In 1948 Andrea Levy's father sailed from Jamaica to England on the Empire Windrush ship and her mother joined him soon after. Andrea was born in London in 1956, growing up black in a very white England. This experience has given her an complex perspective on the country of her birth.
Andrea Levy did not begin writing until she was in her mid-thirties. At that time there was little written about the black British experience in Britian. She writes entertaining novels that reflect the experiences of black Britons, that look closely and perceptively at Britain and its changing population and at the intimacies that bind British history with that of the Caribbean.
Works:
In her first three novels she explored the problems faced by black British-born children of Jamaican emigrants: Every Light in the House Burnin' (1994), Never Far from Nowhere (1996), The Fruit of the Lemon (1999), In her fourth novel Small Island Levy examines the experiences of those of her father's generation who returned to Britain after being in the RAF during the Second World War and the changes immigration brought to everyone's lives. In her latest novel, The Long Song, Levy goes further back to the origins of that intimacy between Britain and the Caribbean. The book is set in early 19th century Jamaica during the last years of slavery and the period immediately after emmancipation.
Andrea Levy is a Londoner. She not only lives and works in the city she loves but has used London as the setting in many of her novels
No comments:
Post a Comment