Caribbean Literature

Most Important Caribbean Writers

Derek Walcott (23.01.1930)
Walcott raised in Castries, Saint Lucia. He has lived most of his life in Trinidad. His family was of mixed race and ethnicity; he had two white grandfathers and two black grandmothers. His father was a Bohemian artist; he died when Walcott was very young. His family reflects the complex colonial history of the island which he explores in his poetry. He received the 1992 Nobel Prize in Literature. He is currently Professor of poetry at the University of Essex. He has published more than twenty plays, the majority of which have been produced by the Trinidad Theatre Workshop, and have also been widely staged elsewhere. Many of them address, either directly or indirectly, the liminal status of the West Indies in the post-colonial period. His poems are characterized by allusions to the English poetic tradition and a symbolic imagination that is at once personal and Caribbean. Walcott identifies as "absolutely a Caribbean writer", a pioneer, helping to make sense of the legacy of deep colonial damage. In such poems as "The Castaway" (1965) and in the play Pantomime (1978), he uses the metaphors of shipwreck and Crusoe to describe the culture and what is required of artists after colonialism and slavery: both the freedom and the challenge to begin again, salvage the best of other cultures and make something new.

V. S. Naipaul (17.08.1932)
Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad "V. S." Naipaul was born in Chaguanas, Trinidad and Tobago, to parents of Indian descent. He is focused on writing about the history of areas and peoples that are usually forgotten. He is the recipient of numerous honors, including the Nobel Prize in 2001, the Booker Prize in 1971, and a knighthood for services to literature in 1990. He has also written works of non-fiction, such as travel writing and essays.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez (06.03.1927)
Gabriel Jose de la Concordia Garcia Marquez was born in the town of Aracataca, Colombia. Considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century, he was awarded the 1972 Neustadt International Prize for Literature and the 1982 Nobel Prize in Literature. Garcaa began his career as a journalist while studying law at the University of Cartagena. His works have achieved significant critical acclaim and widespread commercial success, most notably for popularizing a literary style labeled as magic realism, which uses magical elements and events in otherwise ordinary and realistic situations. Some of his works are set in a fictional village called Macondo (the town mainly inspired by his birthplace Aracataca), and most of them express the theme of solitude.

Miguel Angel Asturias (1899-1974)
Asturias was born and raised in Guatemala though he lived a significant part of his adult life abroad. He was a poet, novelist, playwright, journalist and diplomat. Asturias helped establish Latin American literature's contribution to mainstream Western culture, and at the same time drew attention to the importance of indigenous cultures, especially those of his native Guatemala. In 1967 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, only the second Latin American to receive this honor.

Saint-John Perse (1887-1975)
Saint-John Perse, pseudonym for Alexis Saint-Leger, was born in Pointe-a-Pitre, Guadeloupe. His great-grandfather, a solicitor, had settled in Guadeloupe in 1815. His grandfather and father were also solicitors; his father was also a member of the City Council. The Leger family owned two plantations, one of coffee (La Josephine) and the other of sugar (Bois-Debout). His literary work was published partly under his own name, but chiefly under the pseudonyms St. J. Perse and Saint-John Perse. In 1960 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Some Caribbean Novels

Daniel Defoe: Robinson Crusoe (1719)
Robinson Crusoe is the story of an Englishman castaway on a remote tropical island near Trinidad for 28 years, encountering cannibals, captives, and mutineers before being rescued.

Robert Louis Stevenson: Treasure Island (1883)
Treasure Island tells of Jim Hawkin's boyhood adventure on a quest for buried treasure. The book was inspired by a real treasure buried on Norman Island in the BVI.

Hemingway: The Old Man and the Sea (1951)
The Old Man and the Sea is the story of a battle between an old, experienced Cuban fisherman and a large marlin.

Samuel Selvon: A Brighter Sun (1952)
The story centers on a young Indian native, who is placed in an arranged marriage at age 16. Leaving home with his equally-young bride, he struggles to come to terms with his newly-acquired adult status and proving that he has, in fact, reached true manhood. The story also delves into the lives of his multi-ethnic neighbors in his new community of Barataria, the Fantastic Racism that is both subtly and openly expressed there and throughout Trinidad at large, and how the nation as a whole is affected by the war happening hundreds of miles away from the Caribbean shores.

Michael Anthony: Green Days by the River (1956)
A novel about a boy on the edge of adult responsibilities. It is the story of Shellie, a Trinidadian boy who moves to a new village and there meets two girls. He is charmed by Rosalie but he is attracted to the more cheerful and accessible Joan.

V. S. Naipaul: Miguel Street (1974)
Set during World War II and narrated by an unnamed–but precociously observant–neighborhood boy, Miguel Street is a work of mercurial mood shifts, by turns sweetly melancholy and anarchically funny. It overflows with life on every page.

Roger Mais: The Hills Were Joyful Together (1981)
This novel, set in a yard which is a microcosm of Kingston slum life, sets out as Mais himself said to give "a true picture of the real Jamaica and the dreadful condition of the working classes."

Zee Edgell Page: Beka Lamb (1982)
Set in Belize, Beka Lamb is the record of a few months in the life of Beka and her family. The politics of the small colony, the influence of the matriarchal society and the dominating presence of the Catholic Church are woven into the fabric of the story to provide a compelling portrait of ordinary life in Belize.

List of significant Caribbean writers

Antigua

Marie-Elena John
Jamaica Kincaid

The Bahamas

Robert Antoni
Christian Campbell

Barbados

Francis Woodbine Blackman
Kamau Brathwaite
Timothy Callender
Austin Clarke
Frank Collymore
Geoffrey Drayton
A. N. Forde
Anthony Kellman
George Lamming
Paule Marshall
Andrea Stuart
John Wickham
Odimumba Kwamdela (J.Ashton Brathwaite)

Cuba

Antonio Benitez-Rojo
Carlos Moore (Cuban writer)
Nancy Morejon
Nicolas Guillen
Pedro Perez Sarduy

Dominica

Phyllis Shand Allfrey
Gabriel Christian
Jean Rhys

Dominican Republic

Julio Vega Battle
Junot Diaz
Jose Cepeda Garcia
Julia Alvarez
Chiqui Vicioso
Blas Jimenez

Guadeloupe

Maryse Conde
Ernest Pepin
Gisele Pineau

Guyana

John Agard
E. R. Braithwaite
Jan Carew
Martin Carter
Cyril Dabydeen
David Dabydeen
Fred D'Aguiar
O. R. Dathorne
Beryl Gilroy
Wilson Harris
Roy A. K. Heath
Ruel Johnson
Oonya Kempadoo
Peter Kempadoo
Mark McWatt
Pauline Melville
Edgar Mittelholzer
Grace Nichols
Sasenarine Persaud
A. J. Seymour
Jan Shinebourne
Eric Walrond
Denis Williams

Haiti

Edwidge Danticat
Rene Depestre
Marie Vieux Chauvet
Dany Laferriere
Jacques Roumain
Emeric Bergeaud
Franketienne
Beaubrun Ardouin
Emile Nau
Ignace Nau

Jamaica

Lindsay Barrett
Edward Baugh
Vera Bell
Alvin Bennett
Louise Bennett-Coverly
James Berry
Lebert Bethune
Erna Brodber
George Campbell
H. D. Carberry
Colin Channer
Kwame Dawes
Jean D'Costa
Herbert de Lisser
Andrew Edwards XIV
Gloria Escoffery
John Figueroa
Honor Ford-Smith
Lorna Goodison
John Hearne
A. L. Hendriks
Constance Hollar
Nalo Hopkinson
Marlon James (author)
Archie Lindo
Roger Mais
Una Marson
Basil McFarlane
John E. C. McFarlane
Claude McKay
Anthony McNeill
Pamela Mordecai
Mervyn Morris
Mutabaruka
Rex Nettleford
Orlando Patterson
Geoffrey Philp
Velma Pollard
Patricia Powell
Claudia Rankine
V. S. Reid
Leone Ross
Namba Roy
Andrew Salkey
Dennis Scott
Olive Senior
M. G. Smith
Mikey Smith
Vivian Virtue
Anthony C. Winkler
Sylvia Wynter

Martinique

Aime Cesaire
Patrick Chamoiseau
Frantz Fanon
Edouard Glissant

Montserrat

E. A. Markham

Puerto Rico

Giannina Braschi
Lola Rodriguez de Tio
Rosario Ferre
Juan Carlos Quintero Herencia
Eugenio Maria de Hostos
Luis Pales Matos
Aurora Levins Morales
Manuel Ramos Otero
Luis Rafael Sanchez
Esmeralda Santiago
Mayra Santos-Febres
Ana Lydia Vega
Jose Luis Vega

St Kitts and Nevis

Caryl Phillips

St Lucia

Kendel Hippolyte
Jane King
Garth St Omer
Derek Walcott

Saint Martin

Lasana M. Sekou

St Vincent and The Grenadines

Shake Keane

Suriname

Clark Accord
Gerrit Barron
John H. de Bye
R. Dobru
Albert Helman
Cynthia McLeod

Trinidad and Tobago

James Christopher Aboud
Lyndon Baptiste
Michael Anthony
Robert Antoni
Kevin Baldeosingh
Dionne Brand
Lennox Brown
Wayne Brown
Vahni Capildeo
Wilfred Cartey
Faustin Charles
Ralph de Boissiere
Ramabai Espinet
Albert Gomes
Cecil Gray
Frank Hercules
Errol Hill
Merle Hodge
C. L. R. James
Anthony Joseph
Ismith Khan
Roi Kwabena
Harold "Sonny" Ladoo
John La Rose
Earl Lovelace
Rabindranath Maharaj
Ian McDonald
Alfred Mendes
Shani Mootoo
Shiva Naipaul
V. S. Naipaul
Lakshmi Persaud
Jennifer Rahim
Ronald Ramdin
Eric Roach
Monique Roffey
Lawrence Scott
Samuel Selvon
Frances-Anne Solomon
Eintou Pearl Springer
John Stewart
Eric Williams

Popular Caribbean Travel Guides
Lonely Planet: Caribbean Islands (Multi Country Guide)
Lonely Planet: Eastern Caribbean Islands
Frommer's: Caribbean Ports of Call

Source Note: Some information on this and on other pages is taken from Wikipedia.