Carolyn Cooper | Calabash Festival lit up Jamaica

It wasn’t only Treasure Beach, St Elizabeth, that was illuminated by the Calabash International Literary Festival two weekends ago. All of Jamaica was lit up. That’s a clever pun by Kwame Dawes, co-founder and programmer for the festival. Literature is up there and it brightens our world. Like athletics, the Calabash festival is one of the positives that is redeeming Jamaica from our dread reputation as a deadly country. Thankfully, we are no longer the murder capital of the world. We have been surpassed by El Salvador. But that’s not much of a consolation. We are number two on Statista’s “Ranking of the most dangerous countries in the world in 2023, by murder rate.” How did we get there?

The international media is now also drawing attention to another merciless plot that local activists have long been condemning. Last Tuesday, the UK Guardian published an article by Kenneth Mohammed with this headline: “What’s the Caribbean without its beaches? But the people are losing access to them.” Mohammed reports that, “The privatisation of beaches and the controversial sale of prime heritage or beachfront sites to developers have become normalised throughout the Caribbean, leaving citizens’ access to public spaces threatened....”

One of the joys of attending the Calabash literary festival was going to Great Bay. It’s really a fishing beach and access is free. Who knows for how long? Some ‘developer’ may decide that the beach is too good for fishers and the general public. And the government will not object. I had lunch at the Lobster Pot restaurant on the beach. The fish was delicious. I also had excellent vegetarian meals at Gee Wiz. The owner, Mr Delroy Brown, had on display an enthusiastic review of the Treasure Beach restaurant that was published in the New York Times in March.

SETTING THE TONE

Curdella Forbes, a distinguished Jamaican writer and a professor of English at Howard University, set the tone of the entire festival with a brilliant reading from her award-winning novel, A Tall History of Sugar. The three-day programme was so dazzling it’s difficult to choose ‘highlights’. It was all lit up. I particularly relished the panel on New Daughters of Africa, the anthology edited by Margaret Busby. Born in Ghana, she has enjoyed a stellar career in the UK as co-founder of the publishing house Allison and Busby; as creative writer; and as cultural activist.

Yvonne Bailey-Smith, born an grow a St Elizabeth, a stone’s throw away from Treasure Beach. She migrated to the UK when she was 14. She read from her cleverly titled debut novel, The Day I Fell Off My Island. Yvonne is the mother of Zadie Smith. It just goes to show that genes don’t lie. At the rate Yvonne is going, Zadie will soon be known as Yvonne Bailey-Smith’s daughter!

The other readers also beautifully illustrated the depth and range of the anthology. Taiye Selasi was born in London to a Ghanaian father and a Nigerian mother. Her riveting debut novel, Ghana Must Go, is set in Accra, Lagos, London and New York. Namwali Serpell from Zambia is a professor of English at Harvard University. She read from her powerful second novel, The Furrows, which tells a haunting story of loss.

Then there was the 50th anniversary tribute reading of Michael Thelwell’s novelisation of the film The Harder They Come. Thelwell gives a persuasive account of the meteoric rise and fall of Ivanhoe Martin from naive country bwoy to city slick star bwoy, and finally, hunted rude bwoy/gun man. Thelwell fills in the void of Ivan’s past, civilising the silences and spaces in the film text. Blakka Ellis, Sheldon Shepherd, Sally Henzell and Carol Lawes were the readers. Carol brought all her decades of expertise as an outstanding actress to the role of telling Elsa’s story.

POWER OF THE WORD

As usual, open mike delighted the appreciative audience with gems. Elizabeth Montano, mother and manager of soca star Machel, read from her book King of Soca. Creativity genes again! Conliffe Wilmot-Simpson almost brought the tent down with his performance of “No pussy in parliament” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZ1KXywPRPQ. Lisa Binns, co-owner with Christopher Binns of the extraordinary farm to table vegan restaurant Stush in the Bush, read from her book in progress about how she developed her passion for cooking.

And the Calabash music! The opening concert with Imeru Tafari, Ras I and Tanya Stephens and the closing celebration of Third World with Ibo Cooper, Steve Golding, Seretse Small and their special guests vividly illustrated the power of the word in song. In his review of Calabash for the New York Times, Anderson Tepper declared, “Among the host of literary gatherings that have sprung up in the last 20 years, Calabash in Jamaica brings the party off the page.”

Thanks to Deika Morrison, media specialist par excellence, and her dedicated team, there were 62 million impressions for Calabash across social media platforms up to yesterday. Digital natives will know what that means. For those of us senior citizens who are digital migrants, an impression, in this context, is not the vibe you get from a person or a thing. It’s the number of times users have seen posts containing references to traceable references to Calabash.

Padma Lakshmi, who hosted Top Chef on Bravo for over a decade and a half, is now the creator, host, and executive producer of Taste the Nation, which debuted on Hulu in 2020. At Calabash, she had a most entertaining conversation with Kei Miller as she tasted the Jamaican nation. She posted a sensual video on Instagram to her 1.4 million followers in which she was savouring a juicy Bombay mango. That’s the beauty of the Calabash International Literary Festival. It nourishes the mind, body and spirit. Give thanks to Colin Channer, Justine Henzell and Kwame Dawes for the magical calabash that’s full to the brim and running over!

- Carolyn Cooper, PhD, is a teacher of English language and literature and a specialist on culture and development. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and karokupa@gmail.com