Austin Clarke

When Mary-Mathilda, one of the most respected women of the island of Bimshire (also known as Barbados) calls the police to confess to a crime, the result is a shattering all-night vigil that brings together elements of the island's African past and the tragic legacy of colonialism in one epic sweep. Set in the West Indies in the period following World War II, The Polished Hoe -- an Essence bestseller and a Washington Post Book World Most Worthy Book of 2003 -- unravels over the course of twenty-four hours but spans the collective experience of a society characterized by slavery.

A Novel

The Polished Hoe

More Memories of Ireland and England

A Penny in the Clouds

A collection of 20 short stories spanning Clarke's 40-year career, drawing on his Caribbean roots as well as his years living in Canada and the United States.

The Best Stories of Austin Clarke

Choosing His Coffin

A Memoir

Growing up Stupid under the Union Jack 

Four Stations in His Circle

Giller Prize winner. Donated by Beta Sigma Phi 2003.

From Austin Clarke, the critically acclaimed author of The Polished Hoe—winner of the Giller Prize—comes More, a powerful new novel of survival in a cold and alienating world. Certain to become a classic in contemporary world literature, More carries readers into the lonely life of an immigrant domestic—abandoned years before by a faithless husband, her life devastated by her son’s involvement in gang culture and crime—and her remarkable journey from tragedy back to the light. An unforgettable portrait of the black immigrant experience, it is a novel to be read and remembered.

More

Giller Prize winner Austin Clarke’s memoirs provide insightful cultural observations by one of today’s most influential black writers.

’Membering

When He was Free and Youg and He Used to Wear Silks

Austin Clarke’s luminous novel, written in vivid, hypnotic prose, reveals the dislocations of place and the nature of memory and the past. Two elderly Barbadian men, childhood friends who haven’t seen each other in fifty years, collide in a snowstorm on a Toronto street. In the warmth of a nearby bar, through the afternoon and into the night, they relate stories, exchange opinions, and share memories of a past in Barbados when, as children, neither could conceive any other place existed for them. As these two men confess to each other their innermost truths, their exploits and their love affairs, one tells the haunting story of a young Chinese woman, the other of the real reason for his visit to Toronto. Infused with pathos and humour, and with an affecting nostalgia for the idea of home, The Origin of Waves is a stunning and original novel by one of the country’s most gifted writers.

The Origin of Waves

The Meeting Point

Alan Sillitoe

Joyce Carol Oates

Leonard Michaels

John Banville

William Trevor

Paul Bowles

Bruce Jay Friedman

Jerome Charyn

William Goldman

Malcolm Bradbury

John Updike

John McPhee

Sol Yurick

Thomas Bridges

Jay Neugeboren

George Garrett

Daniel Spicehandler

Jean Claude Van Itallie

Penelope Gilliatt

Harry D. Miller

Alfred Chester

Victor Sawdon Pritchett

Frank Tuohy

Irvin Faust

Morris Lurie

Asa Baber

Paul Breslow

Hugh Allyn Hunt

Edward Franklin

Norma Meacock

Virginia Moriconi

Shirley Schoonover

Walter Clemons

Stories from the Transatlantic Review

Invaluable adjunct to a larger college or university interested in Anglo-Irish studies...or for the Yeats devotee.--Choice. Clarke places the early dramatic work of W.B. Yeats in the context of the period. His stature as a writer of verse drama giv

The Celtic Twilight and the Nineties

At the news of her son BJ's involvement in gang crime, Idora Morrison, a maid at the local university, collapses in her basement apartment. For four days and nights she retreats into a vortex of memory, pain, and disappointment that becomes a riveting exposÉ of her life as a Caribbean immigrant living abroad. While she struggled to make ends meet, her deadbeat husband, Bertram, abandoned her for a better life in New York. Left alone to raise her son, Idora has done her best to survive against immense odds. But now that BJ has disappeared into a life of crime, she recoils from his loss and is unable to get out of bed, burdened by feelings of invisibility. As she summons the strength to investigate her son's troubles—and her own weaknesses—the book quietly builds to its crescendo. Eventually Idora finds her way back into the light with a courage that is both remarkable and unforgettable. More zeroes in, with laserlike intensity, on the interior life of an extraordinary "ordinary woman," showcasing Clarke's skill as a writer of inimitable force.

This bundle unites a novel and a short story collection by Austin Clarke, one the most respected authors in North America and one of Canada's national literary treasures, a master of fictional invention. Includes the Giller Prize winner The Polished Hoe.

The Polished Hoe / Choosing His Coffin

The Austin Clarke Library

This is a literary masterpiece that evokes the sensuality of the tropics and the tragic richness of Island culture.

Mnemosyne Lay in Dust

Austin Clarke grew up in Barbados, enveloped in the heavenly smells and smoke of women cooking. From them, he learned how to prepare the beloved dishes of the island - Rich Golden Roast Pork, Fried King Fish, Breadfruit Cou-Cou and, of course, his very own Chicken Austintacious. He shares his recipes for these hearty meals and reminisces about the "slave" food that was so much a part of his life. Whether it's a story about the village butcher whose qualifications were somewhat suspect, or a sure-fire route to a woman's love through her stomach, Austin Clarke will make you hungry for the "hot cuisine" and spirit of the island.

Rituals of Slave Food: A Barbadian Memoir

Pig Tails 'n Breadfruit

"Austin Clarke's first book of poetry was published in 1917, his last in 1971. In a writing life spanning much of the twentieth century, Clarke created a poetry of passionate, idiosyncratic modernity, rooted in place and time, universal in its resonance. His is poetry, writes Christopher Ricks, of 'delicate and dancing interlacings' which is also 'simple as join-hands'. Clarke can be challengingly elliptical or as robust and earthy as folk tradition; he dares the terrors of the damaged soul. His later poems Thomas Kinsella described in The Dual Tradition as 'wickedly glittering narratives ... poetry as pure entertainment, serious and successful'." "An earlier Collected Poems of Austin Clarke appeared shortly after his death in 1974. Now, newly edited and corrected, with Clarke's original Notes restored, a bibliography and an illuminating introduction by Christopher Ricks, the poetry takes its place for a new generation of readers as one of the most compelling bodies of twentieth-century Irish poetry."--BOOK JACKET.

Collected Poems

The Collected Poems

Austin Clarke

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