We all know James Baldwin the high priest of Civil Rights, but what about Jimmy B, the extremely horny homosexual?

JB was a chain-smoking, vodka-swilling romantic who fell hard and often—usually for straight men he could never have.

This week, Bash and his bestie guestie, Clark Moore, crack open Baldwin’s chaos: from his Harlem childhood all the way to his retirement villa in the South of France.

Along the way we meet the English teachers who found him a pleasure to have in class, revisit the first gay nights in Greenwich Village, and soak in the winter sun at his Swiss twink's chalet.

This is a tour of Baldwin's life through his greatest loves.

Get ready to talk about:

• Love with a capital L, and how it was the key to Baldwin's ideas on race, sex, and revolution
• The contradictions of Baldwin's genius—he was a brilliant debater who lived on a bottle a day and a prophet of love, who struggled to love himself

• Giovanni’s Room, the gay novel he swore wasn’t about being gay
• And why his words still influence us today, from antiracists "doing the work" to an almost annual New Yorker article summing up his life, work, or legacy

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Episode Credits

Written and hosted by Bash.

Produced by Dani Henion.

Edited by Alex Toskas.

© Sebastian Hendra 2025