The Burt Caribbean Award for Young Adult Literature and our Authentic Voices: a much needed sponsor

 

I promised a comment on the Burt Caribbean Award for this next blog and yet thoughts on 'own voices' pull at me. Having thought about it some more, I find they are intertwined. As our young people move from childhood to the distractions of the teenage years, the period of further development of the self concept, bombarded by social media and  media in general, they need a cultural  anchor for this journey towards adulthood. I am not for one moment suggesting that we miss out on the exciting Divergent series, the emotionally engaging Hunger Games series, nor even the Nancy Drew/Hardy Boy books which, in fact, by now they have probably out grown. There are wonderful new and exciting books out there, books galore, books like sand. 

This is where the Burt Caribbean Award for Young Adult literature came in. I have enjoyed these books, become overawed at the ideas, the gorgeous language, the sway of emotions. And then suddenly the euphoria was over! It ended! I believe it was decided that money be directed instead to indigenous writers in Canada. ( Please correct me if this is wrong). I applaud this. It’s not my business, but I have wondered how the indigenous people of North America have been 'abandoned' for so long. I once created a bit of excitement at an overseas conference in the USA by asking a question about the country not supporting their development more. Chaos erupted! Shouting from people at the back and the front of the room. (On occasion I have been known to be carried away with emotion and done things like this.) When I explained to some Jamaican officers later, one said, “Then, Diane, you come to mash up the people’s country.”  "No," said I, "but this is not right." You know, Jamaican  righteous indignation. So I am overjoyed for this move. Not the same country, nor the same First Nations, but you get the drift.

So, guys, why can’t somebody here in the Caribbean be convinced to be a replacement sponsor for that award? Everybody supports adult writing. Brilliant! But are we going to treat YA writing like we have done with children’s for years. Adolescence is when our young people explore, interrogate values, attitudes, cultural norms. This is when they begin to become the adults they will be. So we say, 'what a way the teachers migrate, eh', 'what a way the nurses migrate eh', and so on.  Big time Brain Drain! However, people have always migrated from island nations, for economic reasons, more opportunities, but some stay. Some even go to study abroad and come back ( I did); the ebb and flow of island life. But what if, exposed to more YA literature, more caught the spirit of our lives, and wanted to contribute more of  themselves than remittances! What a something, eh! No, I’m not knocking remittances. People from developing countries all over the world go abroad to work to send money, barrels home. 

You are going to say that nobody can prove that reading your own literature as a young adult made a difference to the adult you became. Well, you can do a research paper on attitudes, values and behaviours  if you wish, to see what you can find out. We have enough Burt Award books for you to do that.

I’m not asking for any big prizes. Just give a first prize, if that’s all you can do. There must be a company, a trust, a 'somebody' that can do this. If I was wealthy I would do it in a heartbeat. Our own authentic voices call to our young people to let them know what we have achieved, what they can achieve. They can’t hear them if they can’t get the books, right?

So my next blog will identify some of the things I learnt from the Burt Award books that I never knew before, or things that I liked, engaged my emotions; or even those that made me wish I could write like that. Working on the cliff hangers!

 

 

Young Adult Books and the Burt Award for the Caribbean

I thought I was going to be more organized and post regularly. In my defense there have been a number of passings of great people ( family or family friends) who contributed to Jamaica and the Caribbean, and we had to go to the funerals. Four in two months takes its emotional toll. And we must believe that indeed there are younger ones who will follow in their footsteps, even if they cannot fill their shoes.

I was most disturbed to read that the Burt Awards for the Caribbean YA books/stories will be discontinued due to the passing of the donor, and the decision of those in control of those purse springs to spend the money in other ways.  I am very, very sad about this. Wonderful work has been produced and my heart has been filled with joy over the talent displayed; and many of the writers are  young. No, Nancy Drew and company cannot replace them, as some have said. No, these are first class books and should be in every school, for reading, for discussion (no, not as set books), but to be recognized as recordings of our times and for knowledge and most of all, enjoyment.  A book for enjoyment? Yes, indeed! If our young people haven't found this out yet what a pleasure they have missed.

I plan to write a few words about the ones I've read (I haven't been able to access all) not a review really, but what I liked about them, the reason why I hope that Bocas Lit will find another sponsor. I will start with Gone to Drift, written by Diana McCaulay. It was a review by me, but more from the point of view of how it affected me, rather than a scholarly approach. I had posted this at a previous time, but it's more relevant to post it again here, as it will inform future postings about the other books .

In praise of "Gone to Drift" by Diana McCaulay: 

 

Prize Winner Burt Award for Caribbean  Literature, 2015:  Papillote  Press, 2016

 

This is a beautiful book. If it were a painting it would be in tones of grey and shades of blue for the sea, and for the land,  tones of beige and green, with splashes of colour added by the people who travel across its landscape. And I would buy it instantly for fear of losing it.  

This may seem like a strange way to begin a book review, and maybe this is not really an actual book review; maybe it’s more like in praise of good writing, a good story, and the environment. This last may seem too obvious to mention because we know that the author is a well known environmentalist. However, this book is not just an opportunity to recognize the importance of the environment; it is a hymn to it. You cannot read this story and come away unmoved by the significance of our environment and its importance to the characters in the story, and  to the island. 

The setting is the environment; more specifically the sea. The characters and  the sea are entwined in a dance, an embrace, which we  soon understand, can at any given time act  in favour of the human characters, or not.  It is this overarching character,  the sea, unmoved one way or the other by all that is happening,  and bearing  no animosity to anyone, that  forms the backdrop to this story.  This sea can bring you a bounty, yet you can get lost in it, gone to drift. 

 

Of the two main human characters, one is Lloyd, a young boy, who is worried about his grandfather, who has not returned from a fishing trip, in what  Llloyd perceives as good time. None of the other characters, mainly fisher families, Lloyd’s family, those who interact with them along the various coastal areas, seem to be very worried. You are left to wonder if, as they suggest, that perhaps there is nothing wrong;  Lloyd is unduly anxious. On the other hand, you wonder if it is that they do not wish to make Llloyd feel any more worried than he is. You fear that they know something that he does not, that they are not telling him the whole truth. 

The other character is Gramps, Lloyd’s grandfather, whose voice Lloyd can hear  in his head, “I come from a line of fishermen.”  This is as powerful as if the statement were, “I come from a  line of kings.” We believe this, a line of greatness.  

 Gramps  also tells his story.  And so we have the two stories, Lloyd looking for his grandfather, using any means necessary, his good friend, Dwight, the Coastguard, Jules, the lady who cares about the dolphins, his mother, his ne’re-do-well father, his grandfather’s friends; and Gramps’  story of his own father, his many brothers, all fishermen, and his mother. We come to care about Gramps’ family, as well as for Lloyd, whose determination and bravery in his search for Gramps often astounds us.  

It eventually dawns on us that Gramps is not on any of the main cays off the coast of the island,  but is stranded on what seems to be  a mere rock in the sea. The tension is created  not only by Lloyd’s search for his grandfather, the question of how  dolphins fit into this scenario, and whether his grandfather can be found in time, but also by seeing the  old man himself wondering how long he can survive on little crabs and rain water, the latter coming  sporadically.   

The author uses the device of alternate chapters for each of these two human characters, so that we can measure Lloyd’s attempts against the will of his grandfather to survive. It works; we are not distracted; rather, we  are caught up in the emotion of the situation.  

The language is measured, like a tale told on dark nights by lantern light, increasing  the feeling of  being at the mercy of the elements.  Descriptions are rich, as  seen in Gramps recollection of a sunrise.  

Then I realised that  I could see my hands and feet as a grey light stole across the sea. And to the east I saw the sky turning into a hundred different colours from the blue of a summer day to the dark purple of the thickest squall, from the pale pink of the inside of a conch shell to the bright orange of a ripe mango, until the round ball of the sun itself came up and the colours of the  sky spread over the water and even warmed our faces. I knew then that the best place to see a sunrise was at  sea.

It is for this reason alone that you cannot hurry through this book. Even as the mystery deepens, you need to stop to see what the characters see, to feel what they feel.

 Then, suddenly you may be caught unawares, by an intervention into this beauty, alerting you to  danger, which may be lurking, as in Gramps’ description of his brothers going to sea: 

It was late when they left and I thought the night was darker than usual.  We stood on the beach and watched them go. The boats made a ragged triangle formation, like a flock of birds, and for a few seconds their wakes were visible. Then they pierced the night and disappeared.

 

And you understand  in the sameness of their going to sea, the routines of their lives, the power of  nature, of the dark, of the night, of the sea.

The dialogue, which is a mixture of standard Jamaican English, and what I like to call a modified Creole, is well handled. It effectively represents  the mother tongue of our people, but does not become so deep as to make it difficult to read, or for the book  to travel to other countries. From Lloyd to his grandfather, to Jules the uptown girl, their voices ring true.  And this use of language, this love and respect for the sea, for the creatures of the sea, bridges what could be social differences and makes us one. 

Consequently, just as you come to respect the environment,  you come to respect the people who depend on the sea, and their way of life. The author does not allow you to feel any  pity for the difficulty of their lives.  This is a great skill, to describe another life with empathy. You may even begin to think that like Lloyd and his grandfather,  these people are the salt of the earth, or the sea, their nobility in facing the dangers of the sea  surpassing those who make a safe living from the land. And then the author brings you back to reality. These people are no better or worse than people anywhere. They have their nobility, they have their heroes and their villains, and their awful betrayals. 

This coming of age story of a boy called Lloyd, who loves his grandfather,  will leave many wondering about the meaning of it all, and yet Lloyd must make sense of it. 

This book should be read in all schools. To say that a book should be read in schools, makes it sound like a textbook, or the over-worked literature set-books. However, I would want all our young people to read it, to discuss it, and  that seems to be the only way to get it to them. This is a beautiful book!

 

More authors who read in schools for Child Month 2016

Melanie Schwapp:

I read at Holy Childhood Prep. School to the Kindergarten classes. I read Abigail’s Glorious Hair by Diane Browne and ‘Lally-May’s Farm Suss’ written by me.  

Abigail’s Glorious Hair sparked a lively discussion about hair and the joys and stresses of combing it. Many of the girls were thrilled to show that they had the same hairstyle as Abigail. Some of the boys expounded on going to the barber and the fact that they did not have to comb their hair every day.

 

Lally-May’s episode with the rolling half and Jonkanoo had them mesmerised and a little frightened, because many of them had never heard of the myth of the rolling calf, and only a handful had ever seen Jonkanoo. Again, a lively discussion of ‘scary’ things and how brave they were when they had to face frightening things. A few of the boys demonstrated some karate moves that they would use to fight the Jonkanoo if ever faced with the Lally-May scenario. 

Bio: 

 

Melanie Schwapp was born in Kingston, Jamaica. She attended Montego Bay High School in St. James from 1st to 5th form, then was enrolled in St. Andrew High School for Girls in 1982 to sit her A’level exams.

Two short migrations at two key stages of her life, opened Melanie’s eyes to the cultural and social discriminations in society, and thus began her quest for understanding through writing. At the age of five she moved to England with her family, where she was awakened to the nature of colour prejudice, and then during her late teens and early twenties, she attended the University of South Carolina, where the subtle traits of discrimination cemented her interest in the social repercussions of these prejudices.

 

Although Melanie has written recreationally all her life, her first published work was a children’s book, Lally-May’s Farm Suss in 2005 in which she revives a Jamaican myth and several cultural aspects through the eyes of a child. Her second publication was the novel Dew Angels in 2011 where she explores the hidden aspect of prejudice and other social handicaps in Jamaican society. Having fallen in love with the rural lifestyle while growing up on her

grandparents’ farm in Montego Bay, Melanie also does small garden landscaping and interior decorating. She is a devoted mother to her three children and a sometimes devoted wife to her husband. She resides in Kingston.

 

 

 

Diana McCaulay:

  I read at Hopefield Prep on May 9th from my new YA novel Gone to Drift, which placed second in the CODE Burt Prize for Caribbean literature and won the Lignum Vitae Vic Reid Award, both in 2015. The children seemed to enjoy the reading – they were very engaged and had lots of questions.

Bio:

Diana McCaulay is an award winning Jamaican writer and a lifelong resident of its capital city Kingston.  She has written two critically acclaimed novels, Dog-Heart (March 2010) and Huracan (July 2012), published by Peepal Tree Press in the United Kingdom.  Dog-Heart won a Gold Medal in the Jamaica Cultural Development Commission’s National Creative Writing Awards (2008), was shortlisted for the Guyana Prize (2011), the IMPAC Dublin Award (2012) and the Saroyan Prize for International Writing (2012).   Huracan was also shortlisted for the 2014 Saroyan Prize. Her third novel, Gone to Drift (February 29, 2016) is published by Papilote Press, placed second in the Burt Prize for Caribbean Literature and won the Lignum Vitae Vic Reid Award in 2015. 

Diana won the Hollick Arvon Prize for Caribbean writing in 2014, for her non fiction work-in-progress Loving Jamaica: a memoir of place and (not) belonging. 

Diana founded the Jamaica Environment Trust (JET) in 1991 and still serves as its CEO and guiding force.   She was a popular newspaper columnist for The Gleaner (1994-2001) and her short fiction has been published by the journal Eleven Eleven, Granta On Line, Fleeting Magazine, The Caribbean Writer, Afro-Beat, Lifestyle Magazine and the Jamaica Observer’s literary supplement, Bookends.  She was the regional winner of the Commonwealth Short Story Prize in 2012, for her short story The Dolphin Catchers.  

Diana was born into the Jamaican upper-middle class and has spent a lifetime pondering questions of race, class, colour, and privilege in Jamaican society.  The honest and penetrating insights in her novels and stories come from sharp observation and profound self-reflection.  Hers is a uniquely authentic voice from a background which usually turns away from all that she unflinchingly faces.

 (I am having all sorts of challenges with the font, as I capture the words of the authors. So apologies for that, but I think you will enjoy what they have to say, what motivates them. I love hearing why authors write what they write.)

 

 

In praise of "Gone to Drift" by Diana McCaulay:

 

Prize Winner Burt Award for Caribbean  Literature, 2015:  Papillote  Press, 2016

This is a beautiful book. If it were a painting it would be in tones of grey and shades of blue for the sea, and for the land,  tones of beige and green, with splashes of colour added by the people who travel across its landscape. And I would buy it instantly for fear of losing it.

This may seem like a strange way to begin a book review, and maybe this is not really an actual book review; maybe it’s more like in praise of good writing, a good story, and the environment. This last may seem too obvious to mention because we know that the author is a well known environmentalist. However, this book is not just an opportunity to recognize the importance of the environment; it is a hymn to it. You cannot read this story and come away unmoved by the significance of our environment and its importance to the characters in the story, and  to the island.

The setting is the environment; more specifically the sea. The characters and  the sea are entwined in a dance, an embrace, which we  soon understand, can at any given time act  in favour of the human characters, or not.  It is this overarching character,  the sea, unmoved one way or the other by all that is happening,  and bearing  no animosity to anyone, that  forms the backdrop to this story.  This sea can bring you a bounty, yet you can get lost in it, gone to drift.

Of the two main human characters, one is Lloyd, a young boy, who is worried about his grandfather, who has not returned from a fishing trip, in what  Llloyd perceives as good time. None of the other characters, mainly fisher families, Lloyd’s family, those who interact with them along the various coastal areas, seem to be very worried. You are left to wonder if, as they suggest, that perhaps there is nothing wrong;  Lloyd is unduly anxious. On the other hand, you wonder if it is that they do not wish to make Llloyd feel any more worried than he is. You fear that they know something that he does not, that they are not telling him the whole truth.

The other character is Gramps, Lloyd’s grandfather, whose voice Lloyd can hear  in his head, “I come from a line of fishermen.”  This is as powerful as if the statement were, “I come from a  line of kings.” We believe this, a line of greatness.

 Gramps  also tells his story.  And so we have the two stories, Llloyd looking for his grandfather, using any means necessary, his good friend, Dwight, the Coastguard, Jules, the lady who cares about the dolphins, his mother, his ne’re-do-well father, his grandfather’s friends; and Gramps’  story of his own father, his many brothers, all fishermen, and his mother. We come to care about Gramps’ family, as well as for Lloyd, whose determination and bravery in his search for Gramps often astounds us.

It eventually dawns on us that Gramps is not on any of the main cays off the coast of the island,  but is stranded on what seems to be  a mere rock in the sea. The tension is created  not only by Lloyd’s search for his grandfather, the question of how  dolphins fit into this scenario, and whether his grandfather can be found in time, but also by seeing the  old man himself wondering how long he can survive on little crabs and rain water, the latter coming  sporadically. 

The author uses the device of alternate chapters for each of these two human characters, so that we can measure Lloyd’s attempts against the will of his grandfather to survive. It works; we are not distracted; rather, we  are caught up in the emotion of the situation.

The language is measured, like a tale told on dark nights by lantern light, increasing  the feeling of  being at the mercy of the elements.  Descriptions are rich, as  seen in Gramps recollection of a sunrise.

Then I realised that  I could see my hands and feet as a grey light stole across the sea. And to the east I saw the sky turning into a hundred different colours from the blue of a summer day to the dark purple of the thickest squall, from the pale pink of the inside of a conch shell to the bright orange of a ripe mango, until the round ball of the sun itself came up and the colours of the  sky spread over the water and even warmed our faces. I knew then that the best place to see a sunrise was at  sea.

It is for this reason alone that you cannot hurry through this book. Even as the mystery deepens, you need to stop to see what the characters see, to feel what they feel.

 Then, suddenly you may be caught unawares, by an intervention into this beauty, alerting you to  danger, which may be lurking, as in Gramps’ description of his brothers going to sea:

It was late when they left and I thought the night was darker than usual.  We stood on the beach and watched them go. The boats made a ragged triangle formation, like a flock of birds, and for a few seconds their wakes were visible. Then they pierced the night and disappeared.

And you understand  in the sameness of their going to sea, the routines of their lives, the power of  nature, of the dark, of the night, of the sea.

The dialogue, which is a mixture of standard Jamaican English, and what I like to call a modified Creole, is well handled. It effectively represents  the mother tongue of our people, but does not become so deep as to make it difficult to read, or for the book  to travel to other countries. From Lloyd to his grandfather, to Jules the uptown girl, their voices ring true.  And this use of language, this love and respect for the sea, for the creatures of the sea, bridges what could be social differences and makes us one.

Consequently, just as you come to respect the environment,  you come to respect the people who depend on the sea, and their way of life. The author does not allow you to feel any  pity for the difficulty of their lives.  This is a great skill, to describe another life with empathy. You may even begin to think that like Lloyd and his grandfather,  these people are the salt of the earth, or the sea, their nobility in facing the dangers of the sea  surpassing those who make a safe living from the land. And then the author brings you back to reality. These people are no better or worse than people anywhere. They have their nobility, they have their heroes and their villains, and their awful betrayals.

This coming of age story of a boy called Lloyd, who loves his grandfather,  will leave many wondering about the meaning of it all, and yet Llloyd must make sense of it.

This book should be read in all schools. To say that a book should be read in schools, makes it sound like a textbook, or the over-worked literature set-books. However, I would want all our young people to read it, to discuss it, and that seems to be the only way to get it to them. This is a beautiful book.

 

Despatches: Caribbean Digital Publishing Conference and Jamaican Literary Awards

The week of November 2 was a splendid one for writers, writing and publishing. First there was the JAMCOPY (Jamaican Copyright Licensing Agency) Onlinemind Caribbean Digital Publishing Conference, November 2-5, at the Pegasus Hotel. Presentations were made by Jamaicans, persons from other Caribbean territories and overseas (outside of the Caribbean). Excellent organization and execution. All presentations I attended were really interesting and informative.

What did I take away from this conference and how might this affect children’s books and writers?  First, it solidified digital publishing in my mind.  Maybe it was just that I was ready; when the student is ready the teacher will appear sort of scenario.

So to all children’s publishers and textbook publishers, you need to  engage meaningfully with this technology at some time, even if you are convinced that Jamaicans will be using print books for ages, since we won’t be able to afford tablets for all children. One presenter felt that children’s picture books were actually better as print books. Normally, I would have felt a surge of validation by this statement. This time I found it merely an interesting comment.

I found two sessions had a major impact  on me and made the entire conference worth my while. One was Born Digital: Creating an e-Book, with Troy Weekes of EZLearner Inc , Barbados. Mr. Weekes showed us how to produce an e-book using templates. Wonderful! And even though I managed to lose my e-book at the end of the session (these things happen while using technology) clearly I had been made confident enough to replicate the activity the next day without losing it. So I have been greatly empowered, even if I do not get to the point of being able to turn one of my children’s stories into an e-book myself. And who knows now? 

The other was Re-imagining Content for the Caribbean Classroom. This was presented by Allman Town Primary, a school for which I have a big soft spot as I had done some research there while doing my MEd.  The vibrant Principal, Mrs. Crooks-Smith, declared that they do not say that Allman Town is an inner city school, but rather it is a school in an inner city area. Important change of focus towards great expectations, eh. The children have been encouraged to create learning for themselves using technology. Students, looking smart in their navy blazers over the normal khaki uniform, explained how they used technology, how they created their own computer games.  For those who know me, I was blown away, sort of in heaven on earth. I thought of best practice being replicated, videos of their achievements to be sent all around the island, etc. (these are all ideas which the Ministry itself has for various aspects of education). So there is hope; always there is hope. Our children can be brilliant wherever they are if the right environment is provided. My take away from this was children, whatever their circumstances, can be  interacting with technology. I know; why has it taken so long for the penny to drop for me? The children in my latest YA novel (at final editing/reconciling stage) are still not interacting with cell phones, because their parents don’t want them to.  (My grandchildren, younger than my protagonists, have a tablet between them - still no cell phones though). Hmm. So I will have to bring technology more meaningfully into my stories. That is, allow the protagonist to interact with it rather than have grown-ups controlling all access. I’ll think about this carefully, because some control is still needed in this world  of too much technological freedom, which can lead to serious trouble. Nonetheless, it was a revelation to me that I needed a change of mind.

 

 

Lignum Vitae Awards: Then on November 6 we had the Lignum Vitae Awards for Literature. The Awards consist of The Una Marson Award for adult literature, won by Donna Hemans; the Vic Reid for young adult literature, won by Diana McCaulay (a former pupil of mine at secondary – rather nice - and also winner of a number of writing awards  since she came onto the world stage a few years ago), and the Jean D’Costa  Award for children's, won by Janet Morrison. The Vic Reid and Una Marson had originated with the National Book Development Council, but had not been awarded for some years. The Jamaican Writers Society (JaWS), along with JAMCOPY, decided to resuscitate them, and to give an additional award for the under twelves, thus making the Vic Reid become a YA award.

‘Una Marson was a poet playwright and journalist and coordinator of the seminal radio programme, BBC’s Caribbean Voices’. My grandmother acted in one of her plays staged at the Ward Theatre here in Kingston, and I have a playbill with all their photos. My fifteen minutes of historical glory. I’m actually very proud of that.

Vic Reid wrote fiction about significant aspects of our history for young adult readers, which can be also be  read by the under twelves.  His books are often found on schools’ literature book lists.

Jean D’Costa’s well known children’s books are also on schools’ literature lists, and she is the only one who is alive. She was a judge as well as the guest speaker. I was struck by her pointing out that we all have stories, and that there are so many stories to be told about Jamaica, in Jamaica.  That’s an important fact for children’s writers to embrace.

The prize money is actually quite significant, more in keeping with awards around the world. The competition is to be held every other year.  So we now have our writing awards again and  there are two for children’s literature. Children’s writers, we can’t complain. The majority of the entries were for the Una Marson award. I hope that we see a significant change in that in the future. Children’s writers, you have time to write your YA novel or children’s stories/novel for the next competition. Grab the opportunity and write.

 

Photos of Awards from the top: Above  centre: the winners: Janet Morrison, Jean D'Costa Award; Donna Hemans, Una Marson Award; Diana McCaulay, Vic Reid Award

Above left: Me giving Diana her award

Next above left:Jean D'Costa

Above centre: Tanya Batson Savage, Chair JaWS; Scarlette Beharie, publicist; Kalilah Enriquez, Vice Chair, JaWS; Diane Browne, Board Member

Despatches: great news for Jamaican/Caribbean literature: recognition and prizes galore

Obviously the big news for children’s writers is the result of the inaugural Burt Award for Young Adult literature in the Caribbean, announced at the Bocas Lit Fest in Trinidad and Tobago. The winner of the first prize is A-dZiko Simba  Gegele (Jamaica),  for her book All Over Again, published by the young publisher, Tanya Batson-Savage of Blue Moon Publishing/Blouse and Skirt Books.  As I have said in previous posts, I love A-dZiko’s style. It is wonderfully lyrical. She is also a storyteller and a poet, so that she actually seems to perform her stories.  Congratulations to both A-dZiko  and Tanya. The other winners were Joanne Hillhouse (Antigua), second, for  her unpublished manuscript, Musical Youth, and  third,  Colleen Smith-Dennis (Jamaica), for her book, Inner City Girl (LMH Publishing). Again, I have liked this book from it came out; it is full of suspense. That two Jamaican books were in the top three is great. It’s not great because it’s  promoting Jamaica in the Caribbean, and the world, although that has merit; it’s great because it’s  promoting Jamaican literature  to Jamaicans. Perhaps for  them children’s/ young adult literature  will have some currency now.  At least, I hope so.
 

And as if that's not enough, late breaking news (after the first draft of this blog was written), I see in the Sunday Observer today that Jamaican, Diana McCaulay has won the 2014 Hollick Arvon Caribbean Writers Prize (administered by Bocas Lit Fest) for her work in progress , Loving Jamaica. So this is even  greater, or our cup runneth over. Congratulations to Diana, whose last book, Huracan, I really love.

Then right here at home, Professor Emeritus Mervyn Morris  is our new Poet Laureate, the first  after 61 years.  Congratulations to Professor Morris who clearly so  richly deserves this recognition.  Moreover, for us to have this post again after an absence of 61 years, suggests that we are once more going to take this aspect of literature very seriously. One of Professor Morris’ tasks will be to promote poetry around the island, and I look forward to his promoting it in our secondary schools and teacher’s colleges, as I have no doubt he will. There is so much for our adolescents to discover and enjoy  in this world of literature.

Martin Henry, a columnist whose work I enjoy,  had  an article, Arts, technics, education and society in the Sunday Gleaner of April 20, 2014, in which he talked  about Professor Mervyn Morris’ appointment and the significance of the arts to the society. Naturally, literacy and literature were mentioned, and I quote, “Literacy is then the gateway into the literature (broadly defined) of the children’s culture (broadly defined from world to community), a tool for producing their own creative content, and a navigational instrument for finding their way about the world.”   He concludes, “I am aware of one very prestigious business school which teaches critical thinking, problem solving and decision making through literature and drama. These are the very skills of mind which schoolchildren and university youth must be  helped to develop through balanced exposure to the arts and sciences, . . . Civilized citizens make better workers. But civilization is an end in itself – and a desirable one.”

I do hope that those who have the power to make decisions to support and sponsor the arts and literature will recognize the significance of  Martin Henry’s piece. I am hopeful,  I am encouraged that with the appointment of Professor Mervyn Morris and the Burt Award going to A-dZiko Simba Gegele,  and another Jamaican, Diana McCaulay, winning this major literary prize, we will know yet again, that we too can write in abundance. And great advances will be made in our island towards the recognition of the civilizing effect of literature, or at the very least, the joy it can add to our lives.

(photos taken from the Sunday Observer, April 27, 2014,  and the Sunday Gleaner, April 20, 2014)