Review
"'George Lamming is one of the most important writers in the African diaspora, and one whose work has touched illuminatingly on significant aspects of colonialism, postcolonialism, and other matters vitally important to our comprehension of the worlds in which we live.' Michael Awkward"
Product Description
A reissue of classic work of Caribbean diaspora writing. This is a new addition to the "Pluto Classics" series. This is Lamming's first work of non-fiction, written during his self-imposed exile in Britain. Lamming's reputation is fast growing as students/academics realise the extent to which he anticipated a current debates in post-colonial studies. An ideal introduction to this brilliant and influential thinker, "The Pleasures of Exile", originally published in 1960, is a classic of Caribbean disapora writing. George Lamming is one of the major figures in late twentieth century literature: his novels - including "In the Castle of My Skin (1953)" - were part of the social, cultural, and political revolution of modern Black writing. This book was Lamming's first work of non-fiction. Written in 1960 during his self-imposed exile in Britain from his native Caribbean, Lamming explores many questions and themes of identity formation. Ranging broadly over cultural politics, he incorporates memoirs of his own experience of exile, as well as his travels across the Caribbean, West Africa and the USA. Drawing upon Shakespeare's "The Tempest" and C. L. R. James's "The Black Jacobins", as well as his own fiction and poetry, Lamming deftly locates the reader in a specific intellectual and cultural domain while conjuring a rich and varied spectrum of physical, intellectual, psychological and cultural responses to colonialism. This new edition, with a foreword by Bill Schwartz, makes a great introduction to a writer who was always far ahead of his time: written before the term 'post-colonial' was invented, the book explores the key issues that have become central to studies of modern literature today, including the politics of migration, cultural hybridity and minority discourse.
