Baldwin’s rage made white readers uncomfortable where Ellison’s mask did not.

Evidence

Ellison, the author of Invisible Man, offered a sophisticated treatment of the race problem in the United States that left the ground fertile. His nonfiction essays brimmed with philosophical and literary rigor, and I could read them with my white classmates without having to manage their discomfort. Baldwin seemed, at least to me back then, to leave the ground scorched. He told the truth, but anger dripped from the page. When I read The Fire Next Time, I could not reconcile his rage with his talk of love. It was like Dr. King meets Henry James meets Malcolm X meets Freud. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Begin Again, 58