This chapter considers the influence of fellow writers James Baldwin and Ed Bullins on August Wilson’s dramaturgy. It argues that Bullins and Baldwin’s simultaneous inclusion on Wilson’s list of “Bs” represents both an expansion of his original influences and a specific articulation of his artistic pursuit or philosophy.

August Wilson famously and often stated that his influences primarily consisted of the “four B’s:” the blues, Romare Bearden, Amiri Baraka, and Jorge Luis Borges. While the blues, Bearden, and Baraka tend to get the most attention, Wilson’s debt to Borges remains abstract and elusive – something that made perfect sense in his mind, but is difficult for readers and theatergoers to bring into sharp focus. This chapter provides an overview of Wilson’s comments on Borges and offer two stories by Borges, “Shakespeare’s Memory” (1983) and “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quijote” (1941), as texts through which aspects of Wilson’s Gem of the Ocean (2003) might be understood.

One critically overlooked aspect of August Wilson’s work is his repeated meditations on acts of perception. This chapter argues that it is precisely in this facet that an understanding of what the playwright learned from Romare Bearden – especially the artist’s collages of the 1960s – can prove most helpful in considering the cultural work Wilson’s monumental body of work does.