Alton Ellis, the “godfather of rocksteady”, died on Friday in London. He was diagnosed with cancer a year ago, but was still performing up to last August. No doubt fuller obituaries will follow; the Jamaica Observer offers some tributes from members of the Jamaican musical scene. (There seems to be some confusion over whether Ellis [...]

Some readers may recall that back in May I ambitiously announced a new Antilles “book of the month” feature. “Every month I’ll choose from among the pile of newly arrived books one that seems worth recommending to Antilles readers,” I said. “The choice will be entirely subjective.” Kei Miller’s novel The Same Earth was my [...]

It’s only just occurred to me, dear readers, that Antilles never linked to this excellent podcast posted over at Caribbean Free Radio a whole month and a half ago: Georgia Popplewell’s interview with Lisa Allen-Agostini, co-editor of the new fiction anthology Trinidad Noir. Readers living in New York: Akashic Books will host a launch event [...]

… and, speaking of Kwame Dawes: two days ago the PBS NewsHour programme ran a report on a project he recently worked on with the Pulitzer Centre on Crisis Reporting–a multimedia website looking at HIV in Jamaica, combining Dawes’s poetry with music, essays, and video. Read the transcript of the NewsHour segment here (or follow [...]

Vahni Capildeo, Oxford, September 2008 Vahni Capildeo is one of the most exciting and ambitious young Caribbean writers at work today. She is also a contributing editor at the CRB–in the last few years, I’ve been privileged to publish both her reviews and her poems in the magazine. And she is furthermore a dear friend. [...]