John Figueroa

John Joseph Maria Figueroa (4 August 1920 – 5 March 1999)^[1] was a Jamaican poet and educator. He played a significant role in the development of Anglophone Caribbean literature both as a poet and an anthologist. He contributed to the development of the University College of the West Indies as an early member of staff, and had a parallel career as a broadcaster, working for various media organizations including the BBC.

Biography

Figueroa was born in Jamaica, where he was educated at St George's College. He attended Holy Cross College, Massachusetts, and did postgraduate studies at London University. He subsequently taught in Jamaica, Britain, the United States, Africa and Puerto Rico. In Jamaica he was the first West Indian to be appointed to a chair at the University College of the West Indies, and the first Dean of the Faculty of Education. Between 1964 and 1966 he was a visiting professor first at Rhode Island University and then Indiana University. In the early 1970s he become Professor of Humanities leading the Department of Education of the Centro Caribeno de Estudios Postgraduados, Puerto Rico. He later spend time as a professor at the University of Jos in Nigeria.

In the 1980s he moved to the UK, where he worked for the Open University, was a Fellow at the Centre for Caribbean Studies, University of Warwick, and an adviser in multicultural education in Manchester. He edited the pioneering two-volume anthology Caribbean Voices (vol 1: Dreams and Visions and vol 2: The Blue Horizons, 1966 and 1970 respectively), a comprehensive landmark collections of West Indian poetry. He was also the first general editor of the Heinemann Caribbean Writers Series.

He also played an important role in the development of Caribbean studies as a founder member of the Caribbean Studies Association and the Society for Caribbean Studies.

His own poetry "reflects his origins as a Jamaican of [Hispanic] descent and a Catholic who, whilst deeply committed to the Caribbean, was concerned to maintain [the diversity of its] heritage without apology. He insisted that drums were not the only Caribbean musical instrument (no doubt a dig at Kamau Brathwaite) and championed Derek Walcott's relationship to the classical and European literary tradition. Ironically, one of Figueroa's most effective poems is in Nation language."^[2] In the words of Andrew Salkey, "The phrase 'cosmopolitan poet' does not really adequately describe him or the impact that he has had on Anglophone Caribbean poetry, but it certainly goes some way in defining a part of his concern in not being tagged as regional or provincial. This is so because he is absolutely free from national limitations."^[3]

Works

• Blue Mountain Peak: Poetry & Prose (privately published, Jamaica, 1944).
• Love Leaps Here (privately published, UK, 1962).
• The Chase: A Collection of Poems 1941-1989 (Peepal Tree, 1991)
• As editor: Caribbean Voices, vol. 1: Dreams and Visions (1966) and vol. 2, The Blue Horizons.

Further reading

• Daryl C. Dance (ed.), Fifty Caribbean Writers: A Bio-Bibliographical Critical Sourcebook, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1986, pp. 178–84.

References

External links

• List of notable reviews of Figueroa's work.
• Pamela Beshoff, "Obituary: John Figueroa", The Independent, 11 March 1999.
• Erika J. Waters, "Interview with John J. M. Figueroa", The Caribbean Writer.
• Philip Nanton, "Wise words from the Caribbean" (John Figueroa obituary), The Guardian, 16 March 1999.