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Literature

1961

• V S Naipaul was born in Trinidad in 1932 of Indian heritage. He moved to England in 1950, published his first novel in '57 and in '61 wins the Somerset Maugham Award for Miguel Street - " a beguiling book about growing up in the West Indies. The sketches are written lightly, so that tragedy is understated and comedy is overstated, yet the ring of truth always prevails." He wins the Nobel prize for Literature in 2001.

1962

• The Pulitzer Prize winning book, To Kill A Mocking Bird by Harper Lee is made into a film. Set in the Deep South of the 1930s it tells the story of a white lawyer defending a black man accused of raping a white girl. The film won several Oscars and brought attention to the inherent racial problems and social injustice that existed in the South.
• Negroes With Guns by Robert F. Williams is published while he's in exile in Cuba with his activist wife, Mabel. Their lack of fear and advocacy of using arms for self-defence was ground-breaking. The book recounted their struggles against the Ku Klux Klan and other racists and was hugely influential. Williams is the first to coin the term 'black power' in its political context - although it was popularised by others such as Willie Ricks, an activist with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) who would call it out to crowds when he addressed them.

1963

• CLR James writes Beyond a Boundary, a classic especially for cricket fans. "He traces the fruition of national West Indian consciousness through the development of cricket, where what happened inside the boundary affected life beyond it." (Darcus Howe, The Observer newspaper). It was when he moved to England from Trinidad that James became a writer as well as a leading Marxist theorist after becoming heavily involved in the politics of the far-left. Another notable book was James' The Black Jacobins (1938) which graphically points to the brutality of slavery and in turn, capitalism.

1964

• The West Indian Gazette ceases publication, after the death of its editor, Claudia Jones.Claudia Jones (1915-1964) was a Trinidadian who spent most of her life in New York. She was an active Communist and edited the Negro Affairs section of the paper, the Daily Worker. In 1955 during the McCarthy 'witch-hunts' for Communists she was given asylum in London.It was in London she founded the West Indian Gazette ('58) which formed part of her campaign for equal rights. Within two years, it had a circulation of 15,000. Claudia was also one of the team that launched the Notting Hill carnival in 1959.
• The Trinidadian Derek Walcott gains widespread recognition as a poet when In a Green Night is published. He creates his own style of literature that's true to West Indian life.He was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1992.

1965

• The American Ebony magazine celebrates it's 20th anniversary at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City and is attended by leading celebrities of the day. John H. Johnson (1918-2005) founded the magazine as well as a publishing empire and the cosmetics firm Fashion Flair. Ebony not only drew attention to black issues, histories and artists but also provided outlets for journalists and photographers who were previously overlooked. He was one of the biggest supporters of Dr. Martin Luther King.

1966

• The Caribbean Artists Movement is founded in London. It oversees and protects the literary, academic and performance skills of Caribbean writers and artists. Andrew Salkey, Edward Kamau Brathwaite and John La Rose were the catalysts.
• The Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys is published to international acclaim. Born to a white Creole woman from Dominica and a Welsh father, Jean left the Caribbean in 1907 when she was 17. However the book brought into the public consciousness some of the issues surrounding inter-racial relationships and colonialism.

1967

• E.R. Braithwaite's novel To Sir, With Love about his experiences as a teacher in the East End of London gets made into a film with Sidney Poitier. A renowned writer, lecturer and a representative for the UN, Braithwaite was born in Guyana. It was his London teaching and social work (finding foster homes for non-white kids) that provided him with the material for his eloquent and moving stories about race and class in Britain.

1970

• Pulitzer Prize winner Maya Angelou publishes the first in the series of her autobiographical works with the groundbreaking book I know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

1976

• Alex Hayley's book Roots is published and becomes one of the most important books of all time in black history. It receives many awards including the National Book Award and a special Pulitzer Prize for making an important contribution to the literature of slavery.

1982

• Alice Walker's groundbreaking book The Colour Purple was released about a poor black girl named Celie. It was a remarkable novel because it was written entirely in the form of her letters. These tell how she suffers at the hand of her father and then husband. The novel went on to win the prestigious Pulitzer prize in 1983.

1983

• Alice Walker won the prestigious Pulitzer Prize for her novel about a young poor black girl, The Colour Purple.

1987

• Paul Gilroy released his book There Ain't No Black in the Union Jack.

1988

• Toni Morrison won the Pulitzer Prize for her novel Beloved which was later adapted into a film starring Oprah Winfrey and the UK's Thandie Newton.

1991

• Nigerian author Ben Okri won the prestigious annual Booker prize for his novel, The Famished Road, a story of Nigerian village life at the bottom of the ladder.

1992

• A wave of new black fiction in the UK is kick-started by Victor Headley's Yardie. This novel, a raw and gritty tale about a drug baron, helped to launch The X Press, a black-owned publishers.

1993

• Toni Morrison was the first black American to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. She was also only the third woman to do so in 27 years. Morrison wrote six novels noted for their depictions of black America.

1994

• Ray Shell's Iced is published. Using street language and poetry, London-based Shell's debut tells the story of Cornelius Washington, Jr., a 40-year-old crack addict. Described by Maya Angelou as "a powerhouse", it was part of a wave of new black fiction in the UK - which kicked off with Victor Headley's Yardie in '92.

1995

• Nigerian writer and human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa was sentenced to death by the country's military regime on fabricated charges. He'd been campaigning for the rights to royalties from the oil reserves under the Ogoni people's lands. After his hanging, Nigeria was suspended from the Commonwealth.