The Guyana Annual! A major victory!
The Guyana Annual is one of the longest lasting literary magazines in Guyana. Last year they launched writing competitions of different categories based on genre and age range of participants. On a whim, I decided to enter the poetry competition and to my surprise I won!
My poem is entitled, "The Scandal of O Tye Kim". The poem is based on Chinese-Guyanese history. O Tye Kim was the founder of Hopetown. The village still exists to this day and bears the exact same name. Today, the village is largely Afrocentric but it started as one of the few Chinese settlements bought by the Chinese indentured labourers who had completed their contracts on the plantation.
O Tye Kim attended the missionary school and was the local pastor of Hopetown. He is immortalized for his extramarital affair with a coloured woman who he would rendezvous with in Georgetown.
The character of O Tye Kim helped me to decide what devices would be used to examine the subject. The piece is filled with biblical allusions and also allusions to Chinese folklore.
The 2018 edition of the Guyana Annual also pays tribute to the amazing Wilson Harris. Wilson Harris helped put Guyana and Caribbean literature on the international map. One of Harris's major troupe is the notion of racial unity. At the end of his debut novel, The Palace of the Peacock, Harris masterfully captures the concept we are all one although diverse from a spiritual perspective.
The Guyana Annual is able to achieve the same goal since it celebrates the diversity of Guyanese culture. It brings together the voices of the new generation and the older one. It brings together amazing writers from all ethnic backgrounds.
The Guyana Annual is an amazing victory for the arts and culture.
My poem is entitled, "The Scandal of O Tye Kim". The poem is based on Chinese-Guyanese history. O Tye Kim was the founder of Hopetown. The village still exists to this day and bears the exact same name. Today, the village is largely Afrocentric but it started as one of the few Chinese settlements bought by the Chinese indentured labourers who had completed their contracts on the plantation.
O Tye Kim attended the missionary school and was the local pastor of Hopetown. He is immortalized for his extramarital affair with a coloured woman who he would rendezvous with in Georgetown.
The character of O Tye Kim helped me to decide what devices would be used to examine the subject. The piece is filled with biblical allusions and also allusions to Chinese folklore.
The 2018 edition of the Guyana Annual also pays tribute to the amazing Wilson Harris. Wilson Harris helped put Guyana and Caribbean literature on the international map. One of Harris's major troupe is the notion of racial unity. At the end of his debut novel, The Palace of the Peacock, Harris masterfully captures the concept we are all one although diverse from a spiritual perspective.
The Guyana Annual is able to achieve the same goal since it celebrates the diversity of Guyanese culture. It brings together the voices of the new generation and the older one. It brings together amazing writers from all ethnic backgrounds.
The Guyana Annual is an amazing victory for the arts and culture.
Comments
Post a Comment