Extravagant Strangers : A Literature of Belonging - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0571192408 ISBN 13: 9780571192403

Publisher: Faber Paperbacks

Synopsis

Aiming to show that the "mongrelization" of Britain and British literature began well before the second half of the 20th century, this selection incorporates 18th-century black writers with direct experience of the slave trade, such as Ignatius Sancho and Olaudah Equiano. It also looks at white writers whose accident of birth took place in a British colony, resulting in a similar sense of ambivalence, whether in the jingoism of a Rudyard Kipling or the social commitment of a George Orwell. And it reflects the emergence of a group of writers who demonstrate the same mixture of attachment and detachment which marks them as products of the British Empire, including V.S. Naipaul and Linton Kwesi Johnson.

About this title

Review

Inglan is a bitch
dere's no escapin' it
Inglan is a bitch
dere's no runnin' whey fram it.

Linton Kwesi Johnson's is just one of the many perspectives on England collected together in Extravagant Strangers: A Literature of Belonging. As the title implies, the contributors come from "outside" of Britain. Johnson was born in Jamaica, and there are pieces by Rudyard Kipling and William Makepeace Thackeray (both born in India); Trinidadian V.S. Naipaul; New Zealander Katherine Mansfield; early slave narratives by Olaudah Equiano, Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, and Ignatius Sancho. There are also entries from the latest crop of non-British-born writers such as Salman Rushdie, Kazuo Ishiguro, and William Boyd, to name just a few. Edited by Caryl Phillips--himself an outsider, born in the West Indies--the collection attempts to identify just what it means to be British. As he writes in his introduction, "For British writers not born in Britain, the question of 'belonging' surfaces in their work in a variety of ways.... However, out of the tension between the individual and his or her society--in this case British--the finest writing is often produced."

Phillips points out that race, class, gender, and historical circumstances also affect the writer--obviously, the freed slave Ukawsaw Gronniosaw coming to England in the early 17th century would have a far different experience than the Anglo-Indian Kipling in the 19th century or the Japanese-born Ishiguro in the 20th. Nevertheless, there is something universal about all the experiences and observations noted here--from Thackeray's satirical exposé of British snobbery, "A Word About Dinners," to V.S. Naipaul's account of his first visit to England during which he "lost the gift of fantasy, the dream of the future, the far-off place where I was going." Extravagant Strangers is a fascinating exploration of British culture across time, race, and gender. It's also a terrific sampler of great writing, one that shouldn't be missed. --Alix Wilber

About the Author

Caryl Phillips was born in St Kitts, West Indies, in 1958. Brought up in England, he has written for television, radio, theatre and the screen.$$$He is the author of numerous books of fiction and non-fiction, including The Final Passage, Higher Ground, Cambridge, Crossing the River (shortlisted for the 1993 Booker Prize), The Nature of Blood, A State of Independence, Atlantic Sound and The European Tribe. He is also the editor of Extravagant Strangers and The Right Set, an anthology of writing on tennis. His adaptation of The Final Passage was directed by Peter Hall and screened by Channel Four. His awards include the Martin Luther King Memorial Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a James Tait Black Memorial Prize. Since 1998 he has been Professor of English and Henry R. Luce Professor of Migration and Social Order at Barnard College, Columbia University. He divides his time between homes in the UK and the USA.

Edition details

• Publisher: Faber Paperbacks
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0571192408
• ISBN 13: 9780571192403
• Binding: Paperback