Transcending conventional identity structures: Dorothea Smartt's re-negotiated self-projections

Abstract

Dorothea Smartt’s poetics reflects an innovative paradigm by which she challenges and reshapes concepts of national and gender identities. She explores old and new world inheritances, and skillfully traverses historical, cultural, temporal and spatial boundaries to arrive at a re-negotiated and reinvigorated identity. Smartt’s poetics thus evinces multiple elements: while it synthesizes Caribbean and Black British traditions, it also enlarges these traditions by incorporating mythic elements. By excavating the Medusa myth as an African legacy, Smartt re-connects old and new world inheritances, in a stratagem that empowers writers in both Black British and Caribbean literary traditions. Key words: Black British Literature, Caribbean literary aesthetics, Medusa myth, identity.