their surroundings based on the color of their skin. As a result, Peter feels isolated from the world because of his skin color. He is not accepted by the white community and he refuses to accept himself in the black community. His refusal to accept who he is and trying to be part of the white community causes him to face fear, anger, humiliation, and alienation.
Throughout the story, Peter talks about his hatred of his ethnicity. He displayed this when he said, “I hated my mother for living there. I hated all the people in my neighborhood. They went

The whites bring down those who are black and make them feel like they are worthless. In James Baldwin’s, “My Dungeon Shook”, Baldwin told his nephew, “You can only be destroyed by believing that you really are what the white world calls a nigger” (Baldwin 4). Peter believed in what the white people said about black people and it destroyed him. As Peter talked to Jules, he said, “I’m goddamn tired of battling every Tom, Dick, and Harry for what everybody else takes for granted. I’m tired, man, tired! Have you ever been to death of something? Well, I’m sick to death. And I’m scared. I’ve been fighting so goddamn long I’m not a person anymore” (Baldwin 93). Peter is angry and has fear at the same time. He is trying to establish himself in a society that does not accept him and it is killing him. His scenario relates to James Baldwin’s father. In Baldwin’s letter to his nephew, he states, “Well, he is dead, he never saw you, and he had a terrible life; he was defeated long before he died because, at the bottom of his heart, he really believed what white people said about him”. Both Peter and James Baldwin’s father showed fear and anger towards whites and believed everything the whites said to them. When the blacks accept what the whites label them as, it makes them worth nothing in

As Peter and Ida were eating dinner she states, “… nothing’s going to change, baby, people are too empty-headed, too empty-hearted—it’s always been like that, people always try to destroy what they don’t understand—and they hate almost everything because they understand so little—” (Baldwin 97). As a result of Ida stating those words, he responds by screaming at Ida to stop. The reason why he screamed was because he felt anger from what Ida said, but it made him realize that the surrounding society is causing him to not appreciate his heritage and to make himself feel worthless. This realization causes Peter to accept his skin color and to also try to fit in with his own kind. The message Baldwin is sending is that blacks should know that no matter how much the blacks get oppressed, the whites will never understand what they are going