Be part of Kincaid as she displays on life and literature at MacEwan Ballroom on Feb. 9 with the Calgary Distinguished Writers Program.
A report by Alex Handley for The College of Calgary.
It’s fairly a distance from the dusty, bustling streets of St. John’s, the capital metropolis of the small Caribbean Island of Antigua, to the quiet rural Most important Road of North Bennington, Vt. And for one girl who calls the New England city her dwelling at the moment, the area between the 2 — and the journey there — has been rather more than geographical.
Immediately she’s the well-known and revered writer and artist Jamaica Kincaid. And on Thursday, Feb. 9 she’s going to be part of the College of Calgary because the 2022-2023 Distinguished Visiting Author to supply the free public occasion An Night with Jamaica Kincaid. The night can be moderated by Giller Prize-winning writer and UCalgary professor of artistic writing Suzette Mayr.
“I’m so honoured to assist welcome Jamaica Kincaid to the College of Calgary as a part of the Calgary Distinguished Writers Program,” says Mayr. “She is likely one of the literary giants of our time.”
Born Elaine Potter Richardson in 1949, Jamaica Kincaid was simply 17 when she was despatched from her island dwelling to New York, leaving her household and the life she knew behind. She couldn’t know on the time that this primary journey would function a street map that might show longer, deeper and extra important to her future than any she had taken earlier than.
When the unknown is the higher choice
An solely baby till age 9, Kincaid was taught by her single mom to learn by age three. Curiously, all of the books her mom provided have been by, from, and about English authors: She was by no means launched to West Indian literature. And whereas the likelihood for attendance at college in Antigua was distant, it turned nearly not possible as her household dynamics shifted.
Three brothers arrived in fast succession. Within the tradition of her homeland, chores fell to Kincaid and her mom’s perspective underwent a dramatic change. Kincaid was now not somewhat lady to be nurtured; as a substitute, she has stated she turned an object of derision.
Kincaid discovered work as an au pair within the suburbs of New York Metropolis after which in Manhattan. Ultimately, she minimize contact with the world she had recognized in Antigua and adjusted her title to keep away from exposing herself and her household by way of her writing.
Discovering a voice by way of photos and phrases
Three years after arriving in New York, Kincaid took jobs in workplaces, picked up work as a mannequin, and even frolicked as a backup singer in a membership. Life in New York offered her with entry to all types of various folks, and Kincaid took the time to be taught from them.
It wasn’t till she found a ardour for pictures that she additionally started to search out her phrases. She drafted poetry to accompany her visible work, then moved to essays and columns in well-known publications similar to The New Yorker, The Village Voice, and Ingénue Journal. Her first printed work was an interview with Gloria Steinem, entitled After I was 17, about Steinem and her teenage experiences.
Writing from expertise is one thing Kincaid is thought for. Though her works, which embody poetry, articles, and books, are thought-about fiction, the fingerprints of her formative years (her relationship along with her mom, her upbringing in a spot the place colonialism was a distinguished issue within the lives of the islanders) are repeated themes.
Her most well-known work is A Small Place, an expansive essay by which she returns to Antigua and views her dwelling by way of an grownup lens. Different well-known works embody Lucy and Annie John, each items about teenage ladies who depart dwelling.
“I keep in mind studying Annie John for the very first time, and it fully modified my understanding of what writing could possibly be,” remembers Mayr. “Kincaid understood so absolutely what it was wish to be a younger girl coming of age. I’m additionally an individual of Caribbean heritage, and that ebook and her non-fiction ebook A Small Place gripped me of their description of place and the way place can influence the psyche.”
Sharing her experiences with UCalgary because the 2022-23 Distinguished Visiting Author
Immediately, Kincaid will be discovered at Harvard College, instructing within the Division of English and the Division of African and African American Research. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and has acquired a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Lannan Literary Award for Fiction, the Prix Femina Étranger, the Anisfield-Wolf Ebook Award, the Clifton Fadiman Medal, and the Dan David Prize for Literature.
And now, Jamaica Kincaid involves the College of Calgary as Distinguished Visiting Author. She joins a formidable listing of literary luminaries to have held this title, together with Lee Maracle, Neil Gaiman, Marlon James, Margaret Atwood, and Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and illustrator Artwork Spiegelman, amongst others.
“The Distinguished Visiting Author is enormously vital to Calgary’s literary group,” notes Clem Martini, appearing chair of the Calgary Distinguished Writers Program, host of the Feb. 9 occasion. “Due to the Calgary Distinguished Writers Program, authors of Jamaica Kincaid’s stature and expertise will be counted on every year to boost new views and ideas which in flip refresh and renew the literary dialogue.”
An Night with Jamaica Kincaid is free to attend however advance registration is required. Register to attend.