Aimé Césaire

John Berger

Anna Bostock

Jason Allen-Paisant

return-to-my-native-land

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Return to My Native Land

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Nothing less than the greatest lyrical monument of this time

A Césaire poem explodes and whirls about itself like a rocket, suns burst forth whirling and exploding

The most influential Francophone Caribbean writer of his generation

Aime Césaire's brooding exploration of Negritude bristles with the energetic, unique qualities of Walt Whitman's Song of Myself . . . [Césaire's] protean lyric, filled with historical allusions, serves to exorcise individual and collective self-hatreds engendered by the psychological trauma of slavery and its aftermath

One of the most powerful French poets of the century

The poem pulls no punches. Now tremulous, now grating, the improvised text drums and jabs in spasmodic phrases and slogans. Each encounter, each twist of idiom, thrusts itself into the reader's mind as a fierce challenge to understand and to empathize

A more razor-sharp encapsulation of the situation of African slavery could not be found

Edouard Glissant once wrote that everything begins with poetry. Aime Cesaire's epic poem was a true beginning in 1939... Return to my Native Land became the rallying cry of decolonization but the fact that it is still read means it has survived as poetry. This translation preserves its poetic force and its reissue is a welcome event

Return to My Native Land is a monumental tome to our times, and this new translation by John Berger and Anya Bostock possesses the tropical heat of the poet's sonority. Though, in his refrain, Aimé Césaire intones "the small hours," there isn't anything small about the raw lyricism articulated into this incantation of fiery wit. The translators convey the spirit of improvisation, yet, with a deftness of image and music, they deliver this book-length poem as a seamless work of art--an existential cry against a man-made void. What translates is the speaker's revolutionary psyche on to the page--his fierce affirmation of existence through an eloquent clarity of the real and surreal. Nowhere is Césaire's passion sacrificed; this translation is a tribute to the poet

Amazing... This level of sophistication is partly why Césaire became a world citizen, mayor, and Martinique's ambassador to the French Parliament

A masterpiece from one of the greatest thinkers of the anti-colonial movement. Cesaire's words are powerful, incisive, and more relevant today than ever

'The undisputed masterpiece of négritude and a poetic milestone of anti-colonialism' Guardian 
 
'We shall speak. We shall sing. We shall shout.' 
 
This blazing autobiographical poem by the founder of the négritude movement became a rallying cry for decolonisation when it appeared in 1939. Following one man's return from Europe to his homeland of Martinique, it is a reckoning with the trauma of slavery and exploitation, and a triumphant anthem for Black identity, one which reclaims and remakes language itself. 
 
'Nothing less than the greatest lyrical monument of this time' André Breton 
 
'A Césaire poem explodes and whirls about itself like a rocket, suns burst forth whirling and exploding' Jean-Paul Sartre 
 
'The most influential Francophone Caribbean writer of his generation' Independent 
 
Translated by John Berger and Anna Bostock

Aimé Césaire (Author) Aimé Césaire (1913-2008) was a Martinican poet and politician who played a leading role in the struggle to liberate the French colonies of Africa and the Caribbean. Renowned for co-founding the Négritude movement, Césaire was a pioneer in surrealist poetry. His achievements as a writer were recognised worldwide with awards including the International Nâzim Hikmet Poetry Award, the Laporte Prize, the Viareggio-Versilia Prize for Literature, and the Grand Prix National de Poésie; in 2002, he was made Commander of the Order of Merit of Cote d'Ivoire. His works include the plays A Tempest (1969) and A Season in the Congo (1966), the searing political essay Discourse on Colonialism (1956), and the long poem Return to My Native Land (1950), dubbed "nothing less than the greatest lyrical monument of this time" (Andre Breton). Jason Allen-Paisant (Introducer) Jason Allen-Paisant is a Jamaican writer and multi-award-winning poet. He is the author of two critically acclaimed books of poetry, Thinking with Trees and Self-Portrait as Othello, which won the UK’s two most prestigious poetry awards for 2023 — the Forward Prize and T.S. Eliot Prize. He is also a Professor of Critical Theory and Creative Writing at the University of Manchester and Associate Editor of Callaloo Literary Journal. Jason lives in Leeds with his partner and two children. John Berger (Translator) John Berger was born in London in 1926. His acclaimed works of both fiction and non-fiction include the seminal Ways of Seeing and the novel G., which won the Booker Prize in 1972. In 1962 he left Britain permanently, to live in a small village in the French Alps. He died in 2017.

'We shall speak. We shall sing. We shall shout.' This blazing autobiographical poem by the founder of the négritude movement became a rallying cry for decolonisation when it appeared in 1939. Following one man's return from Europe to his homeland of Martinique, it is a reckoning with the trauma of slavery and exploitation, and a triumphant anthem for Black identity, one which reclaims and remakes language itself. 
 
'Nothing less than the greatest lyrical monument of this time' André Breton 
'A Césaire poem explodes and whirls about itself like a rocket, suns burst forth whirling and exploding' Jean-Paul Sartre 
'The most influential Francophone Caribbean writer of his generation' Independent

Return to My Native Land

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