Novel
A Quality of Violence
Andrew Salkey · 1959
Synopsis
In April 1900, in the east of Saint Thomas parish, an endless drought ruins the small planters, who think of emigrating. The Marshalls, who are thinking of leaving for Haiti, go one evening to question Brother Parkin and Cousin Biddy, who lived there for two years; the evocation of the island sets off Biddy's cries and Parkin's calm replies. Parkin leads them to a pocomania meeting, where Dada Johnson and his wife are to put an end to the scourge through their rites.
Context
The novel appeared in London in 1959 with New Authors, and its narrative is carried in the creole of the island. In 1974, Kamau Brathwaite devoted a very critical passage to it in an essay on the African presence in Caribbean literature, published by the journal Daedalus; the affair ended the friendship of the two men, who had together founded the Caribbean Artists Movement in London, and a letter from Brathwaite, between apology and defence, was published in 2026 by the journal of the Modern Language Association.
Who it is for
In English, with a narrative in Jamaican Creole; the long, violent worship scenes make it a gruelling read.
Prizes and reception
Its author's first novel, it remains at the heart of a debate on how to represent Afro-Caribbean cults.
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