Kamau Brathwaite facts for kids

The Honourable Edward Kamau Brathwaite (born Lawson Edward Brathwaite; 11 May 1930 – 4 February 2020) was a famous Barbadian poet and teacher. He is known as one of the most important writers in the Caribbean.

Brathwaite was a professor of Comparative Literature at New York University. This means he studied and compared literature from different cultures. In 2006, he won the International Griffin Poetry Prize for his book of poems called Born to Slow Horses.

He earned a special degree (Ph.D.) from the University of Sussex in 1968. He also helped start the the Caribbean Artists Movement (CAM). This group helped Caribbean artists share their work. Brathwaite won many important awards, including the Guggenheim Fellowship and Fulbright Fellowships. These awards help people do research and travel. He also won the Neustadt International Prize for Literature in 1994.

Brathwaite was well-known for his studies of Black culture. He wrote about African life and the lives of people of African descent around the world. His books include Folk Culture of the Slaves in Jamaica (1970) and The Development of Creole Society in Jamaica, 1770–1820 (1971). His book History of the Voice (1984) made him an expert on "nation language." This is a special way of speaking and writing that comes from the Caribbean.

Brathwaite often used a unique writing style. He called it Sycorax video style. It used special fonts and spellings, sometimes looking like old computer printing.

Drawing of Kamau Brathwaite on the cover of Liviticus, one of his last collections of poetry. It shows his unique Sycorax Video Style. Artist: Fay Helfer.

About Kamau Brathwaite's Life

Early Life and School

Lawson Edward Brathwaite was born in Bridgetown, Barbados. His parents were Hilton and Beryl Brathwaite. In 1945, he started high school at Harrison College. There, he wrote about jazz for a school newspaper he started. He also wrote for a literary magazine called Bim.

In 1949, he won a special scholarship. This allowed him to study English and History at the University of Cambridge in England. In 1953, he earned his degree in History. He also started working with the BBC's Caribbean Voices radio show in London. Many of his poems and stories were shared on this program. In 1954, he earned a teaching degree.

Years in Ghana

In 1955, Brathwaite moved to the Gold Coast (now Ghana) in Africa. He worked there as an education officer. He saw Kwame Nkrumah become a leader and Ghana gain its independence. This experience greatly influenced his ideas about Caribbean culture. He also studied music with a famous music expert, J. H. Kwabena Nketia.

In 1960, while visiting home, Brathwaite married Doris Monica Wellcome. She was from Guyana and studied Home Economics. They had a son named Michael.

During his time in Ghana, Brathwaite's writing really grew. His play Odale's Choice was first performed in Ghana in 1962.

Coming Back to the Caribbean and UK

From 1962 to 1963, Brathwaite worked in St Lucia. Later in 1963, he moved to the University of the West Indies (UWI) in Kingston, Jamaica. He taught history there.

In 1966, Brathwaite helped start the Caribbean Artists Movement (CAM) in London. He was a co-founder and secretary. Other important people involved were John La Rose and Andrew Salkey.

In 1971, he started Savacou, a journal for CAM, at the University of the West Indies. That same year, he received the name Kamau. This happened in Kenya during a visit to the University of Nairobi.

His special doctoral paper from Sussex University was published in 1971. It was called The Development of Creole Society in Jamaica. In 1973, he published The Arrivants: A New World Trilogy. This book is considered one of his best works. It combined three earlier books of his poems.

In 1986, his wife, Doris Monica Brathwaite, created a list of all his published writings. After she passed away later that year, Brathwaite wrote a book called The Zea Mexican Diary about his feelings.

Brathwaite called the years from 1986 to 1990 a "time of salt." During this time, his wife died. A hurricane destroyed his important papers in Jamaica in 1988. He also had a very serious experience in Kingston in 1990.

Later Years and Legacy

From 1997 to 2000, Kamau Brathwaite spent three years at his home in Barbados. He called these his "Maroon Years." In 1998, he married Beverly Reid, who was from Jamaica.

In 1992, Brathwaite became a Professor of Comparative Literature at New York University. He then split his time living between Barbados and New York.

In 1994, he won the Neustadt International Prize for Literature. This was a big award for all his writings. He was chosen over other famous writers like Toni Morrison.

In 2002, the University of Sussex gave him an honorary doctorate degree. This was a special recognition of his work.

After he retired from New York University in 2004, Brathwaite started writing about a "Second Time of Salt." He wrote about what he felt were difficult cultural experiences.

In 2006, he received a Musgrave gold medal from the Institute of Jamaica. This is a very important award for literature. In 2010, he reported that this medal and other items were stolen from his New York home.

Kamau Brathwaite was a Professor Emeritus (a retired professor who keeps his title) at New York University. He lived in Barbados. He passed away on 4 February 2020, at the age of 89. He was given a special official funeral.

Honors and Awards

Kamau Brathwaite received many awards for his amazing work:

• 1970: Cholmondeley Award
• 1983: Guggenheim Fellowship
• 1983: Fulbright Fellowship
• 1987: Order of Barbados (CHB)
• 1994: Neustadt International Prize for Literature
• 1999: Charity Randall Citation for Performance and Written Poetry
• 2002: Honorary doctorate, University of Sussex
• 2006: Griffin Poetry Prize, International Winner
• 2006: Gold Musgrave Medal for Literature
• 2007: President's Award, St. Martin Book Fair
• 2010: W. E. B. Du Bois Award
• 2011: Casa de las Americas Premio
• 2015: Robert Frost Medal
• 2016: Honorary Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge
• 2018: PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry
• 2020: Bocas Henry Swanzy Award for Distinguished Service to Caribbean Letters

Selected Works

Here are some of the books and plays written by Kamau Brathwaite:

• Four Plays for Primary Schools (1964)
• Odale's Choice (1967)
• Rights of Passage (1967)
• Masks (1968)
• Islands (1969)
• Folk Culture of the Slaves in Jamaica (1970)
• The Development of Creole Society in Jamaica, 1770–1820 (1971)
• The Arrivants: A New World Trilogy (1973)
• Contradictory Omens (1974)
• Other Exiles (1975)
• Days & Nights (1975)
• Black + Blues (1976)
• Mother Poem (1977)
• Soweto (1979)
• History of the Voice (1979)
• Jamaica Poetry (1979)
• Barbados Poetry (1979)
• Sun Poem (1982)
• Afternoon of the Status Crow (1982)
• Gods of the Middle Passage (1982)
• Third World Poems (1983)
• History of the Voice: The Development of Nation Language in Anglophone Caribbean Poetry (1984)
• Jah Music (1986)
• X/Self (1987)
• Sappho Sakyi's Meditations (1989)
• Shar (1992)
• Middle Passages (1992)
• The Zea Mexican Diary (1993)
• Trench Town Rock (1993)
• Barabajan Poems (1994)
• DreamStories (1994)
• Dream Haiti (1995)
• Words Need Love Too (2000)
• Ancestors (2001)
• Magical Realism (2002)
• Golokwati (2002)
• Born to Slow Horses (2006)
• Limbo (2005/2008)
• Elegguas (2010)
• Strange Fruit (2016)
• Liviticus (2017)
• The Lazarus Poems (2017)

See also

In Spanish: Kamau Brathwaite para niños

• Caribbean poetry