Caribbean Books

Having read a lot of general history from Europe to South America to the Middle East, you come to really appreciate someone who can write like a person. Professor Pico, without taking anything from the historical record, manages to write from a perspective of "our" history, and frequently uses that possessive along with the word "we", giving a very involved and intimate feel to the chronology.

Writign history is by nature to at teimes write about some of the dullest, but necessary data in the world. Only a seasoned and talented writer like Professor Pico can actually make the transition from one main crop to another interesting. Never before have I encountered a historian so talented as a writer that he can actually use imagery like a farmer lying in his hammock smoking part of his new crop of tobacco.

Some of the best written parts of this book are; the attempted English invasions, described in crisp detail; the radical movements of the 1960s (although he somehow never mentions the FALN by name);, and the reforms of the semi-enlightened Spanish despot, Pezuela.

I do wish there had been more maps in the book, but this is the only downfall. It can be frustrating to read about places and not be able to know where they are.

Essentially, this is an updated and expanded version of the second edition of the brilliant work published in Spanish in 1986. As with his other publications, Pico demonstrates why he ranks among the most magisterial historians of Puerto Rico. The 16 chapters are arrestingly readable and cover the complex history of Puerto Rico with commendable verbal economy. Pico impressively contextualizes the story by consistently placing Puerto Rico in the wider Caribbean, Atlantic, and Hispanic worlds, and does an excellent job with the main outlines of the local history. The book starts with the geological formation of the island; continues chronologically with a description of the first settlers, their conquest and virtual annihilation; and details the Spanish society and economy constructed after 1493. Like all excellent histories of the Caribbean, this one is inordinately rich on the social aspects of community formation and the inevitable cross-imperial relations that invariably frustrated local administrators.

"Quien toca este libro, toca a un hombre" decía Whitman, y esto se aplica perfectamente a Leaves of Grass, u Hojas de Hierba. Al leer esta obra, una de las principales obras de la poesía universal. Uno puede palpar y casi degustar el canto hermoso y sentido que Whitman hace al mundo que lo rodea (EE.UU. de mediados del XIX), pero que es un canto a todo lo que regala la vida, y todo lo que se puede disfrutar y poetizar de la naturaleza. Sin duda Whitman logra entregarnos una sincera alabanza a la existencia, y a todo lo simple que regala el mundo, lo que comprende especialmente la naturaleza, la gente simple, el contacto con los personajes típicos, como por ejemplo los esclavos de su tiempo. El vigor y la potencia de la voz poética de Whitman, exenta totalmente de racionalismo o intelectualismo filosófico agrio y pesado, no han sido aún superadas por poeta alguno, y Hojas de Hierba es la prueba fehaciente de ello. Un volumen fundamental de la poesía universal, que nos describe uno de los más infatigables alientos poéticos de la historia, infaltable en las bibliotecas de poetas, o bien en la bilbioteca familiar.

Creo que es uno de los mejores libros de poesía americana que he leido

Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia is required reading for anyone interested in the history of Black radicalism in the United States, particularly the singular role played by people of Caribbean descent. Professor James skillfully examines the history and political economy of race relations in the French and Spanish speaking Caribbean. Here is the background of the African Blood Brotherhood led by Cyril Briggs and the Universal Negro Improvement Association led by Marcus Garvey. Moreover, this is the background of the singular Arthur Schomburg (actually Arturo Schomburg) who founded the pivotal Harlem library and research center. There is an important analysis of Hubert H. Harrison's role in inspiring Harlem's Black radicalism. Furthermore, this is the complex history of Jesus Colon's ideas on race and class. In conclusion, this book is essential to an understanding of 20th Black radicalism, modern Black leadership, and the background to Black Power. While we are waiting for Jeff Perry's biography of Hubert H. Harrison, the Black Socrates of the Harlem Renaissance, this is as good as it gets!

Winston James' Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia will clarify our understanding of Afro-Caribbean migrants in the US. It sheds more light on not just Hispanics but non-Hispanics as well.

His thesis is expository. He explains the "scale and determinants of Caribbean migration to the United States and the migrants' political behavior from the turn of the century up to the Great Depression."

Some well-known but poorly constructed and substantiated arguments, advanced by scholars about the political behavior of Caribbeans in their States of origin and as migrants in America are rejected by James. It could well be that literature on the subject--Afro-Caribbeans political views/behaviour--is just sparse. Then James is right, much more scholarly work on the people who came to America from the Caribbean should be done.

The book is fairly comprehensive in its study, by looking beyond the English speaking Caribbean to the Spanish speakers as well, covering the period 1900-1932.

His stated objectives for the book are:

i.) To present historical evidence and analysis to of arguments claiming that Caribbean migrants changed from "conservatism" in the Caribbean to "radicalism" in America;
ii.) To broaden the discussion beyond the Anglophone Caribbean to the Hispanic Caribbean;
iii.) To contribute to the wider understanding of the African Diaspora; and
iv.) To throw new light on the historical and cultural complexity and heterogeneity of the Caribbean Region and variations in it's Diaspora in the USA.

Of the Afro-Cubans in Florida, James tell a beautiful, yet sad story of a community of Cuban tabaqueros, cigar makers, who worked for Vincente Martínez Ybor the Cuban, anti-colonialism cigar producer who established a Cuban cigar factory in Tampa Florida. Some of these workers were leaders in the "Union de Tabaqueros," founded in 1879.

Strong class solidarity existed between whites and Afro-Cubans during this period. This cohesion was reinforced by the leadership of Jose Marti, the Cuban Nationalist who denounced racism and attempted to militarily remove the Spanish and to establish a Cuba, free from racism and intolerance.

James explained how the racial harmony of Cuban workers in Ybor City succumbed to bigotry and hatred by 1923.

The change was not instigated by white America's racial practices alone but by a combination of:
a) The change in the principled leadership of the Cuban-American Community after Jose Marti, was killed in battle to liberate Cuba;
b) The implementation of Apartheid in Ybor City by America's Jim Crow laws;
c) Penetration of the Cuban Community by other people living in the surrounding cities;
d) White Cubans realigning themselves for the privileges associated with whiteness.

I recommend this work for students, general readers and especially those with an interest in history, politics, literature and the development of the Society!

See Also:

Ready for Revolution: The Life and Struggles of Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture)

In-Dependence from Bondage: Claude McKay and Michael Manley: Defying the Ideological Clash and Policy Gaps in African Diaspora Relations

The Groundings With My Brothers

Cuba: A Revolution in Motion

Puerto Rican poet and playwright, Rane Arroyo could be introduced with several more identifiers before his name. Perhaps the poet himself would add titles such as Intellectual, Gay, Dreamer, Comedian, American, and Friend. Invoking this multitude of identities, Rane Arroyo's collection of poems, Home Movies of Narcissus, playfully explores realms that are forbidden, imagined, and erotic. There are few borders in Arroyo's writing: his poems seamlessly fuse humor with sincerity as they capture the truths of loneliness, sex, culture, and history. At times merely a stream of consciousness while other times careful constructed stanzas, Arroyo's poems are structured as diversely as the stories which they reveal. Arroyo's poetry artfully recreates its subjects in terms of the emotions that they illicit, not just the linear definitions of or societal reactions to them. Such multi-dimensional reflection and writing are a testament to Arroyo, a poet with strong identities and a deep personal awareness. I think that you will find your own adventure as you read Home Movies of Narcissus. This book of poems reads like a cultural biography of America, featuring a multitude of fascinating worlds and people, both real and imagined.
In the first section of the book "Yes, Si, Aha," poems such as "The Cousins" and "Delicious Parable" articulate truths of Arroyo's Puerto Rican identity during the author's childhood and adult years. In the poem "Cousins," Arroyo references his "tropics-starved parents" (9) while recounting a homoerotic conversation among childhood friends. This scene is among countless others in the collection which juxtapose multiple identities, in this case exploring notions of cultural relocation as a Latino and internal exile as a gay adolescent. The reader can only smile as he is left to ponder "Zorro's erection" or a childhood game about "the addict's attic" in the hometown "cha-cha-cha Chicago." Classic poetic devices such as alliteration describe unconventional or even taboo subjects, creating poetry that is both interesting and entertaining to read. Such poems relive moments which border between nostalgia and dysfunction, adding to the lure of Arroyo's dynamic writing.
The poem "Delicious Parable" details a poignant sacrifice, an impoverished Puerto Rican mother who struggles to provide a traditional meal for her son. The speaker in the poem cries when he realizes that the dried codfish "with chance bones in it" is the "only inheritance she can give." As he describes the memory, Arroyo's tone is playful yet upfront. He avoids making a political statement about poverty (or any of the other numerous issues in the book). Rather, Arroyo's identity as a poet and his powerful honesty about life experiences (and dreams) awaken the reader without offending him.
In the section of poems entitled "The Mask Museum" Arroyo reinvents traditional notions of identity, death, and art. In "Bad Disguises," a clever poem about Halloween with characters such as Antonio Banderas, Richard Nixons and Andrew Carnegies, the speaker ponders, "Someone in a devil's mask / demands my green card. / It's a joke, / but not for me. When is this home?" (12-14). Throughout the book, Arroyo's confessions of fear, loneliness, and pain can be intimate, sudden, and even haunting. In "Bad Disguises," Arroyo conveys the powerful pain evoked by racism, while the humor of Halloween deflects but does not undermine his message. This is one of several poems where Arroyo narrates struggles of discrimination as a Chicago-born Latino. A search for a home within a world of discrimination is a reoccurring struggle in his stories of identity.
"Unfunded Art" searches for beauty in a bizarre studio of nude models with "gunshot craters," "gang tattoos," and "stone testicles." In choosing to write about such a place, the poet celebrates imperfection and garners respect for it among his readers. Arroyo celebrates such characters not because they are marginalized but because they have discovered their own beauty. These triumphs of discovering personal identity give a voice to the marginalized without clouding the message with political protest.
In the section "Hungry Ghost," a series of poems about Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon, Arroyo creates a clever banter between a witty poet and the arrogant historical figure who demands that the poet memorialize him. Arroyo expresses the shared frustrations of a poet and a historical figure, with statements such as "To be forgotten is a daily death" and "You are all memorialists with / nothing to confess." However, from the frustrations of the speaker arise humorous and playful images, and even a Ricky Martin reference. Arroyo reawakens the identity of a Puerto Rican with words that passionately long for a homeland and mourn a commercialized paradise. The Ponce de Leon sequence of poems explores an interesting concept that appears throughout poems of Latin American identity, such as Arroyo's: Spanish conquest wrote history with violence and a sword. The Latin American poet recreates history with his pen and words. Arroyo's poetry is particularly successful in such creation because he does not taint the art or history of his work with politically charged messages. If anything, his personal commentary merely adds humor that is both quirky and enchanting.
"The Black Moon Poems" contains some of the darkest moments of Arroyo's book. Sleepless nights and drunken moments paint images of struggle, anger, and confusion. Yet, in recounting his searches for identity, Arroyo's identities are never undermined. The reader is given a glimpse into the sufferings and frustrations of a self-proclaimed "double exile." Arroyo's yearning for mutual acceptance and understanding of his gay and Latino self's echoes throughout his poetry. His writing expresses the physicality of such yearnings. They are eroticized with frequent references to images such as pubic hair, hard laps, wet dreams, and masturbation.
Underlying Arroyo's tales of exile and frustration are a message of acceptance and a desire for human dignity. Arroyo is an openly gay, Latino man who powerfully and successfully describes his experiences, creating an art form. Arroyo's existence alone is a political poem; yet, his life professes truth by experience rather than protest. His work is thought-provoking, clever, and funny; however, at its core is a sincerity of experience which makes it a worthwhile read. With an open-mind, the reader can understand Arroyo's search for identity. Along the way, he will find all of the realities of the journey: humor, discrimination, love, and loneliness. Whether to savor the cultural experiences of an artist or to grow closer to one's own identities, Home Movies of Narcissus is a rare and wonderful journey of discovery.

Rane Arroyo has a quality refined by love and talent, which he has released on paper in the form of this collection. His humor, his emotions and his love for words makes him a modern-day legend. I am a fan!

How Long She'll Last In This World is an articulate and engaging collection of remarkable poetry by Maria Melendez. Drawing from her expansive knowledge of the environment and biology, Melendez creates poetry which induces muse and highlights the spirit as it carries its readers through a creative and evocative philosophy. American Adhaan (October 2001): Watch night spilling on the western edge/of invisible, its cool surrender/to the peach-colored clouds (just water/that has lately collapsed/into form).//How violently natural/my petroliferous valley looks/in this faint, blue wash;/the slow, arc'd strokes/of a great egret's wings/deny the crude thickness/of this air.//The shattered world's particulates/fall everywhere around us;/the call to prayer means bowing/and facing them all.

How Long She'll Last In This World is an articulate and engaging collection of remarkable poetry by Maria Melendez. Drawing from her expansive knowledge of the environment and biology, Melendez creates poetry which induces muse and highlights the spirit as it carries its readers through a creative and evocative philosophy. American Adhaan (October 2001): Watch night spilling on the western edge/of invisible, its cool surrender/to the peach-colored clouds (just water/that has lately collapsed/into form).//How violently natural/my petroliferous valley looks/in this faint, blue wash;/the slow, arc'd strokes/of a great egret's wings/deny the crude thickness/of this air.//The shattered world's particulates/fall everywhere around us;/the call to prayer means bowing/and facing them all.

Written from the perspective of 'being there', join, Tom Barnes in his rich-with-history account of his experiences as a navy pilot working hurricane patrol in 1944. At an altitude of 28,000 feet, Barnes describes the beauty of the 'beast', and the birth of a hurricane, as well as the intricate maze of an instrument panel. Charting storms in the Devil's Triangle during hurricane season was definitely not for sissies. Suspense and humor are joined together, along with a picture perfect depiction of numerous navigations, making this a book that's difficult to put down. History buffs will find this a treasure to read. As a bonus, Barnes has included his own history as it related to Flight 19 and its mysterious disappearance. Two thumbs up, Tom!

View A Hurricane At 20,000 Feet

Separated from his navy squadron which was sent to the Pacific, the author found himself in Florida at the Jacksonville Municipal Airport with its long runways able to handle a heavy bomber outfit. With a great deal of skill he relates his experiences during 1945 as World War II was winding down. True- to- life anecdotes and episodes move the story along.
Sent to Masters Field in Miami, after Washington ordered the military to develop a hurricane warning system, he was assigned to Squadron 114, the early Hurricane Hunters. They tracked storms from Barbados in the eastern Carribean to Honduras and Belize in the west. At that time hurricanes had Roman Numeral numbers instead of names. Hurricane #IX, a category 4, hit Miami and Masters Field. He writes from experience with frightening realism about the danger and destruction of hurricanes.
Flying many times over the Bermuda Triangle, the same area as the five planes which made up Flight 19 mysteriously lost while on a training mission, the author adds his speculation as to what may have happened to them. Interesting and logical.

I found this well written, well researched book to be riveting and compelling. Worth the read.

Lenora Smalley
Writer and Poet

This is a great book about the Haitian Revolution it is different essay about this revolution impact on other nations in the Atlantic World. It not only gives various historians thoughts and ideas but a more rounder view of what this revolution really did for the atlantic world.

Like most of the recent work of David Geggus, this book provides a good frame work and introduction for a much-needed academic study of the Haitian Revolution and it's world-wide impact.

Well researched and engaged with the scholarly discussion, yet readable and at times very elegantly argued. The book contributes to discussions of race and sexuality and should be of interest to many more than the few academics in Latin American history and women's studies. Those people, and many others interested in those and related fields, however, MUST read it!

I am the grandchild of a Puerto Rican woman who lived on the island about the time this book was written. I was absolutely fascinated by the book and found it explained a lot about attitudes toward race and sexuality that prevailed in my own family that I'd always found contradictory and inexplicable.

I generally avoid books written by academicians because their writing style is usually turgid, wordy and devoid of life. Not so this book. While it does carefully document its subject, the writing is lively and engaging.

A must-read for anyone who wants insight into a fascinating aspect of Puerto Rican culture.

there are not enough words for this book. enticing and mesmerizing, Neruda remains to me one of the greatest lovers of life. An acute observer of surroundings, a revolutionary, a lover, a man of the world and of the senses. this book is a whirlwind of poetical autobiographical moments and what a wonder it is. recommended to be read quietly and in an atmosphere undisturbed.

a masterpiece.

I just purchased this book of poetry. Wonderful stuff! Exquisite translation. Why is it no longer available? I keep this in the same place as my collection of Elliot poems. But these are warmer, deeply personal reflections of a life. It is like walking through a man's memories while he tells you what each one meant to him.

a great book with wonderful photography. it's written by an academic, but is widely accessible. would make a wonderful addition to any library.

This is a touching and lyrical account that mixes memoir with ethnography in ways that enrich both. A pleasure to read. Those who want to see how an anthropologist can also reveal something of herself as she reveals others would do well to read this book