It Falls Into Place: The Short Stories of Phyllis Shand Allfrey - Softcover

Allfrey, Phyllis Shand

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0953222411 ISBN 13: 9780953222414

Publisher: Papillote Press, 2004

Synopsis

It Falls Into Place brings together for the first time the shorter fiction of Phyllis Shand Allfrey whose novel The Orchid House is a classic of Caribbean literature.

These tantalising stories set in Dominica, New York and London yet always steeped in an unmistakably West Indian identity probe beneath the surface of colonial life, often drawing on autobiographical experience. Allfrey s skill is to lead her characters of different races and cultures into unpredictable encounters where miracles can happen.

With an introduction by Allfrey s biographer, Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert, professor of Caribbean culture and literature in the department of Hispanic Studies at Vassar College, USA.

About this title

Review

"[Allfrey s] delicate touch, discerning eye and a heart wise to the human condition animate these stories."
Olive Senior

"Allfrey the artist and Allfrey the activist merge in this memorable collection of stories."
David Dabydeen

"The magical literary voice of the luscious island of Dominica....These marvellous stories are a pleasure.
--Carmen Callil

About the Author

Phyllis Shand Allfrey (1908-1986), author of Love for an Island and It Falls Into Place, was born in Dominica, into a once wealthy planter family like her compatriot and sometime friend Jean Rhys and became a significant politician as well as a literary figure.

As a young woman she lived for a time in the United States, moving in well-connected New York society, and later spent some years in Britain, where she joined the Fabian Society and the Socialist League. In London, her career as a poet blossomed, both before and during the second world war. Returning to the West Indies in the 1950s, she co-founded the Dominica Labour Party and became a minister in the cabinet of the short-lived Federation of the West Indies in Trinidad. Back in Dominica, she ran a newspaper The Dominica Star and lived until her death in a tiny stone house filled with books and memories, of both the triumphs and the disappointments that characterised her personal and political life. Her acclaimed novel, The Orchid House, was first published in 1953 and filmed for Channel 4 television in 1991.

About this edition

• Publisher: Papillote Press
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0953222411
• ISBN 13: 9780953222414
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 144