To Embrace or Kill: "Fathers and Sons"

Abstract

Fathers ought to avoid utter nakedness before their sons. I did not want to know—not, anyway, from his mouth—that his flesh was as unregenerate as my own . . . I did not want to think that my life would be like his, or that my mind would ever grow so pale, so without hard places and sharp, sheer drops . . . I wanted the merciful distances o f father and son, which would have perm itted me to love him .—James Baldwin, Giovanni's Room