Derek Walcott is a West Indian poet and playwright who earned the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1992 for his portrayal of post-colonial Caribbean life and culture. He inherited the richness of diverse cultures, which he has reflected in his large oeuvre of plays and poetry, having been born into a family of English, Dutch, and African origin and been fed English classics from childhood. He began his career as a painter, but by the age of eighteen, he had self-published his first book of poems and had achieved international renown as a poet. Although he focused on the vibrant scenery and culture of his birthplace, many of his paintings also depict his loneliness, which stemmed from a conflict between his western education and the black folk customs he had been raised in from boyhood. He has also been a writer, having written roughly thirty plays. He was also a successful professor, teaching at a number of universities in the United States. Despite his success, his career and personal lives were turbulent, and he was broke until he was awarded the Nobel Prize.
Childhood and Adolescence
Derek Alton Walcott was born on January 23, 1930, into a mixed-race family in the colonial city of Castries, on the eastern Caribbean island of St. Lucia. His grandfathers were both white, but his grandmothers were both ancestors of African slaves who were brought to the island years ago.
Warwick Walcott, his father, was a civil servant by trade, but a watercolorist and poet by avocation. He was a free spirit who died of mastoiditis at the age of 31.
Alix Walcott, his mother, worked as a teacher at the local Methodist school and raised their three children on her own.
Derek had an older sister named Pamela, as well as a twin brother named Roderick, who would go on to become a well-known writer. They talked an English-French patois and grew up in a house filled with books, art, and recorded music.
The territory was ruled by the British at the time, and English was the official language. However, remnants of former French administration remained, and the majority of the population was Roman Catholic, as the French had decreed. Derek, as a Methodist, often felt like a foreigner in his own country.
He would frequently go out as a small boy to observe the destitute people living in shanties, some of whom would later feature in his autobiographical poetry, ‘Another Life.’ He also found the sea fascinating, with its various moods and traditions, fishermen and schooners, and sea sounds.
Derek was eventually accepted into St. Mary’s College, the city’s an only secondary school at the time. He began studying English here and was instantly enthralled by English poetry. Like many of his generation, he soon began to think of English as his own.
Alix, his mother, was also a fan of English literature, particularly Shakespeare, and would frequently read them to her children. Early on in his youth, he developed an appreciation for poetry and drama as a result of this.
Although he learned English as a second language, he was also aware of British empire and slavery policies in prior centuries. As a result, he developed an ambivalent mindset that would later impact his writings.
Derek, like his father, had a talent for painting and began receiving instruction from Harold Simmons, a well-known artist who was also a historian, archeologist, and expert in local mythology. Derek, who was mentored by him, learned to value his ancestors.
He began writing poetry at a young age, and his first poem was published in a local monthly when he was fourteen years old. It was a Miltonic holy poem called ‘1944,’ and it consisted of forty-four lines of blank verse. Despite the fact that the Catholic clergy condemned it as blasphemy, he continued.
He had a lot of poems ready for publishing by 1948, but no publisher was willing to publish them. Unfazed, he borrowed $200 from his mother and self-published ’25 Poems,’ his first book of poems. He then repaid the money by selling the copies on the street corner.
Derek Walcott’s second book, ‘Epitaph for the Young: XII Cantos,’ was published in 1949. He’d also written two dramas by this time, ‘Henri Christophe: A Chronicle’ and ‘Henri Dernier.’ In 1950, the latter was transmitted on radio. But, fed up with the clergy’s attacks, he has chosen to leave the island.
He moved to Kingston, Jamaica, in 1950, to pursue a Colonial Development and Welfare scholarship at the University College of the West Indies.
Despite the fact that the institution had only been open for two years, it had already begun to attract students from all over the Caribbean, and Derek began to thrive in its welcoming environment.
He, too, came from a tiny town and found Kingston to be a fantastic city. There were good theatres, fine art galleries, and talented poets, writers, and artists with whom he enjoyed interacting and eventually became acquainted.
He followed his literary ambitions in Kingston, in addition to his academic degree, and authored a number of poetry and plays. He also contributed poetry, art criticism, and essays to publications such as the ‘Trinidad Guardian’ and ‘Jamaica’s Public Opinion.’ He earned his bachelor’s degree in 1953.
The Early Obstacles
Derek Walcott began working as a theatrical and art critic in Trinidad in 1953. However, other biographers believe he first returned to Castries, where he taught for a year at St. Mary’s College, before coming to Trinidad.
Whichever version is correct, it is widely agreed that he was well-established in Trinidad by 1954, as evidenced by the presence of two of his plays in the mid-1950s.
The premieres of ‘The Sea at Dauphin’ and ‘Ione’ took place here. He decided to start a resident theatre project on the island soon after.
Walcott traveled to New York City in 1958 after receiving a Rockefeller Foundation grant for his play “Drums and Colours,” with the goal of working with off-Broadway directors. He intended to master the abilities he’d need to start a repertory company in Trinidad. He was, however, extremely dissatisfied.
He quickly understood that he wanted to make something unique and that neither Off-Broadway nor Broadway were the ideal models for him. As a result, he returned to Trinidad and, with his brother Roderick, formed Trinidad Theatre Workshop in Port of Spain, the island’s capital, in 1959.
Derek Walcott remained the Workshop’s founding director until 1971. He also worked as a reporter for the ‘Trinidad Guardian’ from 1960 to 1968, covering local news for the paper.
Simultaneously, he continued to research the history of the Caribbean, as well as myths, rituals, and even superstitions and composed a series of plays about these topics, which his company staged. He also penned a number of poetry, but his audience was mostly limited to the Caribbean.
Recognition on a Global Scale
Derek Walcott’s poems caught the attention of the editors of Jonathan Cape’s publishing firm in the United Kingdom in 1962. ‘In a Green Night: Poems 1948–1960,’ published by the same publisher, was Walcott’s first significant book of poems. The book was favorably received, and he quickly established himself as a poet.
Poet Robert Lowell, who came to Trinidad to see Walcott, was one of his admirers. Farrar, Straus, and Giroux (FSG) signed him as their new writer partly as a result of his efforts.
His later works, ‘Selected Poems’ (1964), ‘The Castaway’ (1965), and ‘The Gulf’ (1969), were praised for their complex rhyme and rich vocabulary. However, they also revealed his thoughts of being caught between his Caribbean traditions and beliefs and the European culture in which he had been raised.
Walcott began spending more time in the United States in the early 1970s, teaching creative writing at prestigious universities such as Harvard and Columbia.
‘Dream on Monkey Mountain and Other Plays’ (1970), ‘The Gulf’ (1970), ‘Another Life’ (1973), ‘Sea Grapes’ (1976), and ‘The Star-Apple Kingdom’ (1977) were among the novels he published at the same time (1979).
He began teaching literature and creative writing at Boston University in 1981. He founded Boston Playwrights’ Theatre in the same year to promote new plays. He continued to publish poems and plays on a regular basis at the same time. In 2007, he stepped down from his position at the institution.
‘The Fortunate Traveler’ (1981) and ‘Midsummer’ (1984) are two of his works from the 1980s that explore his predicament as a black writer in America. However, his best work is believed to be ‘Omeros,’ which was published in 1990.
Walcott applied for the position of Oxford Professor of Poetry in 2009 but withdrew his candidacy when a sexual harassment claim was made against him. Instead, he accepted a three-year job as a scholar-in-residence at the University of Alberta in Canada.
In 2010, he was appointed as a Visiting Professor of Poetry at the University of Essex. In the same year, he published his poetry collection ‘White Egret.’ This is the final book he has written.
Major Projects of Derek Walcott
Derek Walcott’s most well-known work is ‘Omeros,’ a book-length epic poem with a total of sixty-four chapters separated into seven “books.” Although the poem’s main plot takes place on his home island of St. Lucia, it is loosely based on Homer’s epic poem ‘Iliad.’
The poem depicts seamen Achilles and Hector competing for the love of Helen, a housemaid. Walcott himself painted the book’s cover, which depicts some of the principal characters riding a boat on the sea.
Achievements & Awards
For ‘Dream on Monkey Mountain,’ he won the Obie Award for Best Foreign Play in 1971.
Walcott was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1972.
He was awarded the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 1988.
He won the Arts Council of Wales International Writers Prize in 1990, as well as the W. H. Smith Literary Award, for his epic poem “Omeros.”
Derek Walcott was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1992 “for a lyrical oeuvre of exceptional brilliance, maintained by a historical vision, the result of a multicultural dedication,” according to the Nobel Committee.
He was awarded the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2004.
For his poetry collection ‘White Egrets,’ he got the T. S. Eliot Prize and the Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature in
2011.
He was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of Saint Lucia in 2016.
Personal History and Legacy
Derek Walcott married Fay Moston, a wealthy Jamaican family member, in 1954. He had a son with her, Peter Walcott, who went on to become a famous painter and now lives in St. Lucia. In 1959, the marriage ended in divorce.
He later married Margaret Maillard, with whom he had previously lived in a live-in relationship. She worked as an almoner in a Port of Spain hospital and was also a dancer and painter. Elizabeth Walcott Hackshaw and Anna Walcott Hardy were their two daughters.
This marriage, too, was short-lived. He began having an affair with Norlin Metivier, a teenage dancer in one of his plays, in the middle of the 1970s. He married her in 1976, but the marriage was short-lived.
Walcott met Sigrid Nama, a Danish-Flemish-American art dealer, during one of his readings in Pittsburg in 1987. Since then, they’ve been living together.
Walcott now spends much of his time in New York and St. Lucia. He enjoys traveling and has traveled to many countries throughout the world.
Estimated Net worth
Derek Walcott is estimated to have a net worth of $3 million dollars. He has amassed enormous wealth as a result of his primary occupation.
Trivia
On October 8, 1992, the Nobel Committee revealed Walcott’s selection for that year’s prize. Incidentally, the year marked the 500th anniversary of Columbus’s landing in the Caribbean.