The Middle Passage: The Caribbean Revisited is a 1962 book-length essay and travelogue by V. S. Naipaul. It is his first book-length work of non-fiction.[1]
The book covers a year-long trip Naipaul took through Trinidad, British Guiana, Suriname, Martinique, and Jamaica in 1961. As well as giving his own impressions, Naipaul refers to the work of earlier travellers such as Patrick Leigh Fermor, who described a similar itinerary in The Traveller's Tree (1950). Naipaul addresses a range of topics including the legacy of slavery and colonialism, race relations, the roles of immigrants from India in the various countries, and differences in language, culture, and economics.
The book was poorly received in Trinidad and other Caribbean nations on account of Naipaul's "patronising attitude" towards these colonies and ex-colonies, his apparent approval of imperialism, and for other reasons.
Harold Sonny Ladoo was a Caribbean novelist, who was the author of two books documenting the struggles of living in poverty in the Hindu communities of Trinidad and Tobago. He moved to Canada in 1968 and was mysteriously murdered while on a visit to Trinidad in 1973.
Rudranath Capildeo was an Trinidadian and Tobagonian politician and mathematician. He was a member of the prominent Hindu Indo-Trinidadian Capildeo family. He was the leader of the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) from 1960 to 1969 and the first Leader of the Opposition in the Parliament of the independent Trinidad and Tobago from 1962 to 1967. He was also a faculty member at the University of London, eventually holding the position of Reader of Mathematics. He was awarded the Trinity Cross, the nation's highest award, in 1969.
Guerrillas is a 1975 novel by V. S. Naipaul. The book is set on an unnamed, remote Caribbean island populated by a mix of ethnicities, but dominated by post-colonial British. Probably the island is modelled after Trinidad, Naipaul's birthplace.
Hinduism is the second largest religion in Trinidad and Tobago. Hindu culture arrived in 1845 in Trinidad and Tobago. According to the 2011 census there were 240,100 declared Hindus in Trinidad and Tobago. There are also various temples in Trinidad and Tobago to accommodate Hindus.
Caribbean literature is the literature of the various territories of the Caribbean region. Literature in English from the former British West Indies may be referred to as Anglo-Caribbean or, in historical contexts, as West Indian literature. Most of these territories have become independent nations since the 1960s, though some retain colonial ties to the United Kingdom. They share, apart from the English language, a number of political, cultural, and social ties which make it useful to consider their literary output in a single category. The more wide-ranging term "Caribbean literature" generally refers to the literature of all Caribbean territories regardless of language—whether written in English, Spanish, French, Hindustani, or Dutch, or one of numerous creoles.
Surya Vahni Priya Capildeo is a Trinidadian Scottish writer, and a member of the extended Capildeo family that has produced notable Trinidadian politicians and writers.
Trinidad and Tobago literature has its roots in oral storytelling among African slaves, the European literary roots of the French creoles and in the religious and folk tales of the Indian indentured immigrants. It blossomed in the 20th century with the writings of C.L.R. James, V.S. Naipaul and Saint Lucian-born Derek Walcott as part of the growth of West Indian literature.
The Loss of El Dorado, by the Nobel Prize winner V. S. Naipaul, is a history book about Venezuela and Trinidad. It was published in 1969. The title refers to the El Dorado legend.
Seepersad Naipaul was an Indo-Trinidadian writer. He was the father of V. S. Naipaul, Shiva Naipaul, Kamla Tewari, and Sati Bissoondath, and married into the influential Hindu Indo-Trinidadian Capildeo family.
British Indo-Caribbean people are residents of the United Kingdom who were born in the Caribbean and whose ancestors are indigenous to India. The UK has a large population of Indo-Caribbean people.
A Flag on the Island is a collection of short stories written by V.S. Naipaul, and first published by André Deutsch in 1967. It includes the title novella, "A Flag on the Island," outtakes from previous books such as "The Enemy", from Miguel Street, and pieces published in periodicals in Britain or the United States. The book is dedicated to Diana Athill.
Raymond R. Ramcharitar is a Trinidadian poet, playwright, fiction writer, historian and media and cultural critic.
Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul, commonly known as V. S. Naipaul and, familiarly, Vidia Naipaul, was a Trinidad and Tobago-born British writer of works of fiction and nonfiction in English. He is known for his comic early novels set in Trinidad, his bleaker novels of alienation in the wider world, and his vigilant chronicles of life and travels. He wrote in prose that was widely admired, but his views sometimes aroused controversy. He published more than thirty books over fifty years.
Kris Rampersad is a writer, researcher, lecturer, journalist, publisher, activist and advocate from Trinidad and Tobago.
Caribbean Voices was a radio programme broadcast by the BBC World Service from Bush House in London, England, between 1943 and 1958. It is considered "the programme in which West Indian literary talents first found their voice, in the early 1950s." Caribbean Voices nurtured many writers who went on to wider acclaim, including Samuel Selvon, Edward Kamau Brathwaite, V. S. Naipaul, Derek Walcott, John Figueroa, Andrew Salkey, Michael Anthony, Edgar Mittelholzer, Sylvia Wynter, and others.
The Mimic Men is a novel by V. S. Naipaul, first published by Andre Deutsch in the UK in 1967.
Selwyn Cudjoe is a Trinidad and Tobago academic, scholar, historian, essayist and editor who is Professor of Africana Studies at Wellesley College. He was also the Margaret E. Deffenbaugh and LeRoy T. Carlson Professor in Comparative Literature and the Marion Butler McClean Professor in the History of Ideas at Wellesley. His particular expertise is Caribbean literature and Caribbean intellectual history, and he teaches courses on the African-American literary tradition, African literature, black women writers, and Caribbean literature.
Nicholas Laughlin is a writer and editor from Trinidad and Tobago. He has been editor of The Caribbean Review of Books since 2004, and also edits the arts and travel magazine Caribbean Beat. He is the festival and programme director of the NGC Bocas Lit Fest, having worked alongside founder and managing director Marina Salandy-Brown since 2011.
Mohamed Ismith Khan, better known as Ismith Khan, was a Trinidad and Tobago-born American author and educator. He is best known for his novel The Jumbie Bird, a semi-autobiographical work which blends Indian and Afro-Caribbean mythology and experience to explore the creation of a new Indo-Caribbean identity.
One out of Many is a short story within an unconventionally formatted novel entitled In a Free State, written by V.S. Naipaul and originally published by André Deutsch in 1971. The protagonist, Santosh, is forced to give up his familiar life inside the stratified castes of India to move with his employer, now an Indian ambassador, to Washington D.C during the civil rights protests and commensurate "hippie era". Themes developed in the story reflect Santosh's abrupt displacement from a comfortable, life-long acclimation in India, to an alien environment in the United States, where his beliefs, perceptions, and sense of belonging are upended.
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