Northwestern University celebrated James Baldwin's incandescent first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain, as the focus for Fall 2007’s ONE BOOK, ONE NORTHWESTERN Series. Baldwin’s 1953 novel was at the center of eight weeks of readings, theatrical and musical performances, artistic installations, seminars, workshops, and public lectures beginning in September, 2007. Northwestern’s selection coincided with Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley’s announcement that the same novel was the Chicago Public Library’s selection for its Spring, 2007 “One Book, One Chicago” program. The happy coincidence provided residents of the Chicagoland area with a nearly year-long opportunity to read, discuss, and learn from the extraordinary first novel by one of the twentieth century’s greatest writers, as well as an unparalleled opportunity for collaboration and cooperation between the City of Chicago and Northwestern University.
Its title taken from an African American spiritual, Go Tell It on the Mountain is a partly autobiographical novel that chronicles the conflicts 14-year-old John Grimes faces—with his father, his family, and his faith—as well as the difficulties growing up in the 1930’s as a young African American man in New York’s Harlem.
“One Book, One Northwestern” kicks off each academic year by inviting the entire community of students, staff, faculty, and the public at-large to focus its collective intellectual, artistic, interpretive, and creative energies around a single book; in Fall 2006, Shakespeare’s Othello served as the focus, and 2008-2009 will celebrate the 150th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species by focusing on David Quammen’s The Reluctant Mr. Darwin: An Intimate Portrait of Charles Darwin and the Making of His Theory of Evolution. Faculty, staff, and students from across the University, as well as our Evanston and Chicago neighbors, are invited to take part in conversations of all kinds all over campus, both inside and outside the classroom.
2007 One Book Website designed by Ryan Werb '10