A 'Post-Post-Colonial' Take On The Violent Birth Of Modern Jamaica
Interview Highlights
On how the violence and turmoil led to the emergence of modern Jamaica
It's also important to know that part of that was also good. It wasn't all a nightmare. In fact, some incredibly progressive things came out of that time. It was also the time when reggae started to become a huge commercial force. And because of that, a lot of young people who would never have had opportunities otherwise went into music. It was also a really vital period and a very successful period for the Jamaican middle class.
So there was a lot of good that was happening in the '70s. There was just so much bad. And it was just so bloody, and the stakes were so high and the gunmen were running certainly west Kingston, bringing it to its knees. And politicians got involved because whoever won Kingston won Jamaica. And they fed into it, and they gave these men guns, and they had them fight over turf. And it was pretty bloody. [In] 1980, over 800 people died.
On describing himself as "post-post-colonial"
"Post-post-colonial" — and that's just because I can't think of something wittier right now — I think is a new generation of, well, new-ish generation of writers, where we're not driven by our dialogue with the former mother country [the United Kingdom]. The hovering power for us when growing up in the '70s and '80s was not the UK. It was the States, it was America. And it wasn't an imperialistic power, it was just a cultural influence. I'm sure if this book was written in the '70s or the '60s, the characters would have ended up in London. They wouldn't have ended up in the Bronx.
For us [as opposed to the post-colonial writers], for example, identity is not necessarily how to define ourselves in the relation of colonial power, colonial oppressor — so now it's a matter of defining who you are as opposed to who you're not.
Jamaica