Literature and liberation: reading James Baldwin with James Cone

Abstract The pioneering Black Liberation theologian James Cone devotes the final chapter of his posthumously-published memoir Said I Wasn’t Gonna Tell Nobody (2018) to the theological legacy of the essayist, novelist, poet and playwright James Baldwin, who Cone claims as a “theological mentor.” This article considers the nature of this mentorship while situating Cone’s reading of Baldwin in the context of his use of Black literature, music and art as primary sources of Black theology. It argues that Cone and Baldwin explore communal models of interpretation in Black religion and explores ways in which this communal hermeneutic might offer directions for liberationist theological reading.