Al Creighton

2020 has been dedicated to the commemoration of 100 years since the termination of the system of indentureship in the Caribbean.

There were two very important items of interest to literature in the news over the last fortnight. 

Though there are those who create and perform for the love of it, because it is a hobby, or because they are in an environment where professional theatre is not developed, theatre around the world today is big business.

(Michael Jordan, Kamarang, Georgetown, published by Michael Jordan, 2017; with illustrations by Harold Bascom; 500pp.)

Throughout history, tales of the Indies were often as romantic and sensationally exotic in appeal as they were superficial, but today playwrights produce work of more depth.

During September, celebrated as the Indigenous Heritage month in Guyana, we are paying another visit to the unfathomable depths of Guyanese Amerindian literature. 

     III     There is a drum upon the plains of Maita Outside the cavern where he lived – a stone Hollowed to beat the mutter of the thunder Moving within the deep Brazilian sky.

The role of Oliver Samuels in Jamaican theatre and his influence on Caribbean theatre are worth noting.

Caribbean theatre began to experience very fundamental changes, formal developments, diversification, and other advancements from the end of the 1960s and through the 1970s.

Poetry Shimmering cloth, green and gold, in two hours she knits a scarf, every now and then she shows me her work unfolding perfectly, every movement poised and deft.

The Song of the Banana Man                                   Touris, white man, wipin his face, Met me in Golden Grove market place.

The culture of the contemporary Caribbean is multi-ethnic, or more importantly cross-cultural (according to Wilson Harris), and one can usually highlight the contributions of different ethnic groups.

Aagus maanin come again                              Aagus maanin jubilee Queen Victoria set we free Jubilee jubilee Queen Victoria jubilee .

At the end of May, the subject of Guyanese art as a label, concept, movement, or school was revisited.

Bastille Day – Georgetown                       Not wanting to deny, I believed it.

[Suite of 5 Poems]                                                       1.   Unwritten histories of human hearts Who knows one day the books will write themselves in magic language soon transforming us to image, symbol and the ultimate silence.

Jamaica                                                            I saw my land in the morning And O but she was fair The hills flared upwards scorning Death and failure here.

Among the most valued achievements of the Caribbean Press, while it flourished between 2009 and 2015, was the reprint of the early volumes of Kyk-Over-Al.

There is an important monument at the University of Guyana (UG) that was established years ago to honour historian Walter Rodney, who was assassinated on Friday, June 13, 1980 by a planted bomb in Georgetown.

It is not unusual on anniversaries to reflect on what is and what has gone before, and the independence commemoration is no different.