Dionne Brand’s Transnational Sublime

Abstract

This article reads moments of the sublime in Dionne Brand’s novels through the framework of Sylvia Wynter’s analysis of the discursive category of Man. I argue that Brand depicts the doubled sense of violence and possibility that arises from occupying the border of the category of Man. The moments of the sublime in her work emerge from confronting the terror and violence committed against black bodies alongside the hopeful gesture of using that violence and history as grounds for reimagining what it means to be human.