- Source: Caribbean poetry
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Caribbean poetry is vast and rapidly evolving field of poetry written by people from the Caribbean region and the diaspora.
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. 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. Caribbean writers, performance poets, newspaper poets, singer-songwriters have created a popular art form, a poetry heard by audiences all over the world. Caribbean oral poetry shares the vigour of the written tradition.
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), Kamau Brathwaite, Edouard Glissant, Giannina Braschi, Lorna Goodison, Aimé Fernand Césaire, Linton Kwesi Johnson, Kwame Dawes, and Claudia Rankine.
Common themes include: exile and return to the motherland; the relationship of language to nation; colonialism and postcolonialism; self-determination and liberty; racial identity.
Caribbean epic poetry
Derek Walcott's Omeros (1990) is one of the most renowned epic poems of the 20th century and of the Caribbean. 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. 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.
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. 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. 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.
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.
Caribbean poets by country
Grouped by territory of birth or upbringing.
= Anguilla
=Patricia J. Adams
Bankie Banx
Rita Celestine-Carty
= Barbados
=Kamau Brathwaite
Frank Collymore
George Lamming
Anthony Kellman
Paterika Hengreaves (Patricia Hendy)
Claudia Rankine
= Cuba
=Roberto Fernández Retamar
Nicolás Guillén
Lezama Lima
José Martí
Nancy Morejon
Jorge Enrique González Pacheco
= Dominica
=Phyllis Shand Allfrey
= Dominican Republic
=Rafael Nino Féliz
Blas Jiménez
Pedro Mir
Chiqui Vicioso
= Guyana
=John Agard
Martin Carter
Mahadai Das
Mark McWatt
Grace Nichols
= Haiti
=René Depestre
Félix Morisseau-Leroy
Jacques Roumain
= Jamaica
=Louise Bennett
Jean "Binta" Breeze
Michelle Cliff
Kwame Dawes
Lorna Goodison
Ishion Hutchinson
Linton Kwesi Johnson
Ann-Margaret Lim
Una Marson
Claude McKay
Kei Miller
Mutabaruka
Oku Onuora
Claudia Rankine
Andrew Salkey
Olive Senior
Mikey Smith
= Martinique
=Nicole Cage
Aimé Césaire
Edouard Glissant
= Montserrat
=Howard Fergus
E. A. Markham
Yvonne Weekes
= Puerto Rico
=Julia de Burgos
Giannina Braschi
Luis Pales Matos
Mara Pastor
= St Lucia
=Adrian Augier
Kendel Hippolyte
Vladimir Lucien
Derek Walcott
= St Martin
=Fabian Adekunle Badejo
Charles Borromeo Hodge
Drisana Deborah Jack
Laurelle "Yaya" Richards
Lasana M. Sekou
= St Vincent and the Grenadines
=Cecil Browne
Shake Keane
N. C. Marks
Philip Nanton
Cecil “Blazer” Williams
= The Bahamas
=Marion Bethel
Christian Campbell
Telcine Turner-Rolle
Nicolette Bethel
Patricia Glinton-Meicholas
= Trinidad & Tobago
=Lauren K. Alleyne
Vahni Capildeo
Anthony Joseph
John La Rose
M. NourbeSe Philip
Roger Robinson
Further reading
Arnold, James. A History of Literature in the Caribbean v. I and II. Philadelphia/Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. (2001)
Breiner, Laurence A. An Introduction to West Indian Poetry, Cambridge University Press, 1998.
Brown, Lloyd. West Indian Poetry. Boston: Twayne, 1978.
Bryan, Beverley. Teaching Caribbean Poetry. London: Routledge, 2014.
Jenkins, Lee Margaret. The Language of Caribbean Poetry. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004.
Müller, Timo (2016). "Forms of Exile: Experimental Self-Positioning in Postcolonial Caribbean Poetry". Atlantic Studies. 13 (4): 457–471. doi:10.1080/14788810.2016.1220790. S2CID 152181840.
Perisic, Alexandra. Precarious Crossings: Immigration, Neoliberalism, and the Atlantic. The Ohio State University Press.(2019) ISBN 9780814214107
= Selected anthologies
=James Berry, Bluefoot Traveller, London: Limestone Publications, 1976.
Stewart Brown, Caribbean Poetry Now, 1984.
Paula Burnett, The Penguin Book of Caribbean Verse in English, 1986.
Stewart Brown, Mervyn Morris, Gordon Rohlehr (eds), Voiceprint: An Anthology of Oral and Related Poetry from the Caribbean, 1989.
E. A. Markham, Hinterland: Caribbean Poetry from the West Indies and Britain, Newcastle upon Tyne: Bloodaxe, 1989.
Stewart Brown and Ian McDonald (eds), The Heinemann Book of Caribbean Poetry, 1992.
Anthony Kellman (ed.), Crossing Water: Contemporary Poetry from the English-Speaking Caribbean, NY: Greenfield Review Press, 1992.
Stewart Brown, Mark McWatt (eds), The Oxford Book of Caribbean Verse, 2005.
Lasana M. Sekou (ed.), Where I See The Sun – Contemporary Poetry in St. Martin, 2013.
Lasana M. Sekou (ed.), Where I See The Sun – Contemporary Poetry in Anguilla. St. Martin: House of Nehesi Publishers, 2015.
Lasana M. Sekou (ed.), Where I See the Sun – Contemporary Poetry in The Virgin Islands (Tortola, Virgin Gorda, Anegada, Jost Van Dyke). St. Martin: House of Nehesi Publishers, 2016.
See also
Caribbean literature
Dub poetry
Nation language
Postcolonial literature
Cuban literature
Puerto Rican poetry
References
External links
"Caribbean Poetry". VCU.