The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists
Culture Matters
Claude McKay (1889-1948) was a Jamaican-born poet and novelist who became one of the central figures of the Harlem Renaissance, the 1920s upsurge of black culture that was a central feature of the jazz age. He was also a leading left wing intellectual of the era. This newly discovered novel is a literary and cultural milestone.
The Man Booker prize, given annually for best English language novel published in the United Kingdom, was awarded this week to Marlon James, for his novel, A Brief History of Seven Killings. He is the first writer from Jamaica to win the prize. The novel is a tale of 1970s-1980s Jamaica, CIA plots, and violence. It is "a story about Jamaica that doesn’t only take place in Jamaica," says Kei Miller, who reviewed the novel late last year.
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