James Baldwin in Turkey

Literary luminary and pioneer, James Baldwin has done much to pave the way for African-American and gay writers who have come since. This book, "James Baldwin's Turkish Decade: Erotics of Exile," by Magdalena J. Zaborowska expounds on his years in a country that straddles both Europe and Asia, where he came to view his status as "other" as part nemesis and part inspiration. According to Zaborowska, it was in Istanbul, where Baldwin learned to embrace the warmth of the Turkish people as well as his identity as a perpetual traveler, a foreigner in every nation.

Here is an additional online biograpical sketch of James Baldwin and an essay from the New Yorker that goes into more depth about his years abroad.