View from Mount Diablo
Encyclopedia
View from Mount Diablo is a verse novel
by Ralph Thompson
(b. 1928), which won the Jamaican National Literary Award in manuscript in 2001, and was published by Peepal Tree Press
in 2003. An annotated edition with a number of small textual corrections appeared in both material and digital formats in 2009.
, during which his uncle Johann, of German extraction, is interned in the same camp as future national leader Alexander Bustamante
. Adam has a close friend, Nathan, a poor black boy who is a gardener and groom, but education forces them apart. After taking a degree at Oxford University in the 1950s Adam returns to Jamaica to work as a journalist on the Daily Tribune (a version of The Daily Gleaner) and marries a Jamaican Chinese, Amber Lee. They have a daughter, Chantal, but when she is 15 (sometime in the early 1970s) she is raped in the grounds of her school, and the marriage subsequently breaks up, Amber and Chantal emigrating to Canada
while Adam stays in Kingston and becomes ever more committed to crusading journalism.
A parallel historical narrative charts Jamaica's progress from Crown Colony
to full independence, and its subsequent descent into serious civil violence. Corruption, veniality, sectarianism, and other elements forming what Rastafarians call the 'politricks' of Jamaica are noted, but the principal force for evil is squarely diagnosed as the international cocaine
trade, in its facilitation of material corruption, in the morally deadening toleration of violence it promotes, and in the appalling opportunity cost
it imposes on national infrastructrure, education, and business. From this history a series of vignettes emerge, of profits turned, of a needless death on the operating table caused by a substandard generator, of extrajudicial killing by a special police squad, and of events in the life of a principal cocaine baron—Adam's sometime friend, Nathan.
Eventually an enforcer named Blaka, spurred by religious conversion, becomes an informer for Adam, whose journalism begins to expose too many secrets of the 'runnings', or details of shipments and transactions. Adam also hears the dying confession of a white middleman, Tony 'the Frog' Blake, who knows of Nathan's involvement, and so becomes an unacceptable threat to the cocaine trader—and as Blaka observes, "Blood / cheaper than drugs" (946-7). Blaka is found murdered on Mount Diablo (a central Jamaican height), "stuffed in a handcart, head severed, torso turned / to the mountain, blank eyes staring down the valley [...] the word Judas, warning intaglio, / carved with a switchblade into the transom" (955-9); another body is floating in the harbour; and Adam himself is confronted at home, and after a brief struggle shot dead, by Nathan.
Formally, View from Mount Diablo uses a tragic (i.e. failed, abortive) Bildungsroman
structure to support a state-of-the-nation novel; additional topoi and tropes concerning the drug trades and policing are drawn both from real Jamaican life and from popular cinematic and print fictions of crime.
Technically, the verse novel is written in loosely heroic single-rhymed quatrains—i.e. the metre consistently approximates iambic pentameter
, and the four-line stanzas rhyme abcb. It is structured in a prologue and 12 chapters, and has 1,048 lines.
Jamaican history from the 1930s-70s certainly is covered, but while those ought to be the limiting dates a series of devices and observations blurs the issue, and forces time to be more advanced than it chronologically should be. In gross, the scale of the cocaine trade reported and the annual murder-rates implicit in it point to a date in at least the later 1980s, while in fine, references to computerisation in journalism and the use of a personal photo as a screensaver
implies a date at least in the 1990s. What Thompson in effect manages is to keep the first half of his story in historical time, but thereafter to subsume into the violence and social problems of the 1970s all later, generically similar events of the 1980s-2000s, so that in the second half of the story time is foreshortened, and the verse novel made much wider-reaching as a contemporary national diagnosis than it may at first seem.
In keeping, while Adam's childhood and racial identity are similar to Thompson's, his Oxford degree, profession of journalism, experience of familial tragedy, and murder in early middle-age progressively distance him from his creator.
Laureate Derek Walcott
, a longstanding personal friend:
The poem won the Jamaican National Literary Award in manuscript
in 2001; the Award Committee that year was chaired by David Williams, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Literatures in English at the University of the West Indies
–Mona, where the poem has subsequently been taught. Initial sales in Jamaica amounted to 300+ copies (average sale of a paperback being c.70).
It was serialised in The Gleaner (Kingston
) and published in paperback by Peepal Tree Press
in 2003 to strongly positive and appreciative reviews; two such are reproduced in the second, annotated edition (2009), and half-a-dozen are linked through the Peepal Tree website.http://www.peepaltreepress.com/review_list.asp?isbn=9781900715812
View from Mount Diablo: An annotated edition, edited by John Lennard
, was published simultaneously in paperback by Peepal Tree http://www.peepaltreepress.com, and digitally by Humanities-Ebooks http://www.humanities-ebooks.co.uk, in 2009. (ISBN 978-1-84523-144-6 [paperback ed.]; ISBN 978-1-84760-093-6 [digital ed.])
Verse novel
A verse novel is a type of narrative poetry in which a novel-length narrative is told through the medium of poetry rather than prose. Either simple or complex stanzaic verse-forms may be used, but there will usually be a large cast, multiple voices, dialogue, narration, description, and action in a...
by Ralph Thompson
Ralph Thompson (poet)
Ralph Thompson, C.D. , is a Jamaican businessman, educational activist, artist and poet.- Life and Business Career :Thompson was born in Poughkeepsie, NY to a Jamaican mother and US father, but the marriage lasted only three years, and from 1931 he and his sister were raised in Jamaica...
(b. 1928), which won the Jamaican National Literary Award in manuscript in 2001, and was published by Peepal Tree Press
Peepal Tree Press
Peepal Tree Press, based in England, publishes Caribbean, Black British and South Asian fiction, poetry and academic books.Peepal Tree is a wholly independent company, founded in 1985, and now publishes around 30-40 books a year. Peepal Tree Press has published over 250 titles, and states a...
in 2003. An annotated edition with a number of small textual corrections appeared in both material and digital formats in 2009.
Summary
The poem narrates the life of a white Jamaican, Adam Cole, born sometime in the 1930s and so growing up during World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, during which his uncle Johann, of German extraction, is interned in the same camp as future national leader Alexander Bustamante
Alexander Bustamante
Sir William Alexander Clarke Bustamante GBE, National Hero of Jamaica was a Jamaican politician and labour leader....
. Adam has a close friend, Nathan, a poor black boy who is a gardener and groom, but education forces them apart. After taking a degree at Oxford University in the 1950s Adam returns to Jamaica to work as a journalist on the Daily Tribune (a version of The Daily Gleaner) and marries a Jamaican Chinese, Amber Lee. They have a daughter, Chantal, but when she is 15 (sometime in the early 1970s) she is raped in the grounds of her school, and the marriage subsequently breaks up, Amber and Chantal emigrating to 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...
while Adam stays in Kingston and becomes ever more committed to crusading journalism.
A parallel historical narrative charts Jamaica's progress from Crown Colony
Crown colony
A Crown colony, also known in the 17th century as royal colony, was a type of colonial administration of the English and later British Empire....
to full independence, and its subsequent descent into serious civil violence. Corruption, veniality, sectarianism, and other elements forming what Rastafarians call the 'politricks' of Jamaica are noted, but the principal force for evil is squarely diagnosed as the international cocaine
Cocaine
Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. The name comes from "coca" in addition to the alkaloid suffix -ine, forming cocaine. It is a stimulant of the central nervous system, an appetite suppressant, and a topical anesthetic...
trade, in its facilitation of material corruption, in the morally deadening toleration of violence it promotes, and in the appalling opportunity cost
Opportunity cost
Opportunity cost is the cost of any activity measured in terms of the value of the best alternative that is not chosen . It is the sacrifice related to the second best choice available to someone, or group, who has picked among several mutually exclusive choices. The opportunity cost is also the...
it imposes on national infrastructrure, education, and business. From this history a series of vignettes emerge, of profits turned, of a needless death on the operating table caused by a substandard generator, of extrajudicial killing by a special police squad, and of events in the life of a principal cocaine baron—Adam's sometime friend, Nathan.
Eventually an enforcer named Blaka, spurred by religious conversion, becomes an informer for Adam, whose journalism begins to expose too many secrets of the 'runnings', or details of shipments and transactions. Adam also hears the dying confession of a white middleman, Tony 'the Frog' Blake, who knows of Nathan's involvement, and so becomes an unacceptable threat to the cocaine trader—and as Blaka observes, "Blood / cheaper than drugs" (946-7). Blaka is found murdered on Mount Diablo (a central Jamaican height), "stuffed in a handcart, head severed, torso turned / to the mountain, blank eyes staring down the valley [...] the word Judas, warning intaglio, / carved with a switchblade into the transom" (955-9); another body is floating in the harbour; and Adam himself is confronted at home, and after a brief struggle shot dead, by Nathan.
Formally, View from Mount Diablo uses a tragic (i.e. failed, abortive) Bildungsroman
Bildungsroman
In literary criticism, bildungsroman or coming-of-age story is a literary genre which focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood , and in which character change is thus extremely important...
structure to support a state-of-the-nation novel; additional topoi and tropes concerning the drug trades and policing are drawn both from real Jamaican life and from popular cinematic and print fictions of crime.
Technically, the verse novel is written in loosely heroic single-rhymed quatrains—i.e. the metre consistently approximates iambic pentameter
Iambic pentameter
Iambic pentameter is a commonly used metrical line in traditional verse and verse drama. The term describes the particular rhythm that the words establish in that line. That rhythm is measured in small groups of syllables; these small groups of syllables are called "feet"...
, and the four-line stanzas rhyme abcb. It is structured in a prologue and 12 chapters, and has 1,048 lines.
The treatment of time and autobiography
Given Adam's apparent dates of birth and marriage, and Chantal's age when raped, it is easy to suppose View from Mount Diablo to cover Jamaican history from the 1930s-70s. Similarly, given that Adam is a white Jamaican protagonist created by a white Jamaican author, it is easy to suppose him autobiographical. But neither supposition is adequately true.Jamaican history from the 1930s-70s certainly is covered, but while those ought to be the limiting dates a series of devices and observations blurs the issue, and forces time to be more advanced than it chronologically should be. In gross, the scale of the cocaine trade reported and the annual murder-rates implicit in it point to a date in at least the later 1980s, while in fine, references to computerisation in journalism and the use of a personal photo as a screensaver
Screensaver
A screensaver is a type of computer program initially designed to prevent phosphor burn-in on CRT and plasma computer monitors by blanking the screen or filling it with moving images or patterns when the computer is not in use...
implies a date at least in the 1990s. What Thompson in effect manages is to keep the first half of his story in historical time, but thereafter to subsume into the violence and social problems of the 1970s all later, generically similar events of the 1980s-2000s, so that in the second half of the story time is foreshortened, and the verse novel made much wider-reaching as a contemporary national diagnosis than it may at first seem.
In keeping, while Adam's childhood and racial identity are similar to Thompson's, his Oxford degree, profession of journalism, experience of familial tragedy, and murder in early middle-age progressively distance him from his creator.
Origins and early reception
Thompson has said that a significant factor in his decision to write View from Mount Diablo was pressurising encouragement from NobelNobel Prize
The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
Laureate Derek Walcott
Derek Walcott
Derek Alton Walcott, OBE OCC is a Saint Lucian poet, playwright, writer and visual artist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1992 and the T. S. Eliot Prize in 2011 for White Egrets. His works include the Homeric epic Omeros...
, a longstanding personal friend:
On one of his visits to Jamaica Derek Walcott said to me, "Thompson, every time I come to Jamaica I feel your anger about the state of politics in Jamaica and the corruption contaminating the society. Why don't you reflect this indignation in your next collection[?]" [...] The first step was to recognize that the anger which Walcott recognized needed to be regulated by a relatively strict poetic form or it would turn into a scream.
The poem won the Jamaican National Literary Award in manuscript
Manuscript
A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...
in 2001; the Award Committee that year was chaired by David Williams, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Literatures in English at the University of the West Indies
University of the West Indies
The University of the West Indies , is an autonomous regional institution supported by and serving 17 English-speaking countries and territories in the Caribbean: Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Dominica,...
–Mona, where the poem has subsequently been taught. Initial sales in Jamaica amounted to 300+ copies (average sale of a paperback being c.70).
It was serialised in The Gleaner (Kingston
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...
) and published in paperback by Peepal Tree Press
Peepal Tree Press
Peepal Tree Press, based in England, publishes Caribbean, Black British and South Asian fiction, poetry and academic books.Peepal Tree is a wholly independent company, founded in 1985, and now publishes around 30-40 books a year. Peepal Tree Press has published over 250 titles, and states a...
in 2003 to strongly positive and appreciative reviews; two such are reproduced in the second, annotated edition (2009), and half-a-dozen are linked through the Peepal Tree website.http://www.peepaltreepress.com/review_list.asp?isbn=9781900715812
Editions
View from Mount Diablo was first published by Peepal Tree Press in 2003 (ISBN 1-900715-81-3).View from Mount Diablo: An annotated edition, edited by John Lennard
John Lennard
John Lennard is Professor of British and American Literature at the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica, and a freelance academic and writer.-Biography:...
, was published simultaneously in paperback by Peepal Tree http://www.peepaltreepress.com, and digitally by Humanities-Ebooks http://www.humanities-ebooks.co.uk, in 2009. (ISBN 978-1-84523-144-6 [paperback ed.]; ISBN 978-1-84760-093-6 [digital ed.])