21 pages • 42 minutes read
Derek WalcottA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Much scholarship surrounds the blurred lines between the poem’s central character, Shabine, and Walcott himself. To understand the links between poet and persona, it is necessary to examine their overlapping biographical details. While Shabine is from Trinidad, Walcott was born and raised in a nearby West Indies island, Saint Lucia. Walcott was raised in the island’s capital city of Castries, which appears in section 7 of the poem, “The Flight Anchors in Castries Harbor.” With Walcott’s youth in mind, the nostalgia that infuses the opening lines resonates even more powerfully: “When the stars self were young over Castries / I loved you alone and I loved the whole world” (Lines 60-61).
Walcott was born with English, Dutch, and African heritage, putting him in the socially complex plight of a racially diverse Carib. The poem explores this same plight through Shabine’s complicated and shifting relationship with his background. Shabine even shares the same ethnic ancestry, as he declares “I have Dutch, n*****, and English in me / and either I’m nobody, or I’m a nation” (Lines 42-43). Many similarities between Walcott and Shabine proceed from this shared plight of ethnic liminality in Caribbean island culture. Additionally both are passionate poets who write about this situation.
By Derek Walcott
A Careful Passion
Derek Walcott
Adam's Song
Derek Walcott
A Far Cry from Africa
Derek Walcott
Dream on Monkey Mountain
Derek Walcott
Love After Love
Derek Walcott
Midsummer XXVII
Derek Walcott
Omeros
Derek Walcott
Pantomime
Derek Walcott
Ruins of a Great House
Derek Walcott
Sabbaths, WI
Derek Walcott
The Almond Trees
Derek Walcott
The Flock
Derek Walcott
To Return To The Trees
Derek Walcott