Giovanni's Room

Author: Baldwin, James, Phillips, Caryl

Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)

Published on 4 October 2001 by Penguin Books Ltd (Penguin Classics) in the United Kingdom as part of 'the Penguin Modern Classics' series.

One of the BBC's '100 Novels That Shaped Our World'Baldwin's ground-breaking second novel, which established him as one of the great American writers of his time'Audacious... remarkable... elegant and courageous' Caryl Phillips'Exquisite, a feat of fire-breathing, imaginative daring' Guardian David, a young American in 1950s Paris, is waiting for his fiancée to return from vacation in Spain. But when he meets Giovanni, a handsome Italian barman, the two men are drawn into an intense affair. After three months David's fiancée returns and, denying his sexuality, he rejects Giovanni for a 'safe' future as a married man — a decision that will bring tragedy, longing and regret.

'Gorgeous, fearless, tempered by dark knowledge and pain ... the greatest American prose stylist of his generation' Colm Tóibín 'A layered exploration of queer desire ... It is electric' Hilton Als