Raymond R. Ramcharitar 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 poet, playwright, fiction writer, historian and media and cultural critic.

Early life

Ramcharitar was educated at the

University of the West Indies The University of the West Indies (UWI), originally University College of the West Indies, is a public university system established to serve the higher education needs of the residents of 18 English-speaking countries and territories in t ...

, St Augustine, where he earned three degrees: a Bachelor's in Economics (1991), a Master's in Literature in English (2002) and a Doctorate in Cultural History (2007). He was awarded a fellowship to

Boston University Boston University (BU) is a Private university, private research university in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. BU was founded in 1839 by a group of Boston Methodism, Methodists with its original campus in Newbury (town), Vermont, Newbur ...

's Creative Writing Program in 2000 by Nobel Laureate

Derek Walcott Sir Derek Alton Walcott OM (23 January 1930 – 17 March 2017) was a Saint Lucian poet and playwright. He received the 1992 Nobel Prize in Literature. His works include the Homeric epic poem '' Omeros'' (1990), which many critics view "as ...

, where he studied poetry and drama.

Author

Ramcharitar's published works include academic and creative books and articles. His book ''The Island Quintet'' (fiction), a collection of novellas, was published 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 ...

, UK, 2009. It was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book, 2010 for the Caribbean & Canada. ''The Island Quintet'' was reviewed in the ''Trinidad & Tobago Review''. A reviewer for ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' compared Ramcharitar's prose to that of

and V. S. Naipaul. ''American Fall'', a collection of poems described as "confident and engaging", was published by Peepal Tree in 2007. He published a historical work, ''A History of Creole Trinidad, 1956-2010'' A book of media criticism, ''Breaking the News, Media & Culture in Trinidad'', was published by Lexicon, a Trinidadian publisher (2005). Ramcharitar's play ''Paradiso'' was one of three winners of the

Warehouse Theatre The Warehouse Theatre was a professional producing theatre in the centre of Croydon, England. Based in an oak-beamed Victorian former cement warehouse, it had 100 seats. The theatre closed in 2012 following withdrawal of funding and the disc ...

's 2002

International Playwriting Festival The International Play writing Festival was founded in 1986 by Steve Gooch and Ted Craig and was hosted by the new playwriting theatre, Warehouse Theatre until the Warehouse Theater Company Limited went into administration in May 2012. The Festi ...

, and he was invited to the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

in September 2003, on a radio drama fellowship. His work as a poet is, unusually for contemporary Caribbean poets, highly formal and entirely in

Standard English In an English-speaking country, Standard English (SE) is the variety of English that has undergone codification to the point of being socially perceived as the standard language, associated with formal schooling, language assessment, and off ...

. He uses traditional forms such as the

sonnet A sonnet is a fixed poetic form with a structure traditionally consisting of fourteen lines adhering to a set Rhyme scheme, rhyming scheme. The term derives from the Italian word ''sonetto'' (, from the Latin word ''sonus'', ). Originating in ...

, villanelle and

sestina A sestina (, from ''sesto'', sixth; Old Occitan: ''cledisat'' ; also known as ''sestine'', ''sextine'', ''sextain'') is a fixed verse, fixed verse form consisting of six stanzas of six lines each, normally followed by a three-line envoi. The wor ...

. He is influenced by Walcott,

Philip Larkin Philip Arthur Larkin (9 August 1922 – 2 December 1985) was an English poet, novelist, and librarian. His first book of poetry, '' The North Ship'', was published in 1945, followed by two novels, '' Jill'' (1946) and '' A Girl in Winter'' (194 ...

R. S. Thomas Ronald Stuart Thomas (29 March 1913 – 25 September 2000), published as R. S. Thomas, was a Welsh poet and Anglican priest noted for nationalism, spirituality and dislike of the anglicisation of Wales. John Betjeman, introducing ''Song at the ...

and

Wallace Stevens Wallace Stevens (October 2, 1879 – August 2, 1955) was an American modernist poet. He was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, educated at Harvard and then New York Law School, and spent most of his life working as an executive for an insurance compa ...

. As a fiction writer, he has been compared to V. S. Naipaul, but his explicit sensuality and tendency to experimentation display debts to writers as diverse as

Umberto Eco Umberto Eco (5 January 1932 – 19 February 2016) was an Italian Medieval studies, medievalist, philosopher, Semiotics, semiotician, novelist, cultural critic, and political and social commentator. In English, he is best known for his popular ...

and

Thomas Pynchon Thomas Ruggles Pynchon Jr. ( , ; born May 8, 1937) is an American novelist noted for his dense and complex novels. His fiction and non-fiction writings encompass a vast array of subject matter, Literary genre, genres and Theme (narrative), th ...

. The epigraph to ''The Island Quintet'' was from Pynchon's ''

Gravity's Rainbow ''Gravity's Rainbow'' is a 1973 novel by the American writer Thomas Pynchon. The narrative is set primarily in Europe at the end of World War II and centers on the design, production and dispatch of V-2 rockets by the German military. In partic ...

''.

Academic

As an academic Ramcharitar is a polemical revisionist. His latest work is ''A History of Creole Trinidad'', ''1956-2010'' (Palgrave Macmillan), which presents a narrative considerably at odds with nationalist histories of Trinidad & Tobago. His doctoral thesis ("The Hidden History of Trinidad: Underground Culture in Trinidad, 1870-1970") provided a "corrective" narrative to the largely ethno-centric historical narratives of West Indian nationalist historians. He has published similarly oriented articles on culture and tourism, literary criticism and history."The Hostile, Recalcitrant Past", in ''Breaking New Ground'' (eds Daive Dunkely et al), New York, Lexington Press, 2011 His work on media and culture—media and collective memory, and the Caribbean emotional economy—seeks to establish a presence in largely untapped areas of Caribbean or West Indian cultural, critical, and media scholarship. Ramcharitar has lectured in theatre arts, cultural studies, and literature as an adjunct at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine, and as a Communications Consultant in Trinidad. He started writing as a journalist in 1991, working with the ''

Trinidad Guardian The ''Trinidad and Tobago Guardian'' (together with the ''Sunday Guardian'') is the oldest daily newspaper in Trinidad and Tobago. The paper is considered the newspaper of record for Trinidad and Tobago. The slogan of the paper is ''The Guardia ...

'', and the ''

Trinidad Express The ''Trinidad and Tobago Express'', better known as ''Daily Express'' (and the weekend editions ''Saturday Express'' and ''Sunday Express''), is one of three daily newspapers in Trinidad and Tobago. The ''Daily Express'' as per its masthead is ...

'' newspapers. He is currently and Assistant Professor of the Humanities at the American University in Iraq, Baghdad. References

External links

Trinidad Media Arts & Culture blog
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ramcharitar, Raymond Living people Trinidad and Tobago non-fiction writers Trinidad and Tobago novelists Trinidad and Tobago poets Trinidad and Tobago dramatists and playwrights 20th-century Trinidad and Tobago male writers Year of birth missing (living people) Trinidad and Tobago male non-fiction writers