Collected Poems: Derek Walcott
Don’t mind the barcode, it’s just from a library.
Though the era of colonialism is behind us we often hear about the current struggles and impacts that time etched in our modern lives. Economics is the most common theme with haves and have-nots originally stemming from the European overlords and their subjects respectively. We also see fragile government systems trying to maintain order when before the people only knew brutalism and exploitation.
These economic and governmental hardships will most likely ease over time. The rise of globalism will eventually spread the wealth and governments will trend toward actually working. Granted, these events will take a long time, likely centuries, but they will likely get there. The longest lasting effects of colonialism though will be the parts that impact what we often think of as defining individuality and culture, genetics and language.
Colonialism, especially in the Americas, caused the greatest migration in human genetics ever. Vast amounts of people were erased from the regions explored by the Europeans, and in their place European colonists and African slaves took up the now, relatively, unpopulated land. After slavery was abolished the British still sought cheap labor for their plantations so the Caribbean saw people from South Asia brought to places like Trinidad. Of course as people are known to do, their genes have become mixed a little over time, though stigma keeps races slightly separated. The new world now has a wide mix of people trying to live together peacefully when before they were mostly forced to work by their neighbors’ ancestors.
In addition to genetics a person’s identity is most commonly linked to their native language. The Native survivors of European colonization had to endure forcible elimination of their culture and language, only to be replaced by the mother tongue of the oppressors. The people brought to the New World had a similar fate, forced to speak the language of their masters or maybe get their tongue cut out. Today we now see countries like Haiti speaking French, mainland Americas mostly speaking Spanish, Jamaica and Canada speaking English, Brazil Portuguese, and others like the U.S. with a mix, but the Native languages never dominate. No Ethiopia exists in the New World.
The inherent tensions of mixed race people living today and the guilt of being able to speak only the language of your ancestral oppressors is the main theme running through the poetry of Derek Walcott. There is so much more though which makes him highly deserving to have won the Nobel Prize in Literature back in 1992.
Walcott was born in St. Lucia in 1930, well before it became a tourist paradise. The island was still a part of the British Empire and the complex history of people who have lived on St Lucia melded into his genes as his ancestry is European and African.
He learned to paint at a young age and his father was also a painter though was not in the picture when Derek was growing up. Eventually he focused on writing with poetry as his primary outlet. He even managed to publish a poem at the age of 14.
After graduating high school in St. Lucia, he went to Jamaica for college, then moved to Trinidad to begin his professional career despite consistently publishing or self-publishing books of his poetry. These moves gave him pan-Carribean insights, but eventually he took a job at Boston University which expanded his geography and palette from which to pull metaphors. He then bounced around North America at various universities.
Derek Walcott was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1992 “for a poetic oeuvre of great luminosity, sustained by a historical vision, the outcome of a multicultural commitment." In other words he was a master of the English language and was able to throw the environment and cultures of the Carribean into poems with skill unmatched by anyone ever. His skill was using English as deftly or better than anyone in Europe or North America, being able to reference classical literature and tell his own stories, which comes across as “fresh” if you have a habit of not paying any attention to parts of our global society.
Reading “Collected Poems 1948-1984” you are able to understand the course of his career. All the hits are in it, but there are also the beginning works where he was figuring out his style. Throughout there are persistent themes regarding race, mixed and conflicting heritage, woe for lost Natives, new-world symbology, and the ever-present sea as a companion.
The most consistent theme was race in the new world. This manifested mostly as majority black countries trying to find their path forward just before and after independence. His own personal racial background was also often explored as a conflicting set of histories. He seemed to be looking for a black hero in himself, but hero’s need villains and his mixed heritage meant he was his own villain. The spread of time this collection covered includes these themes from the beginning to end meaning he probably never settled his inner conflict.
Part of the heroes and villains in the racial makeup of the Caribbean was the acknowledgement that the pre-Columbian Natives of the islands had a significant history and that almost nothing today recognizes that. He saw their ghosts everywhere and their lost knowledge. The complete loss of Caribbean native civilizations on these islands is often a footnote or the first chapter in a textbook before what the histories are actually trying to cover. Walcott however is intune with the islands and that the history post-Columbus is only a fraction of what could be told by the mountains and beaches.
After reading a lot of poetry for this project I have learned some of the European poetry tropes. Most can be referencing Classical or Biblical stories or some other well established allegorical fixture set well over a thousand years ago. The assumption is that a well read person will understand the subtle meaning taken from that old story. Walcott is able to take his “New”-world experiences and use their subtle meanings to convey his meaning. The waves make appearances as grounding him to the world that keeps moving despite your current troubles but not in a friendly way, it is pounding or crashing at your life. It can imply that you are an island surrounded by the commotion of an unceasing and unforgiving world. Walcot was able to take the reason so many escape for a vacation and turn it into a reality check, lovely.
There are other new world descriptions, such as North America’s forests and snow, or the volcanic island jungles on St Lucia but he does persistently mention enough Classical literature, especially Greek mythology that you know he knows his literary heritage, and likes the Greek myths quite a bit, finding the Odyssey particularly pertinent for the Caribbean. Blending his skill with classics with the eye for the world actually surrounding him makes for a new chapter in poetry expanding into the Caribbean.
Structurally he was flexible and would use any form that fit the poem. The only odd feature that kept coming back was his use of indentation. There would be multiple indentations halfway across the line in some cases. Then there would be some poems with multiple indents with different depths for each. It was confusing to read and after looking up that it can be used to force pauses it sort of made sense, but it also seemed to be used in his early years most often. Maybe he also found it too distracting because the use of severe indents tapered after his early works, though not disappearing. I don’t think they add too much, but I didn’t sing them so maybe I should try it again someday.
The poem “In Another Life” is an autobiography of his early life in poetry. I had never read a poetic autobiography before and it was extremely refreshing. It also felt like a more real expression of remembering one’s life. When you think about your life you don’t (I at least don’t) organize memories into a chronological list of factoids. You remember events as you internalized them, with feelings, imagery, and associations from your senses like music or smells. The flexible wordplay and emotional control of poetry is perfect for this and now I’m confused why it isn’t the main way autobiographies are written (it’s probably money). Walcott being the master that he is may also be the reason why it seems this should be the way to write about your own life. He makes it seem simple and straightforward, which of course it is absolutely not.
Most of the poems in the collection were dedicated to specific people. Some other famous authors, some were even Nobel laureates too. Typically in these collections there may be one or two dedicated poems but Walcott seems to be writing for a community not himself by doing this. It was a friendly touch. Many of the poems seem to be written in a certain moment and when they are dedicated to someone it is as if he is saying, “wish you were here.”
My version of the collection was heavily notated by a previous reader. Based on the handwriting I’m guessing it was a ‘she’ so I will use those pronouns. It looked like notes for a class or a study of Walcott because there were certain poems with notes and many without. Her comments were interesting and I got to have a one sided debate with her about each piece which was entertaining. She seemed to focus heavily on race as the primary point of his work. Specifically culture vs culture with lesser mentions of his own internal racial conflict. Also she was fixated on any mention or allusion to black/white. Any time the native people were mentioned she missed that as another race relevant to Walcott. Race is a very important topic especially when discussing colonization, but race is only just one part of a person. There was much more to what Walcott had to say than racial conflict. The constant crashing of the waves cannot be ignored and they don’t care about one’s race at all, you are a speck compared to them, that is what is really important.
“Collected Poems” by Derek Walcott was a better poetry experience than I typically have. I know I am biased toward New World culture so that likely played a part in the enjoyment, but that’s OK. His internal tension is evident and it’s sad that he never seems to have truly come to peace with things that happened before he was ever born. He does have a wonderful perspective on life which comes across often in his poetry and hopefully people can see what he saw and move past false narratives and unimportant problems. Every poem shows why he won a Nobel and I hope to go back to St Lucia someday with an eye to see his impact on the people there.
