Here is Michael McMillan’s “Renaissance: St. Martin’s Book Fair 2022—An Overview.” Many thanks to House of Nehesi Publishers (HNP) for sharing this article.]
From being relatively invisible, black writers in Britain have over the past five decades become more visible on the lists of mainstream publishers, on the bookshelves in shops and libraries, on shortlists for literary prizes, on judging panels and at book fairs. For this level of success, it would seem that we have had to give up the cultural institutions led by, about, with and for us. Here I am thinking of Black-led publishers, Black-run bookstores (the New Beacon bookstore was recently saved from closure with the support of the Black community), and book fairs, especially the International Radical Black Book Fair and of the Third World. The international book fair took place from 1982, mainly in London, until 1995, was coordinated by Bogle L’Ouverture, New Beacon and Race Today and embraced the internationalism of the global majority.
Coming out of cultural events being held via Zoom during the confinement of the COVID-19 pandemic, I personally attended the 20th Anniversary St. Martin’s Book Fair, June 2 – 4, to present an abridged version of my foreword to NC Marx’s renaissance collection of poems Children of grace (HNP, 2022). Her previous books include When silence speaks (2011) and Memoirs of a teacher (2012), and her novel Plastered in Pretty (HNP, 2018) was reviewed by Alice Walker. IN Children of graceMarks uses the 2020 to 2021 La Soufrière volcanic eruptions to expose the dirty realities of life and the landscape-changing experiences of the people of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.
In Britain, we tend to focus on what happens in the “British West Indies”, with the Calabash book festival in Jamaica dominating that gaze. St. Martin, in the northeastern Caribbean archipelago, is an island of 37 square miles. The island has been divided between France and the Netherlands since the 17th century, where salt was mined from the basins, particularly the Great Salt Pan, by enslaved African peoples on the island. Today, tourism dominates the economy of Saint Martin. In their daily lives, I was told that St. the status.
The Book Fair was co-founded by Shujah Reiph of the Conscious Lyrics Foundation and poet and cultural historian Lasana M. Sekou of House of Nehesi Publishers (HNP), whose roster includes Kamau Brathwaite, Amiri Baraka, Shake Keane, Nidaa Khoury, Tishani Doshi, and George Lamming. HNP has published several poetry collections by Sekou, who also performed at the International Radical Black and Third World Book Fair. Reiph, who coordinates the St. Louis Book Fair. Hide something from a nigger, put it in a book.”
Taxi drivers and the like asked me if I was on vacation in St. Martin. When I told them that I was participating in the Book Fair, they replied: “I know the Book Fair well, I even buy books from it”, adding that they also knew Shuxha and Lasana.
The Book Fair is cherished by St. Martiners, with 40% – 50% of the financial support coming from their donations. On such a small island with few arts and cultural institutions to compete for financial resources, the Book Fair receives strong local support, but it is not without structural and political challenges, says Reiph, who has been an organizer of socio- cultural for over 30 years.
In his keynote address at the opening of the Book Fair, David Commissiong, Barbados’ ambassador to CARICOM, reminded us that resistance to neo-colonial forces in the Caribbean region, much less the diaspora, lies in embracing the cultural history we share.
Reiph echoed this sentiment, arguing that the 20th edition of the St Martin’s Book Fair marked an attempt to reinvent itself, “to chart a course that will launch us into a new orbit”; hence the “rebirth” theme. This seemed appropriate as several writers have died during a period of grief and mourning marked by the pandemic, including invited authors from previous fairs, notably the Barbadian novelist, essayist and thinker George Lamming, who stopped by on the last day of the Fair of the Book.
An essential theme in black art and culture throughout the diaspora has been the development of intergenerational conversations, not simply in terms of consolidating the historical continuity of art practice, but to replenish cultural institutions with new blood. This was clearly seen in St. Martin by the young people who coordinated the activities and activities of the literary festival. Some of those young people on the Book Fair Committee had attended the Book Fair in its early years as teenagers. Poet Caleb Dros was five years old when the first Book Fair took place and read from his recently published book. Oualichi: Land of Omalaunched by HNP at the fair’s Literary Evening in the former fishing village of Grand Case.
The event, billed as “Under the Big Literary Tent,” seated an audience of over 100 people under a makeshift marquee and on the Main Street sidewalk near the Grand Case Bridge. Now more of a town than a village, Grand Case effortlessly competes with a handful of Caribbean islands for the coveted title of “culinary capital” of the region. Dros was one of the leading poets he read; others included award-winning poet and novelist Nicole Cage from Martinique. From the balance, power and intimacy of Dros’ poems it seemed that he might have absorbed the work of other poets at the Book Fair growing up. There was also Marie-Pierre “Mapie” Loiseau, an animated performer from Martinique who brought elements of Creole oral tradition, zouk music and hip hop that, along with other poets, caught the attention of strolling passers-by.
In addition to book launches and signings, exhibitions and book sales, the Book Fair was complemented by a dedicated program of daily activities and evening events. There were workshops covering a range of genres, topics and issues related to culture and industry, such as children’s literature with child participants, maternal health and black women’s hair management, as well as panel discussions for women writers for the first time. first, one exploring Creole literature from Martinique, Guadeloupe and Marie-Galante, another on independent publishing and the annual symposium called the Forum of Presidents.
An interesting session featured authors Mary J. Romney-Schaab and Serge Gumbs, whose respective books: An Afro-Caribbean in the Nazi Era: From Papiamentu to German AND Saint-Martin in the Great War talk about the stories of Saint Martiners involved in the First and Second World War.
There was a poetry masterclass with Geoff Goodfellow, an Australian poet, novelist and activist who, along with his friend, traveled over thirty hours to reach St. Martin. Teachers and students also had an opportunity to participate in a drama and education masterclass led by Jillian John, a dynamic educator and playwright from Trinidad and Tobago, and an acting workshop led by playwright, educator and published poet, Yvonne Weeks. Since being forced to move from Montserrat due to the Soufriere Hills volcanic eruption in 1995, Weeks has lived in Barbados.
Several books were “launched” at the lively festival, including Weeks’ Voices: Monologues and Dramatic Texts for Caribbean Actorspublished by HNP in 2021, with an e-book in 2022. There was also Disaster Matters: Disasters Matter (HNP, 2022) edited by Weekes (UWI) and Wendy McMahon (UEA). Unique to the Caribbean, Disaster Matters is a high school-focused anthology of poetry, drama, fiction, nonfiction, and science articles complemented by photographs and images that offer “storytelling experiences and critical questions about climate issues, risks, and disasters, particularly hurricanes, earthquakes and volcanoes in the Caribbean.” (Catastrophe matters2022)
The Saint Martin Book Fair may be small compared to other similar festivals in the diaspora, but it is talawa: small but large in its scope and, therefore, provides a model for building and sustaining Black-led cultural institutions, led by St. Martin, led by the Caribbean, echoing Lamming’s point that “The architecture of our future is not only unfinished; the scaffolding is barely raised.”1
1 George Lamming, “The West Indian People” (1966) in Andrew Salkey (ed.) Caribbean Essay (1973); quoted by Owen Arthur, Prime Minister of Barbados, symposium 28-30 June 2006.
[Photo above: Michael McMillan, PhD, closing ceremony keynote speaker at St. Martin Book Fair (6.4.22). Dr. McMillan is a playwright, artist/curator; associate lecturer, London College of Fashion; research associate, VIAD, University of Johannesburg. (© CLF/HNP courtesy/I. Hodge)]
