Derek Walcott

by Edward Baugh

Overview

This succinct account the life of Nobel laureate Derek Walcott focuses on his development as poet, playwright and man of the theatre: director, producer, teacher. Friends and colleagues who figured in his career are recalled. The importance of his native St Lucia and family influences in the shaping of his creativity and his view of the world are highlighted, as these evolved in synergy with his receptivity to the poetry and theatre of the wider world. In this evolution, the tensions and complex nuances of the concept “home” are seen as an informing factor. The story points to Walcott’s seminal contribution to the emergence of Caribbean literature, with his response to the region’s colonial history as a central factor.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521556743
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	01/26/2012
Series:	Cambridge Studies in African and Caribbean Literature , #10
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	270
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.63(d)

About the Author

EDWARD BAUGH is Professor Emeritus of English, the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica. His publications on Walcott include Derek Walcott: Memory as Vision – “Another Life”, Derek Walcott and an annotated edition of Walcott’s Another Life (co-edited with Colbert Nepaulsingh). He is also the author of Frank Collymore: A Biography and the poetry collections A Tale from the Rainforest, It Was the Singing and Black Sand.

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CHAPTER 1

Derek Walcott has given words of caution for anyone who undertakes his biography. His essay “On Robert Lowell” begin: “Biographies of poets are hard to believe. The moment they are published they become fiction, subject to the same symmetry of plot, incident, dialogue as the novel. The inarticulate wisdom of really knowing another person is not in the broad sweep of that other person’s life but in its gestures; and when the biography is about a poet the duty of giving his life a plot makes the poetry the subplot.”1 Later in the essay Walcott writes, with reference to Lowell: “But we have all done awful things, and most biographies that show the frightening side of their subjects have a way of turning us into moral hypocrites” (Twilight, 97).

Table of Contents

Chronology; 1. Walcott, writing and the Caribbean: issues and directions; 2. Connections and separations: from 25 Poems to The Gulf; 3. 'What a man is:' Dream on Monkey Mountain and Other Plays, The Haitian Trilogy and Franklin; 4. 'Is there that I born:' Another Life, Sea Grapes, The Star-Apple Kingdom; 5. The challenge of change: the dramatist after Dream; 6. 'Here' and 'elsewhere,' 'word' and 'world:' The Fortunate Traveller, Midsummer, The Arkansas Testament; 7. Narrative variations: Omeros, The Odyssey, The Bounty, Tiepolo's Hound; 8. Homecoming: The Prodigal; Select bibliography; Index.

Editorial Reviews

Review of the hardback: 'Baugh presents a study of each of Walcott's published books and this volume can therefore be seen as a valuable introductory tool for students, scholars and readers of Walcott's work, as well as being useful to those engaged in Caribbean and postcolonial studies.' British Bulletin of Publications

From the Publisher