Reviews

On these small islands where people, transplanted from all continents into a small space, both physically and mentally, the blossoming of raw human talent has been explosive. 

Trinidad and Tobago has been home to two Nobel Laureates for Literature, Sir VS Naipaul, and Derek Walcott, (both incidentally one-time staff writers at the Trinidad Guardian), and writers like Earl Lovelace and Sam Selvon. 

Here you will find obituaries on Sir Ellis Clarke, (the father of our constitution) and the late great newspaper editors Raoul Pantin and Keith Smith both fierce protectors of the fourth estate. 

With the annual Bocas Literary Festival, we saw a bourgeoning of a slew of Trinidadian writers and thinkers from Monique Roffey, Amanda Smyth to Ayanna Gillian Lloyd and Caroline Mackenzie. This is also the home to the mega cricket star Brian Lara and a world-famous Carnival. Many people of note have passed through these islands from Bill Clinton, Donald Trump, Barack Obama, and Fidel Castro, to the Queen, and Malcolm Gladwell.

The columns below demonstrate how even as we are absorbed in creating our own identity, with globalisation, travel and technology, we remain porous to the world and the people who shape our times. I have deliberately profiled some of our own artists, journalists, and intellectuals alongside recognised global figures as I genuinely believe their talent is equal to any in the world, their contribution as deep. For Trinis and Tobagonians these reviews are a dip in familiar calm waters, and for international readers, a portal into fascinating minds of the new world people. These reviews are dedicated to my brother Varun Mathur who came to Trinidad and Tobago as a boy when he was 14 and died loving these islands at 45.

This section is dedicated to my brother Varun
(Sept 6th, 1961 - Dec 31st, 2006)

Varun was a brilliant Engineer who studied in Plymouth and MSC in Construction and Management at Reading University. In 1985 Varun met and married Leela who worked with the Caribbean airlines, and had two beautiful daughters Priyanka and Sanjana. In Trinidad he worked for Readymix Concrete Company, followed by Neal and Massy’s EIL. In 2000 Varun became a partner in Premix Concrete until 2001 and soon became an expert in turning around flailing companies. It was while he was working with Central Concrete and Pumps Limited that he was diagnosed with colon cancer. He battled the disease bravely, privately and without self-pity. He made time for his colleagues, friends and gave all to his work as long as he could. Above all, he was a family man who adored us all as we loved him. When we were children, we had a shared history. Now, since his death, I see the world through both his eyes and mine, with double wonder. Varun passed away on Dec 31st 2006 at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, with one last smile.