In the Castle of My Skin - Softcover

Lamming, Mr George

3.7

942 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0805207503 ISBN 13: 9780805207507

Publisher: Schocken Books, 1988

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An autobiographical novel of race and class by one of the leading Black writers of the 20th century

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Review:

George Lamming's "In the Castle of My Skin" skilfully depicts the Barbadian psyche. Set against the backdrop of the 1930s riots which helped to pave the way for Independence and the modern Barbados, through the eyes of a young boy, Lamming portrays the social, racial, political and urban struggles with which Barbados continues to grapple even with some thirty-three years of Political Independence from Britain. Required reading for all Caribbean people. The novel also offers non-Barbadians and non-Caribbean people insight into the modern social history of Barbados and the Caribbean.

‘A writer of the people...one is back again in the pages of Huckleberry Finn_ the fundamental book of civilisation...Mr Lamming captures the myth-making and myth-dissolving mind of childhood’

NEW STATESMAN

‘Its poetic imaginative writing has never been surpassed’

TRIBUNE

‘A striking piece of work, a rich and memorable feat of imaginative interpretation’

THE SPECTATOR

‘He produces anecdote after anecdote, rich and riotous.’

THE TIMES

‘There is not a stock figure in the story... fluent, poetical, sophisticated.’

THE SUNDAY TIMES

From the Back Cover:

'They won't know you, the you that's hidden somewhere in the castle of your skin'

Nine-year-old G. leads a life of quiet mischief crab catching, teasing preachers and playing among the pumpkin vines. His sleepy fishing village in 1930s Barbados is overseen by the English landlord who lives on the hill, just as their 'Little England' is watched over by the Mother Country. Yet gradually, G. finds himself awakening to the violence and injustice that lurk beneath the apparent order of things. As the world he knows begins to crumble, revealing the bruising secret at its heart, he is spurred ever closer to a life-changing decision. Lyrical and unsettling, George Lamming's autobiographical coming-of-age novel is a story of tragic innocence amid the collapse of colonial rule.

'Rich and riotous' The Times

'Its poetic imaginative writing has never been surpassed' Tribune

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