Monique Pauline Roffey (born 1965) is a

Trinidad Trinidad is the larger, more populous island of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, the country. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is the southernmost island in ...

ian-born British writer and memoirist. Her novels have been much acclaimed, winning awards including the 2013

Biography

Born in

Port of Spain Port of Spain ( ; Trinidadian and Tobagonian English, Trinidadian English: ''Port ah Spain'' ) is the capital and chief port of Trinidad and Tobago. With a municipal population of 49,867 (2017), an urban population of 81,142 and a transient dail ...

, Trinidad, in 1965, to an English father and mother of French, Italian, Maltese and Lebanese descent. Roffey was educated at St Andrew's School in Maraval, Trinidad, and then in the UK at St Maur's Convent, and

St George's College, Weybridge St George's Weybridge is an independent mixed Roman Catholic co-educational Josephite day school in Surrey, taking pupils from 3 to 18. St George's Weybridge is made up of St George's Junior School (3–11) and St George's College (11–18). ...

. She graduated with a BA in English and Film Studies from the

University of East Anglia The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a Public university, public research university in Norwich, England. Established in 1963 on a campus university, campus west of the city centre, the university has four faculties and twenty-six schools of ...

in 1987, and later completed an MA and PhD in Creative Writing at

Lancaster University Lancaster University (officially The University of Lancaster) is a collegiate public university, public research university in Lancaster, Lancashire, England. The university was established in 1964 by royal charter, as one of several new univer ...

. Between 2002 and 2006 she was a Centre Director for the

Arvon Foundation The Arvon Foundation is a charitable organisation in the United Kingdom that promotes creative writing. Arvon is one of Arts Council England's National Portfolio Organisations. Andrew Kidd is the Chief Executive Officer, and Patricia Cumper is ...

. Roffey is an experienced creative writing tutor and has taught for numerous creative writing providers and organisations, including The National Writers Centre, First Story, The Arvon Foundation and English PEN. She is a Professor of Contemporary Fiction at Manchester Metropolitan University, teaching creative writing on the novel route MA.. Since 2013, she has been a literary activist and advocate for emerging writers in Trinidad, teaching for COSTAATT, Bocas Lit Fest and privately in Port of Spain, where she set up the St James Writers’ Room in 2014 and numerous other writing workshops since. She has also co-led writing retreats in Trinidad in collaboration with other Caribbean writers such as Professor Loretta Collins-Klobah in partnership wit
Mount Plaisir Estate
in

Grande Riviere Grande Riviere is a village on the north coast of Trinidad located between Toco and Matelot. The area was originally settled by immigrants from Venezuela and Tobago who cultivated cacao and subsistence crops. After falling cocoa prices in the ...

, Trinidad. Roffey has dual nationality, British and Trinidadian. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a co-founder of the group Writers Rebel inside Extinction Rebellion. She is also a mitra of the Triratna Buddhist order.

Literary career

Roffey has written six novels and a memoir. ''Sun Dog'' (2002), set in west London, is a

magical realist Magical realism, magic realism, or marvelous realism is a style or genre of fiction and art that presents a realistic view of the world while incorporating magical elements, often blurring the lines between speculation and reality. ''Magical rea ...

tale of psychological estrangement, identity loss and subsequent individuation. ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle'' (2009; shortlisted for the 2010

Orange Prize The Women's Prize for Fiction (previously with sponsor names Orange Prize for Fiction (1996–2006 and 2009–2012), Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction (2007–08) and Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction (2014–2017) is one of the United Kingdom's ...

and the 2011

Encore Award The £15,000 Encore Award for the best second novel was first awarded in 1990. It is sponsored by Lucy Astor, presented by the Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820 by King Ge ...

), is the story of European ex-colonials living in Trinidad during the island's early Independence years and their subsequent process of creolisation. It was hailed by

Commonwealth Prize Commonwealth Writers (established in 2011) is the cultural initiative of the Commonwealth Foundation. It aims to inspire, develop and connect writers across the Commonwealth. Its flagship is a literary award for short stories, the Commonwealth S ...

-winner Olive Senior, who said: :"…it breaks entirely new ground. It is a major contribution to the New Wave of Caribbean writing: energetic, uncompromising, bold in the choice of narrative devices and a great read." It has been published to critical acclaim in the UK, United States and Europe. Roffey's 2011 memoir, ''With the Kisses of His Mouth'', is a personal account of a mid-life quest for sexual liberation and self-identification other than the aspirant hetero-normative model. It has been characterised as "a subversive work that transcends the author's personal story: it stands alone in the chasm that has opened between feminist literature and the belles du jour brigade." Her novel ''Archipelago'', published in July 2012, set in the aftermath of a flood, examines climate change from the perspective of a man from the southern Caribbean. Andrew Miller ( Costa Award winner, 2011) said: "''Archipelago'' is beautifully done. There's a warmth to it, an exuberance and a wisdom, that makes the experience of reading it feel not just pleasurable but somehow instructive. It's funny, sometimes bitingly poignant. And how well Roffey writes a male central character. A brilliant piece of storytelling." ''Archipelago'' won the 2013

OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, inaugurated in 2011 by the NGC Bocas Lit Fest, is an annual literary award for books by Caribbean writers published in the previous year.Bocas Lit Fest was announced on 27 April 2013 as the best overall book from all categories. Roffey's 2014 novel, ''House of Ashes'', is a fictionalised account of the events surrounding the 1990 attempted coup in Trinidad. Ronald Adamolekun, for ''

Wasafiri ''Wasafiri'' is a quarterly British literary magazine covering international contemporary writing. Founded in 1984, the magazine derives its name from a Swahili word meaning "travellers" that is etymologically linked with the Arabic word "safari ...

'' magazine, said: ''House of Ashes'' will be remembered as the most authoritative fictionalised account of the 1990 Trinidad and Tobago revolution, arguably the darkest moment of the island’s history." ''The Telegraph'' called it "vigorous, grimly absorbing tale", while ''The Observer''′s reviewer concluded: "Roffey's writing is raw and visceral and she thrusts her readers headlong into the very middle of the action, her pen as powerful as the butts of the guns shoved in her hostages' backs." A fifth novel, ''The Tryst'', published in July 2017, was sold twice, first to Simon and Schuster UK, and then to independent press Dodo Ink. Having worked on it, on and off, for 14 years, Roffey revisits the tale of Adam's first wife, Lilith, and examines the common but taboo issue of celibacy within marriage. Like much of Roffey's work, it weaves magical realism into a contemporary setting. Many well-known literary writers, sex writers and sex workers have applauded ''The Tryst''.

DBC Pierre Peter Warren Finlay (born in 1961), also known as DBC Pierre, is an Australian author who wrote the novel '' Vernon God Little''. Pierre was born in South Australia, and largely raised in Mexico. He has resided in the Republic of Ireland and ...

said of it: "Not a shade of grey within a mile of this book. What makes ''The Tryst'' an unexploded virus isn't just the quality and brightness of Roffey's writing on sex, even as it uncovers inner glades between flesh and fantasy where sex resides – but the taunting clarity of why those glades stay covered. A throbbing homewrecker of a tale, too late to call Fifty Shades of Red." Hollywood actor Gabriel Byrne said, "The Tryst is a gorgeously written page-turner, deceptive in its simplicity. Monique Roffey writes an erotically charged fable that mixes the real with the mythological, a truly unsettling and disturbing novel. She writes about lust and sex in a way that is thrillingly sexy and beautiful." Rowan Pelling, editor of '' The Amorist'', also said: "''The Tryst'' is a sly, feral, witty, offbeat erotic novella that unsettles the reader, even as it arouses. There are sex scenes of breathtaking audacity. What would any of us do if an irresistible sex daemon broke and entered our domestic lives, leaving havoc in her amoral wake? Monique Roffey knows that the real question about human desire is whether we even recognise our deepest yearnings. How can anyone resist what they have never even dreamt of?" '' The Mermaid of Black Conch'' was first published in April 2020 by

Peepal Tree Press Peepal Tree Press is a publisher based in Leeds, England which publishes Caribbean, Black British, and South Asian fiction, non-fiction, poetry, drama and academic books. Poet Kwame Dawes has said: "Peepal Tree Press's position as the leading pu ...

and won the 2020

Costa Book Award for Novel The Costa Book Award for Novel, formerly known as the Whitbread Award (1971–2005), was an annual literary award for novels, as part of the Costa Book Awards. The awards were dissolved in 2022. Recipients Costa Books of the Year are distingu ...

and Costa Book of the Year. It was nominated for seven awards in total, being shortlisted for the Rathbones/Folio Prize (2021), the

Goldsmiths Prize The Goldsmiths Prize is a British literary award, founded in 2013 by Goldsmiths, University of London, in association with the ''New Statesman.'' It is awarded annually to a British or Irish piece of fiction that "breaks the mould or extends the ...

(2020), and the

Republic of Consciousness Prize The Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses is an annual British literary prize founded by the author Neil Griffiths. It rewards fiction published by UK and Irish small presses, defined as those with fewer than five full-time employee ...

(2021). It was published in paperback by

Vintage Books Vintage Books is a trade paperback publishing imprint of Penguin Random House originally established by Alfred A. Knopf in 1954. The company was acquired by Random House in April 1960, and a British division was set up in 1990. After Random Ho ...

, in June 2021. It was a

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

Book of the Week in August 2021. Film Four and Dorothy Street Pictures have bought the screen adaptation rights.

Style and themes

A writer of dual nationality and perspective, Roffey writes about sex, fatherhood, the Caribbean, mermaids, Lilith and other outcasts, be they the terminally awkward August Chalmin (in ''Sun Dog''), the left-behind Europeans in Trinidad (George and Sabine Harwood in ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle''), a cursed mermaid, a celibate wife or indeed herself. Stylistically, her books can be linked in terms of post-modern narrative choices, in that they often weave together magical realism, real-life historical characters and events, biography and autobiography to tackle themes of alienation and otherness.

Publications

Novels

*''Sun Dog'' (2002), Scribner, Simon & Schuster UK *''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle'' (2009), Simon & Schuster UK *''Archipelago'' (2012), Simon & Schuster UK *''House of Ashes'' (2014), Simon & Schuster UK *''The Tryst'' (2017), Dodo Ink'' *'' The Mermaid of Black Conch'' (2020), Peepal Tree Press * ''Passiontide'' (2024), Harvill Secker

Memoir

* ''With the Kisses of His Mouth'' (2011), Simon & Schuster UK

As editor

* ''The Global Village, Tell Tales'' (2009), Peepal Tree Press.

Selected shorter writings

*"Finale" (short story; 2005), in ''New Writing 13'', Picador
"'Please sit down, I have something shocking to say…'"
''The Guardian'', 18 June 2011.
"Women and sex: intimate adventurers"
''The Guardian'', Comment is free, 6 July 2011.

''The Independent'', 15 September 2012.
"Private Notes Made Public – An Essay"
''Caribbean Quarterly'', Volume 62, December, 2016.
"Lotus, Nun, Mysterious: some brief notes, at 51, of a hetaera woman"
''Advantages of Age'', August 2016.
"I was 41, single and looking for pleasure"
''The Times'', 27 June 2017.
"So long to my sexless life - now I'm out of the sexual mainstream I finally feel alive"
''The Telegraph'', 3 July 2017.

Awards

Honors

* 2022: Elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820 by King George IV to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 800 Fellows, elect ...

Literary awards

*2010:

, shortlisted for ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle'' *2011:

, shortlisted for ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle'' *2013:

Costa Book Awards The Costa Book Awards were a set of annual literary awards recognising English-language books by writers based in United Kingdom, UK and Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Originally named the Whitbread Book Awards from 1971 to 2005 after its first ...

shortlisted for ''House of Ashes'' *2015:

OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, inaugurated in 2011 by the NGC Bocas Lit Fest, is an annual literary award for books by Caribbean writers published in the previous year.Goldsmiths Prize The Goldsmiths Prize is a British literary award, founded in 2013 by Goldsmiths, University of London, in association with the ''New Statesman.'' It is awarded annually to a British or Irish piece of fiction that "breaks the mould or extends the ...

, shortlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' *2021: Costa Book of the Year award for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' *2021:

Rathbones Folio Prize The Writers' Prize, previously known as the Rathbones Folio Prize, the Folio Prize and The Literature Prize, is a literary award that was sponsored by the London-based publisher Folio Society, The Folio Society for its first two years, 2014–2 ...

, shortlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black'' *2021:

, shortlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' *2021: Orwell Prize for Political Fiction, longlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' *2021: Ondaatje Prize (for writing that evokes the "spirit of a place"), longlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' *2021: OCM Bocas Fiction Award, shortlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch''

References

External links