{"product_id":"the-fire-is-upon-us-james-baldwin-william-f-buckley-jr-and-the-debate-over-race-in-america-9780691181547","title":"The Fire Is Upon Us: James Baldwin, William F. Buckley Jr., and the Debate Over Race in America","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"A great read.\"--Whoopi Goldberg, \u003ci\u003eThe View\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eHow the clash between the civil rights firebrand and the father of modern conservatism continues to illuminate America's racial divide \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eOn February 18, 1965, an overflowing crowd packed the Cambridge Union in Cambridge, England, to witness a historic televised debate between James Baldwin, the leading literary voice of the civil rights movement, and William F. Buckley Jr., a fierce critic of the movement and America's most influential conservative intellectual. The topic was \"the American dream is at the expense of the American Negro,\" and no one who has seen the debate can soon forget it. Nicholas Buccola's \u003ci\u003eThe Fire Is upon Us\u003c\/i\u003e is the first book to tell the full story of the event, the radically different paths that led Baldwin and Buckley to it, the controversies that followed, and how the debate and the decades-long clash between the men continues to illuminate America's racial divide today. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eBorn in New York City only fifteen months apart, the Harlem-raised Baldwin and the privileged Buckley could not have been more different, but they both rose to the height of American intellectual life during the civil rights movement. By the time they met in Cambridge, Buckley was determined to sound the alarm about a man he considered an \"eloquent menace.\" For his part, Baldwin viewed Buckley as a deluded reactionary whose popularity revealed the sickness of the American soul. The stage was set for an epic confrontation that pitted Baldwin's call for a moral revolution in race relations against Buckley's unabashed elitism and implicit commitment to white supremacy. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eA remarkable story of race and the American dream, \u003ci\u003eThe Fire Is upon Us \u003c\/i\u003ereveals the deep roots and lasting legacy of a conflict that continues to haunt our politics.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eNicholas Buccola\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of \u003ci\u003eThe Political Thought of Frederick Douglass\u003c\/i\u003e and the editor of \u003ci\u003eThe Essential Douglass\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eAbraham Lincoln and Liberal Democracy\u003c\/i\u003e. His work has appeared in the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eSalon\u003c\/i\u003e, and many other publications. He is the Elizabeth and Morris Glicksman Chair in Political Science at Linfield College in McMinnville, Oregon, and lives in Portland.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Princeton University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50412818858258,"sku":"9780691181547","price":32.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_d0e91009-16df-4f10-9398-f490b333fa38.jpg?v=1729330586","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/the-fire-is-upon-us-james-baldwin-william-f-buckley-jr-and-the-debate-over-race-in-america-9780691181547","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}