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Georgetown Journal
416 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1972
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
August 20, 2023
This will be a fascinating read for anyone who has a keen interest in the history and politics of the modern Caribbean – and more specifically in the 'Burnham years' of the early 70s in Guyana. Otherwise, it's probably too specialist to hold the attention of a more general reader.
An incredibly detailed diary of Salkey's two-week trip to Guyana in 1970 as a guest of prime minister Forbes Burnham, it provides a revealing snapshot of a time when the Caribbean was trying to come to terms with the ideas of 'black power' and when its various new nation states were attempting to work out the best way to forge political systems and identities in the wake of independence.
In between attending official functions, conferences, theatre presentations, poetry readings and school visits, Salkey managed to arrange a number of interviews with various Guyanese figures, including Burnham himself and the opposition leader Cheddi Jagan, as well as with more ordinary subjects, some of whom remained anonymous.
Each of these conversations is produced at length, while there are also accounts of more informal encounters with Caribbean personalities of all stripes, from Sam Selvon and Earl Lovelace to Aubrey Williams and Jan Carew.
Overall one gets the sense that Salkey is in sympathy with Burnham, who has invited him to Guyana – along with a host of other writers and artists from the Caribbean diaspora – to mark the declaration of the country as a 'cooperative republic'.
However, he never allows himself to fall hook, line and sinker for Burnham's charm and rhetoric. Even though he's clearly impressed by the idea of a fresh beginning, with shirt-jacked ministers using a new kind of language and exhibiting a more informal attitude to the business of government, he's careful to hedge his enthusiasm with scepticism, and to give full voice to those who are not nearly so enthused by what is going on.
That he chooses to do so is just as well, given the terrible subsequent record of the Burnham government.
There are quite large sections of this 400+ page book that readers may choose to skip - I, for instance, had no wish to read any of the accounts of the proceedings of a specially convened convention of writers and artists in Georgetown. There are also inordinately long sections where Salkey quotes extracts from news stories in local papers.
But if you're prepared to dip in and out of what's provided, then you'll undoubtedly be rewarded with some great nuggets of information – and a sense of what was driving the Caribbean forward during that optimistic period.
An incredibly detailed diary of Salkey's two-week trip to Guyana in 1970 as a guest of prime minister Forbes Burnham, it provides a revealing snapshot of a time when the Caribbean was trying to come to terms with the ideas of 'black power' and when its various new nation states were attempting to work out the best way to forge political systems and identities in the wake of independence.
In between attending official functions, conferences, theatre presentations, poetry readings and school visits, Salkey managed to arrange a number of interviews with various Guyanese figures, including Burnham himself and the opposition leader Cheddi Jagan, as well as with more ordinary subjects, some of whom remained anonymous.
Each of these conversations is produced at length, while there are also accounts of more informal encounters with Caribbean personalities of all stripes, from Sam Selvon and Earl Lovelace to Aubrey Williams and Jan Carew.
Overall one gets the sense that Salkey is in sympathy with Burnham, who has invited him to Guyana – along with a host of other writers and artists from the Caribbean diaspora – to mark the declaration of the country as a 'cooperative republic'.
However, he never allows himself to fall hook, line and sinker for Burnham's charm and rhetoric. Even though he's clearly impressed by the idea of a fresh beginning, with shirt-jacked ministers using a new kind of language and exhibiting a more informal attitude to the business of government, he's careful to hedge his enthusiasm with scepticism, and to give full voice to those who are not nearly so enthused by what is going on.
That he chooses to do so is just as well, given the terrible subsequent record of the Burnham government.
There are quite large sections of this 400+ page book that readers may choose to skip - I, for instance, had no wish to read any of the accounts of the proceedings of a specially convened convention of writers and artists in Georgetown. There are also inordinately long sections where Salkey quotes extracts from news stories in local papers.
But if you're prepared to dip in and out of what's provided, then you'll undoubtedly be rewarded with some great nuggets of information – and a sense of what was driving the Caribbean forward during that optimistic period.
Displaying 1 of 1 review