Victor Stafford Reid
Encyclopedia
Victor Stafford Reid was a Jamaican writer born in Kingston, Jamaica
who wrote with an intent of influencing the younger generations. He was awarded the silver and gold Musgrave medals (1955–1978), the Order of Jamaica
(1980) and the Norman Manley Award for Excellence in Literature in 1981. He was the author of seven novels, three of which were aimed towards children, one play production, and several short stories. Two of his most well noted works include New Day and The Leopard.
As a writer, Reid aimed to instil an awareness of legacy and tradition among the Jamaican people. His writings reflected many of the social and cultural hardships that pervade the time periods illustrated in his literary works. As literary critic Edward Baugh
has stated, “[Reid’s] writing showed a fondness for the rebel with a cause… he wanted people to learn about their heritage through his writing.”
Reid was one of a handful of writers to emerge from the new literary and nationalist movement that seized Jamaican sentiment in the period of the late 1930s. From this “new art” surfaced many of Reid’s literary contemporaries, including Roger Mais
, George
Campbell, M.G. Smith, and H.D. Carberry. A common objective among this new generation of writers was an inclination to “break away from Victorianism
and to associate with the Jamaican independence movement.”
Reid’s emphasis on resistance and struggle is reaffirmed in a 1978 lecture he delivered at the Institute of Jamaica on the topic of cultural revolution in Jamaica post-1938. In the address, Reid contended that the collective discontent of the working class majority was the public assertion of a “new brand of loyalty” that situated itself not only beyond, but more importantly, in direct resistance to imperial rule.
VICTOR STAFFORD REID
was Born in Kingston, Jamaica
, Victor Reid was the son of Alexander Reid. Victor along with his two brothers and one sister grew up and attended school in Jamaica. Victor graduated from Kingston Technical High school in 1929. His father was a business man who worked in the shipping industry in the United States and married Margaret Reid. Victor called himself a “city bred” person because of his urban background. He was first involved in advertising, journalism, farming and the book trade before becoming a writer. Because of success in literature, his early life was prosperous. In 1935, he married his wife Monica and they had four children. Reid held several posts in the Jamaican government, including Chairman of the Jamaica National Trust Commission, and a Trustee of the Historic Foundation Research Centre in Kingston. Reid was also well traveled, journeying Victor Stafford Reid (1 May 1913 - 25 August 1987) was a Jamaican writer born in Kingston, Jamaica who wrote with an intent of influencing the younger generations. He was awarded the silver and gold Musgrave medals (1955–1978), the Order of Jamaica (1980) and the Norman Manley Award for Excellence in Literature in 1981. [1] He was the author of seven novels, three of which were aimed towards children, one play production, and several short stories. Two of his most well noted works include New Day and The Leopard.to Great Britain
, East Africa
and West Africa
, Canada
and the United States
during his lifetime. . Three of his book are The Leopard,The young warriors and new day
(1949) chronicles the Morant Bay Rebellion
of 1865 and the series of events that led to the establishment of the new Jamaican constitution in 1944. Because this was Reid’s first work and he was based on the small island, it was difficult to get a publisher, especially when his manuscript was written in a different type of language, Creole
. In order to break the normal means of literary education, Reid decided to introduce creole language ( patoice)speech in order to familiarize young Jamaicans with black history as well as to form a consolidation of pride in their heritage. Luckily for Reid, a piece of his work in The Gleaner
, a Jamaican newspaper, caught the attention of some magazine people that were visiting the island. This started his first publication and gave him exposure to the literary world. He was soon also involved in editing and writing for Spotlight News Magazine and The Toronto Star. Just after publishing New Day
, Reid published a novel written for young people called Sixty-Five that also portrays the Morant Bay Rebellion
, but “in an easier gentler sort of way.”
In the wake of the later Mau Mau Rebellion in Kenya
, Reid was inspired to write a novel about the African situation in an attempt to relate that situation to the Jamaican uprising presented in New Day
. His representation of this rebellion in Kenya
is evidence that Reid found literary inspiration in these black uprisings. During the time that he was writing The Leopard
, he was simultaneously working as an editor of a weekly newspaper called Public Opinion. Once the book was finished, it was “snapped up by an American and English publisher and was published.” Reid’s reviews on his new novel were well received by its first audience. After publishing his first few novels, he decided to shift from literary works on specific events to focus on educating the younger generation in Jamaica. According to Reid, it was more difficult for him to write children’s novels than adult novels, because he “had never written down to children.”
Along with his Sixty-Five, Reid also wrote a number of novels for school children including The Young Warriors (1967) which deals with runaway slaves, called the Maroons
. He also wrote Peter of Mount Ephraim (1971), which dates back to the 1831 Samuel Sharpe
slave uprising. His next novel, The Jamaican, was written in 1976. It was written to commemorate the life of the Juan de Bolas, a pre Maroon band leader during the English and Spanish quest for supremacy in Jamaica during the mid 17th century. Nanny Town (1983) was Reid’s last published novel that portrays Jamaica’s original Queen Mother who led the Jamaican Maroons
to independence from the English. Reid’s final work was a biography of the Jamaican national hero, Norman Manley
, called The Horses of the Morning (1985). Although novels comprised the bulk of Reid’s literary body of work, Reid was also the author of several stories in Fourteen Jamaican Short Stories (1950) and a play production entitled Waterford Bar (1959). Furthermore, edited transcripts of lectures delivered by Reid, such as “The Cultural Revolution in Jamaica after 1938” (1978) and “The Writer & His Work: V.S. Reid” (1986), have been reprinted posthumously in texts such as The Routledge Reader in Caribbean Literature and the Journal of West Indian Literature, respectively.
Another important aspect of Reid’s writing included his desire to contribute to the education system. Previously, schools were solely taught from an English perspective and through a colonial lens. Reid, however, wanted people in school to learn about their own heritage through his writing; he wanted people to recognize that blacks, not only Europeans, participated in history. Therefore, Reid wrote novels to be used in Jamaican schools that provided a historical context of their country and heritage.
Reid was also constantly reinventing language through his writing. In his first novel, New Day
, he created a newly modified language that combines both the elements of Standard English and the native Creole language
. Later, in works such as The Leopard
, Reid integrates a singing prose style of writing.
his first novel was actually sixty-five not the one mentioned above even though it still chronicles the mora bay rebellion
Kingston, Jamaica
Kingston is the capital and largest city of Jamaica, located on the southeastern coast of the island. It faces a natural harbour protected by the Palisadoes, a long sand spit which connects the town of Port Royal and the Norman Manley International Airport to the rest of the island...
who wrote with an intent of influencing the younger generations. He was awarded the silver and gold Musgrave medals (1955–1978), the Order of Jamaica
Order of Jamaica
The Order of Jamaica is the fourth of the five ranks in the Jamaican honours system. The Order was established in 1969, and is considered the equivalent of knighthood in the British honours system....
(1980) and the Norman Manley Award for Excellence in Literature in 1981. He was the author of seven novels, three of which were aimed towards children, one play production, and several short stories. Two of his most well noted works include New Day and The Leopard.
As a writer, Reid aimed to instil an awareness of legacy and tradition among the Jamaican people. His writings reflected many of the social and cultural hardships that pervade the time periods illustrated in his literary works. As literary critic Edward Baugh
Edward Baugh
Edward Alston Cecil Baugh is a Jamaican poet and scholar, recognised as an authority on the work of Derek Walcott.He was born in Port Antonio, Jamaica, and began writing poetry at Titchfield High School...
has stated, “[Reid’s] writing showed a fondness for the rebel with a cause… he wanted people to learn about their heritage through his writing.”
Reid was one of a handful of writers to emerge from the new literary and nationalist movement that seized Jamaican sentiment in the period of the late 1930s. From this “new art” surfaced many of Reid’s literary contemporaries, including Roger Mais
Roger Mais
Roger Mais was a Jamaican journalist, novelist, poet, and playwright. He was born to a middle-class family in Kingston, Jamaica. By 1951, Mais had won ten first prizes in West Indian literary competitions...
, George
Campbell, M.G. Smith, and H.D. Carberry. A common objective among this new generation of writers was an inclination to “break away from Victorianism
Victorianism
Victorianism is the name given to the attitudes, art, and culture of the later two-thirds of the 19th century. This usage is strong within social history and the study of literature, less so in philosophy. Many disciplines do not use the term, but instead prefer Victorian Era, or simply "Late 19th...
and to associate with the Jamaican independence movement.”
Reid’s emphasis on resistance and struggle is reaffirmed in a 1978 lecture he delivered at the Institute of Jamaica on the topic of cultural revolution in Jamaica post-1938. In the address, Reid contended that the collective discontent of the working class majority was the public assertion of a “new brand of loyalty” that situated itself not only beyond, but more importantly, in direct resistance to imperial rule.
VICTOR STAFFORD REID
was Born in Kingston, Jamaica
Kingston, Jamaica
Kingston is the capital and largest city of Jamaica, located on the southeastern coast of the island. It faces a natural harbour protected by the Palisadoes, a long sand spit which connects the town of Port Royal and the Norman Manley International Airport to the rest of the island...
, Victor Reid was the son of Alexander Reid. Victor along with his two brothers and one sister grew up and attended school in Jamaica. Victor graduated from Kingston Technical High school in 1929. His father was a business man who worked in the shipping industry in the United States and married Margaret Reid. Victor called himself a “city bred” person because of his urban background. He was first involved in advertising, journalism, farming and the book trade before becoming a writer. Because of success in literature, his early life was prosperous. In 1935, he married his wife Monica and they had four children. Reid held several posts in the Jamaican government, including Chairman of the Jamaica National Trust Commission, and a Trustee of the Historic Foundation Research Centre in Kingston. Reid was also well traveled, journeying Victor Stafford Reid (1 May 1913 - 25 August 1987) was a Jamaican writer born in Kingston, Jamaica who wrote with an intent of influencing the younger generations. He was awarded the silver and gold Musgrave medals (1955–1978), the Order of Jamaica (1980) and the Norman Manley Award for Excellence in Literature in 1981. [1] He was the author of seven novels, three of which were aimed towards children, one play production, and several short stories. Two of his most well noted works include New Day and The Leopard.to Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
, East Africa
East Africa
East Africa or Eastern Africa is the easterly region of the African continent, variably defined by geography or geopolitics. In the UN scheme of geographic regions, 19 territories constitute Eastern Africa:...
and West Africa
West Africa
West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of the African continent. Geopolitically, the UN definition of Western Africa includes the following 16 countries and an area of approximately 5 million square km:-Flags of West Africa:...
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
during his lifetime. . Three of his book are The Leopard,The young warriors and new day
Career
His first novel, New DayNew Day (novel)
New Day marks Jamaican writer V. S. Reid’s first novel published in 1949. Upon its release, Reid’s fictional and historical narrative was well received by the literary audience and “caught hold of people’s imagination in a kind of way that [Reid] couldn’t imagine would happen in Jamaica.” ...
(1949) chronicles the Morant Bay Rebellion
Morant Bay rebellion
The Morant Bay rebellion began on October 11, 1865, when Paul Bogle led 200 to 300 black men and women into the town of Morant Bay, parish of St. Thomas in the East, Jamaica. The rebellion and its aftermath were a major turning point in Jamaica's history, and also generated a significant political...
of 1865 and the series of events that led to the establishment of the new Jamaican constitution in 1944. Because this was Reid’s first work and he was based on the small island, it was difficult to get a publisher, especially when his manuscript was written in a different type of language, Creole
Creole language
A creole language, or simply a creole, is a stable natural language developed from the mixing of parent languages; creoles differ from pidgins in that they have been nativized by children as their primary language, making them have features of natural languages that are normally missing from...
. In order to break the normal means of literary education, Reid decided to introduce creole language ( patoice)speech in order to familiarize young Jamaicans with black history as well as to form a consolidation of pride in their heritage. Luckily for Reid, a piece of his work in The Gleaner
Gleaner
Gleaner may refer to:*Gleaner Company, a newspaper publishing enterprise in Jamaica.*Gleaner Manufacturing Company, a manufacturer of combine harvesters.*Gleaning, the collection of crops left over after harvest....
, a Jamaican newspaper, caught the attention of some magazine people that were visiting the island. This started his first publication and gave him exposure to the literary world. He was soon also involved in editing and writing for Spotlight News Magazine and The Toronto Star. Just after publishing New Day
New Day (novel)
New Day marks Jamaican writer V. S. Reid’s first novel published in 1949. Upon its release, Reid’s fictional and historical narrative was well received by the literary audience and “caught hold of people’s imagination in a kind of way that [Reid] couldn’t imagine would happen in Jamaica.” ...
, Reid published a novel written for young people called Sixty-Five that also portrays the Morant Bay Rebellion
Morant Bay rebellion
The Morant Bay rebellion began on October 11, 1865, when Paul Bogle led 200 to 300 black men and women into the town of Morant Bay, parish of St. Thomas in the East, Jamaica. The rebellion and its aftermath were a major turning point in Jamaica's history, and also generated a significant political...
, but “in an easier gentler sort of way.”
In the wake of the later Mau Mau Rebellion in Kenya
Kenya
Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...
, Reid was inspired to write a novel about the African situation in an attempt to relate that situation to the Jamaican uprising presented in New Day
New Day (novel)
New Day marks Jamaican writer V. S. Reid’s first novel published in 1949. Upon its release, Reid’s fictional and historical narrative was well received by the literary audience and “caught hold of people’s imagination in a kind of way that [Reid] couldn’t imagine would happen in Jamaica.” ...
. His representation of this rebellion in Kenya
Kenya
Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...
is evidence that Reid found literary inspiration in these black uprisings. During the time that he was writing The Leopard
The Leopard
The Leopard is a novel by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa that chronicles the changes in Sicilian life and society during the Risorgimento...
, he was simultaneously working as an editor of a weekly newspaper called Public Opinion. Once the book was finished, it was “snapped up by an American and English publisher and was published.” Reid’s reviews on his new novel were well received by its first audience. After publishing his first few novels, he decided to shift from literary works on specific events to focus on educating the younger generation in Jamaica. According to Reid, it was more difficult for him to write children’s novels than adult novels, because he “had never written down to children.”
Along with his Sixty-Five, Reid also wrote a number of novels for school children including The Young Warriors (1967) which deals with runaway slaves, called the Maroons
Maroon (people)
Maroons were runaway slaves in the West Indies, Central America, South America, and North America, who formed independent settlements together...
. He also wrote Peter of Mount Ephraim (1971), which dates back to the 1831 Samuel Sharpe
Samuel Sharpe
Samuel 'Sam' Sharpe, or Sharp, National Hero of Jamaica was the slave leader behind the Jamaican Baptist War slave rebellion. Samuel Sharpe was born in the parish of St. James...
slave uprising. His next novel, The Jamaican, was written in 1976. It was written to commemorate the life of the Juan de Bolas, a pre Maroon band leader during the English and Spanish quest for supremacy in Jamaica during the mid 17th century. Nanny Town (1983) was Reid’s last published novel that portrays Jamaica’s original Queen Mother who led the Jamaican Maroons
Jamaican Maroons
The 'Jamaican Maroons are descended from slaves who escaped from slavery and established free communities in the mountainous interior of Jamaica during the long era of slavery in the island. African slaves imported during the Spanish period may have provided the first runaways, apparently mixing...
to independence from the English. Reid’s final work was a biography of the Jamaican national hero, Norman Manley
Norman Manley
Norman Washington Manley MM QC National Hero of Jamaica , was a Jamaican statesman. A Rhodes Scholar, Manley became one of Jamaica's leading lawyers in the 1920s...
, called The Horses of the Morning (1985). Although novels comprised the bulk of Reid’s literary body of work, Reid was also the author of several stories in Fourteen Jamaican Short Stories (1950) and a play production entitled Waterford Bar (1959). Furthermore, edited transcripts of lectures delivered by Reid, such as “The Cultural Revolution in Jamaica after 1938” (1978) and “The Writer & His Work: V.S. Reid” (1986), have been reprinted posthumously in texts such as The Routledge Reader in Caribbean Literature and the Journal of West Indian Literature, respectively.
Literary Themes
Reid’s novels focus on the freedom of black culture and describe the struggles that blacks had to and sometimes still endure. His works tend to focus primarily on the history, hopes, and powers of the Jamaican people. Through his writing, Reid wanted to break apart the “distortions of history” portrayed by the foreign press, which described Jamaican radicals as criminals. He wrote to prove the innocence of people who were rendered to be the opposite. Reid held that “[he] must discover, somehow, that these people were not the criminals they were thought to be.” In a way, he was telling the untold stories of the times.Another important aspect of Reid’s writing included his desire to contribute to the education system. Previously, schools were solely taught from an English perspective and through a colonial lens. Reid, however, wanted people in school to learn about their own heritage through his writing; he wanted people to recognize that blacks, not only Europeans, participated in history. Therefore, Reid wrote novels to be used in Jamaican schools that provided a historical context of their country and heritage.
Reid was also constantly reinventing language through his writing. In his first novel, New Day
New Day (novel)
New Day marks Jamaican writer V. S. Reid’s first novel published in 1949. Upon its release, Reid’s fictional and historical narrative was well received by the literary audience and “caught hold of people’s imagination in a kind of way that [Reid] couldn’t imagine would happen in Jamaica.” ...
, he created a newly modified language that combines both the elements of Standard English and the native Creole language
Creole language
A creole language, or simply a creole, is a stable natural language developed from the mixing of parent languages; creoles differ from pidgins in that they have been nativized by children as their primary language, making them have features of natural languages that are normally missing from...
. Later, in works such as The Leopard
The Leopard (novel)
The Leopard is a novel by Jamaican writer, V. S. Reid. It portrays the hardships of the Kenyan people during the time of the Mau Mau Rebellion. Novels similar to The Leopard, like Caroline Elkin’s Imperial Reckoning , as well as Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s Petals of Blood also reflect events during the...
, Reid integrates a singing prose style of writing.
his first novel was actually sixty-five not the one mentioned above even though it still chronicles the mora bay rebellion