Unmanning lessons : emasculation in novels by C.L.R. James, Garth St. Omer, and Orlando Patterson

Abstract

Caribbean men have been affected by racist, classist, and sexist discourses and praxes that privilege “true” masculinity (i.e. heterosexual, usually Anglo-Saxon) at the expense of “lesser” masculinities (non-binary, African, East Indian, Euro-Creole, etc.). These contradictory ways of thinking and performing maleness coalesce with colonial, neocolonial, and postcolonial regimes in 1920s Trinidad, 1950s St. Lucia, and 1960s post-independence Jamaica, and thereby emasculate aspirant males who fail to meet such standards. Hindered by their colonized state and personal choices, the protagonists of C.L.R. James’s Minty Alley (1936), Garth St. Omer’s A Room on the Hill (1968), and Orlando Patterson’s An Absence of Ruins (1967) see their claims to “real” masculinity disrupted.

This work focuses upon three seldom studied West Indian novels whose characters struggle to attain wealth, power, and preeminence through the conquest of hegemonic masculinity. It also elaborates upon the fiction works of two canonical West Indian writers (James, Patterson) better known for their theory and nonfiction. The resulting dialogue between a marginalized West Indian fiction writer (St. Omer) and the aforementioned canonical writers/theorists employs a theoretical framework which elucidates the ways fictional characters negotiate the demands of society, the church, colonial education, and their families. By elaborating upon previous theoretical works by Frantz Fanon, Belinda Edmonson, and other scholars, this work seeks to illumine a seldom explored topic in gender studies.