Biographer Delia Jarrett-Macauley stumbled across Marson's name while doing research for another book. The book has been well-received throughout Britain. Copies have sold out during every one of Jarrett-Macauley's book-signings and scheduled talks. "I saw this clipping that said, `Una Marson, the well-known BBC producer is now on holiday in Jamaica.' And I said: `What! You mean we had a black woman producer at the BBC as early as 1945 and we don't know about it.' I decided her story must be known," she said. Marson joined the BBC in 1936 and made an immediate impact, rising rapidly through the ranks. In 1942 she became the West Indies producer and created the Caribbean Voices programme, which won exposure and respectability for Caribbean writers and poets.
Oonya Kempadoo has been praised for her debut novel, Buxton Spice, a coming-of-age story set in the Caribbean. The book is a breathtaking glimpse into the inner life of Lula, a lively, highly imaginative girlchild growing up in a racially mixed family in Guyana in the 1970s. Kempadoo's unique and vibrant prose is the camera lens on the lushly exotic world that Lula inhabits. Through her eyes readers are introduced to the colorful denizens of Tamarind Grove. We see the village prostitutes (Sugar Baby, Bullet and Rumshop), the eccentric families, the gentle town spinsters, and Aunt Ruthy, the obeah voodoo lady.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
Though only a small percentage of the quarter million Indians who came to Guyana, the South Indian Madrasis, now much dispersed through emigration to North America, played an influential role in Guyanese life. The Kali-Mai churches they established, for instance, now draw devotees from all Guyanese ethnic groups. At the heart of the narrative are the stories of the entrepreneurial Naga, like pot-salt in everything, his wife Chunoo, resolute in her sense of community and justice, and Hendree, Naga's sidekick, an idler, brilliant drummer and would-be healer. In their lives are played out the polarities which gave Madrasi life its extraordinary dynamism: its spirituality and earthiness, its respect for goodness - and delight in scampishness, its faithfulness to Madrasi culture and openness to the culture of others, particularly the Afro-Guyanese.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
v, 174 leaves ; 29 cm., This novel is a contemporary novel that deals with the history of france; "UMI:9959638."/ Includes bibliographical references ( 167-174)./ Reproduction: Photocopy./ Ann Arbor, Mich. :/ UMI,/ 2000./ v, 174 ; 21 cm.
