Jean 'Binta' Breeze
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Jean "Binta" Breeze (born 1956) is a Jamaican dub poet, and storyteller. She has worked also as a theatre director, choreographer, actor and teacher. She was awarded in 2003 a Nesta Fellowship of two years, to be held in Cambridge.
She was brought up in rural Jamaica, and studied at the Jamaican School of Drama in Kingston. She came to London in 1986, at the invitation of Linton Kwesi Johnson; she taught Theatre Studies at Brixton College. She has since also written for drama in various media.
She suffers from schizophrenia and has written poetry about what she herself calls "madness." In April 2006, on the BBC Radio program "The Interview," Breeze gave her perspective on mental illness and advocated increased attention to the needs of schizophrenics who do not have a "talent" like hers.
[edit] Works
- Answers (1983)
- Riddym Ravings and Other Poems (1988) edited by Mervyn Morris
- Spring Cleaning (1992)
- On the Edge of an Island (1997)
- Song Lines (1997)
- The Arrival of Brighteye and Other Poems (2000)
