Go Tell It on the Mountain

Go Tell It on the Mountain is a 1953 semi-autobiographical novel by James Baldwin. The novel examines the role of the Christian Church in the lives of African-Americans, both as a source of repression and moral hypocrisy and as a source of inspiration and community. It also, more subtly, examines racism in the United States. In 1998, the Modern Library ranked Go Tell It on the Mountain 39th on its list of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. Time Magazine included the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005. The opening chapter tells the story... of John, a young African-American boy in Harlem in the 1930s. John has been raised by his mother Elizabeth and her preacher husband Gabriel, who nominally is John's father and is a strict disciplinarian, abusive to both his children and his wife. Gabriel's religious philosophy is tough and one of salvation through faith in Jesus, without which one is damned to hell. John hates his father and dreams of wounding or killing him and running away. The characters are members of the Temple of the Fire Baptized Church in Harlem, a Pentecostal Protestant denomination.
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