Caribbean poetry

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Martinique poet Aime Cesaire in 2003 Aime Cesaire 2003.jpg
Martinique poet Aimé Césaire in 2003

Caribbean poetry is a vast and rapidly evolving field of poetry written by people from the Caribbean region and the diaspora.

Contents

Caribbean poetry generally refers to a myriad of poetic forms, spanning epic, lyrical verse, prose poems, dramatic poetry and oral poetry, composed in Caribbean territories regardless of language. It is most often, however, written in English, Spanish, Spanglish, French, Hindustani, Dutch, or any number of creoles. Poetry in English from the former British West Indies has been referred to as Anglo-Caribbean poetry or West Indian poetry.

Since the mid-1970s, Caribbean poetry has gained increasing visibility with the publication in Britain and North America of several anthologies. [1] Over the decades, the canon has shifted and expanded, drawing both on oral and literary traditions and including more women poets and politically charged works. [2] [3] [4] Caribbean writers, performance poets, newspaper poets, singer-songwriters have created a popular art form, a poetry heard by audiences worldwide. [5] Caribbean oral poetry shares the vigour of the written tradition. [5]

Among the most prominent Caribbean poets whose works are widely studied (and translated into other languages) are: Derek Walcott (who won the 1992 Nobel Prize for Literature), [6] [7] Kamau Brathwaite, [8] Edouard Glissant, [9] Giannina Braschi, [10] [11] Lorna Goodison, [12] Aimé Fernand Césaire, [13] Linton Kwesi Johnson, [14] [15] Kwame Dawes, [16] Claude McKay, [17] and Claudia Rankine. [18] [19]

Common themes include: exile and return to the motherland; [20] the relationship of language to nation; [21] colonialism and postcolonialism; self-determination and liberty; [22] racial identity. [23] [24]

Caribbean epic poetry

Derek Walcott's Omeros (1990) is one of the most renowned epic poems of the 20th century and of the Caribbean. [25] The work is divided into seven books containing sixty-four chapters. Most of the poem is composed in a three-line form that is reminiscent of the terza rima form that Dante used for The Divine Comedy . The work, referencing Homer and other characters from the Iliad, refers to Greek, Roman, and American slavery. [26] The narrative arch of the epic takes place on the island of St. Lucia, where Walcott was born and raised, but includes imaginings of ancient Greece and Rome, as well as travels to modern day Lisbon, London, Dublin, Toronto. [27] [28]

Giannina Braschi's Empire of Dreams (1988) is a postmodern Caribbean epic composed of six books of poetry that blend elements of eclogues, epigrams, lyrics, prose poem, and manifesto. [29] Braschi's United States of Banana (2011) is a geopolitical tragic-comedy about the fall of the American empire, the liberation of Puerto Rico, and the unification of the Caribbean isles. [30] [31] Blending elements of poetry, lyrical essay, and dramatic dialogues, this postmodern epic tackles the subjects of global debt, labour abuse, and environmental crises on the rise. [32]

Anthony Kellman created the Caribbean poetic form Tuk Verse, which incorporates melodic and rhythmic elements of Barbadian indigenous folk music called Tuk. His 2008 book Limestone: An Epic Poem of Barbados is the first published epic poem of Barbados. [33] [34]

In 1977, the government of Jamaica named Claude McKay the national poet and posthumously awarded him the Order of Jamaica for his contribution to literature. [35] [36]

Caribbean poets by country

Grouped by territory of birth or upbringing.

Anguilla

Barbados

Cuba

Dominica

Dominican Republic

Guyana

Haiti

Jamaica

Martinique

Montserrat

Puerto Rico

St Lucia

St Martin

St Vincent and the Grenadines

The Bahamas

Trinidad & Tobago

Further reading

Selected anthologies

See also

References

  1. ↑ Edward Baugh, "A History of Poetry", in Albert James Arnold, Julio Rodríguez-Luis, J. Michael Dash (eds), A History of Literature in the Caribbean, Vol 2: English- and Dutch-speaking countries, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 1994, pp. 227-282.
  2. ↑ Emilio Jorge Rodríguez, "Oral Tradition and New Literary Canon in Caribbean Poetry", in Albert James Arnold, Julio Rodríguez-Luis, J. Michael Dash (eds), A History of Literature in the Caribbean, Volume 3: Cross-Cultural Studies, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Co., 1994, pp. 177-185.
  3. ↑ Arturo Cattaneo, "Caribbean Verse: History of Literature As History in Literature". Archived 2014-02-21 at the Wayback Machine
  4. ↑ Christian Andrew Campbell, Romancing "the Folk": Rereading the Nation in Caribbean Poetics, Duke University dissertation, 2007.
  5. 1 2 Burnett, Paula (1986). The Penguin Book of Caribbean Verse in English. Penguin Books. ISBN   978-0-14-058511-7. OCLC   13857617.[ page needed ]
  6. ↑ Poets, Academy of American. "Poems by Derek Walcott". poets.org. Archived from the original on 18 September 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  7. ↑ "Derek Walcott". Poetry Foundation. 6 September 2020. Archived from the original on 3 January 2018. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  8. ↑ "Kamau Brathwaite". Poetry Foundation. 6 September 2020. Archived from the original on 26 September 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  9. ↑ Britton, Celia (13 February 2011). "Edouard Glissant". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077. Archived from the original on 2 August 2017. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  10. ↑ "Giannina Braschi". PEN America. 9 August 2012. Archived from the original on 1 October 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  11. ↑ "Giannina Braschi: 2012 National Book Festival". Library of Congress. Archived from the original on 11 October 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  12. ↑ "Lorna Goodison". Poetry Foundation. 6 September 2020. Archived from the original on 27 May 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  13. ↑ "Aimé Fernand Césaire". Poetry Foundation. 6 September 2020. Archived from the original on 28 August 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  14. ↑ Maya Jaggi, "Profile: Linton Kwesi Johnson - Poet on the front line" Archived 2016-12-26 at the Wayback Machine , The Guardian , 4 May 2002.
  15. ↑ "Linton Kwesi Johnson - Literature". literature.britishcouncil.org. Archived from the original on 27 September 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  16. ↑ "Kwame Dawes". Poetry Foundation. 6 September 2020. Archived from the original on 7 November 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  17. ↑ "Claude McKay". Poetry Foundation. 15 March 2025. Archived from the original on 10 March 2025. Retrieved 10 March 2025.
  18. ↑ "Claudia Rankine | Biography, Poetry, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived from the original on 19 May 2017. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  19. ↑ Muhammad, Ismail (4 September 2020). "Claudia Rankine's Quest for Racial Dialogue". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on 6 September 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  20. ↑ D’haen, Theo (2009). "Exile, Caribbean Literature, and the World Republic of Letters". Perspectives on the 'Other America'. pp. 219–231. doi:10.1163/9789042027053_013. ISBN   978-90-420-2704-6.
  21. ↑ Belisle, Natalie L. (2017). Strangers at Home: Opaque Citizenships in Contemporary Caribbean Literature (Thesis).
  22. ↑ "CFPs – The Caribbean Commons". Archived from the original on 11 August 2020. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  23. ↑ "caribbean literature themes - Google Search". www.google.com. Archived from the original on 26 February 2022. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  24. ↑ Burge, Peggy. "LibGuides: Caribbean Writer Series: Caribbean Literature". research.pugetsound.edu. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  25. ↑ Hamner, Robert D. (1997). Epic of the Dispossessed: Derek Walcott's Omeros. University of Missouri Press. ISBN   978-0-8262-1124-8. OCLC   36663076.[ page needed ]
  26. ↑ Taplin, Oliver (1991). "Derek Walcott's 'Omeros' and Derek Walcott's Homer". Arion: A Journal of Humanities and the Classics. 1 (2): 213–226. JSTOR   20163475.
  27. ↑ Morrison, James V. (1999). "Homer Travels to the Caribbean: Teaching Walcott's 'Omeros'". The Classical World. 93 (1): 83–99. doi:10.2307/4352373. JSTOR   4352373.
  28. ↑ Baral, Raj Kumar; Shrestha, Heena (2020). "What is behind Myth and History in Derek Walcott's Omeros?". Cogent Arts & Humanities. 7 (1): 1776945. doi: 10.1080/23311983.2020.1776945 .
  29. ↑ Aldama, Frederick Luis; O'Dwyer, Tess (2020). Poets, Philosophers, Lovers: On the Writings of Giannina Braschi. University of Pittsburgh Press. ISBN   978-0-8229-4618-2. OCLC   1143649021.[ page needed ]
  30. ↑ Cruz-Malavé, Arnaldo Manuel (2014). "'Under the Skirt of Liberty': Giannina Braschi Rewrites Empire". American Quarterly. 66 (3): 801–818. doi:10.1353/aq.2014.0042. S2CID   144702640.
  31. ↑ Riofrio, John (March 2020). "Falling for debt: Giannina Braschi, the Latinx avant-garde, and financial terrorism in the United States of Banana". Latino Studies. 18 (1): 66–81. doi:10.1057/s41276-019-00239-2. S2CID   212759434.
  32. ↑ Perisic, Alexandra (2019). Precarious Crossings: Immigration, Neoliberalism, and the Atlantic. Ohio State University Press. ISBN   978-0-8142-1410-7. OCLC   1096294244.[ page needed ]
  33. ↑ "Anthony Kellman" Archived 2016-03-08 at the Wayback Machine , Authors, Peepal Tree Press.
  34. ↑ "Kellman, Anthony | Encyclopedia.com". www.encyclopedia.com. Archived from the original on 17 January 2021. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  35. ↑ Julie Buckner Armstrong; Amy Schmidt, eds. (2009). "Claude McKay". The Civil Rights Reader: American Literature from Jim Crow to Reconciliation. University of Georgia Press. p. 62. ISBN   9780820331812 . Retrieved 4 December 2013.
  36. ↑ "Jamaica National Heritage Trust". Jnht.com. 19 February 2007. Retrieved 4 December 2013.
  37. ↑ "Welcome to House of Nehesi Publishers". Archived from the original on 28 February 2015. Retrieved 26 February 2022.
  38. ↑ "BVI Book of Poetry Set for Year End Reveal - BVIPlatinum.com | BVIDailyNews.com". Archived from the original on 4 November 2016. Retrieved 3 November 2016.
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