Description
A young Afro-Guyanese engineer comes to a coastal Kentish village as part of a project to shore up its sea-defences. He boards with an old English woman, Mrs Rutherford, and through his relationship with her discovers the latent violence and raw emotions present in this apparently placid village. He discovers, too, that underlying the village's essential Englishness, echoes of the imperial past resound. In the process, he is forced to reconsider his perceptions of himself and his native Guyana, and in particular to question his engineer's certainties in the primacy of the empirical and the rational. This is a richly intertextual novel which uses reference to the novels of Conrad, Wilson Harris and V.S. Naipaul's 'The Enigma of Arrival' to set up a multi-layered dialogue concerning the nature of Englishness, the legacy of Empire and different perspectives on the nature of history and reality.
About the Author
David Dabydeen was born on a sugar estate in Berbice, Guyana in 1957. His family lived for a time in New Amsterdam where he attended school. He recalls moving back to his family village, Brighton, during the 1964 race riots. At the age of around ten he won a scholarship to Queen's College in Georgetown where he studied for a couple of years. He was sent to England at the age of twelve in 1969 and was in care until he was sixteen. He won a scholarship to Cambridge University and read English there and at London Universities, completing his doctorate in 1982. He was a post-doctoral fellow at Oxford University for three years. He is currently Professor at the Centre for Caribbean Studies, University of Warwick and was for some years a roving ambassador for Guyana.
Reviews
'Richly layered with symbol and metaphor, Disappearance is about the brief relationship between a young Guyanese engineer and the old English woman he lodges with while building sea-defences for a cliff-top village near Hastings' Time Out. 'An electrifying array of surmises about how the imperial past has affected everyone in Britain today.' Scotsman.
Book Information
ISBN 9781845230142
Author David Dabydeen
Format Paperback
Page Count 157
Imprint Peepal Tree Press Ltd
Publisher Peepal Tree Press Ltd
About the Author
David Dabydeen was born on a sugar estate in Berbice, Guyana in 1957. His family lived for a time in New Amsterdam where he attended school. He recalls moving back to his family village, Brighton, during the 1964 race riots. At the age of around ten he won a scholarship to Queen's College in Georgetown where he studied for a couple of years. He was sent to England at the age of twelve in 1969 and was in care until he was sixteen. He won a scholarship to Cambridge University and read English there and at London Universities, completing his doctorate in 1982. He was a post-doctoral fellow at Oxford University for three years. He is currently Professor at the Centre for Caribbean Studies, University of Warwick and was for some years a roving ambassador for Guyana.
Reviews
'Richly layered with symbol and metaphor, Disappearance is about the brief relationship between a young Guyanese engineer and the old English woman he lodges with while building sea-defences for a cliff-top village near Hastings' Time Out. 'An electrifying array of surmises about how the imperial past has affected everyone in Britain today.' Scotsman.
Book Information
ISBN 9781845230142
Author David Dabydeen
Format Paperback
Page Count 157
Imprint Peepal Tree Press Ltd
Publisher Peepal Tree Press Ltd
