I am becoming my mother

by Lorna Goodison

Paperback in good condition. From the collection of Michael Stephen Cleary, (d. 02.07.2023), former lecturer at Kingsway College and SOAS, University of London. MC has penned half-title page. General shelf and handling wear, including light creasing and scoring to cover, creasing and wear to edges and corners, and age-related discolouration to pageblock. Within, pages are tightly bound, and content is clear, bright and unmarked. CN

Genres: Poetry

50 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Lorna Goodison was born in Jamaica, and has won numerous awards for her writing in both poetry and prose, including the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, the Musgrave Gold Medal from Jamaica, the Henry Russel Award for Exceptional Creative Work from the University of Michigan, and one of Canada’s largest literary prizes, the British Columbia National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction for From Harvey River: A Memoir of My Mother and Her People (2007). Her work has been included in the major anthologies and collections of contemporary poetry over the past twenty-five years, such as the Norton Anthology of Modern and Contemporary Poetry, the Harper Collins World Reader, the Vintage Book of Contemporary World Poetry, the Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces, and Longman Masters of British Literature.

Along with her award winning memoir, she has published three collections of short stories (including By Love Possessed, 2011) and nine collections of poetry.

Her work has been translated into many languages, and she has been a central figure at literary festivals throughout the world. Lorna Goodison teaches at the University of Michigan, where she is the Lemuel A. Johnson Professor of English and African and Afro American Studies.

Reviews

[Shivanee Ramlochan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in 1986, the year I was born, Lorna Goodison’s second collection of poems reconfirms Caribbean feminist brilliance to me in every syllable. The crowning poem of the book, “For My Mother (May I Inherit Half Her Strength)” continues to resonate in the heart-chambers of generations of regional students, and spending time with the entire work summons divine mystic energy; the pulse of Harvey River; the devotions of a mother who is a miraculous force.

“and she cried.

For her hands grown coarse with raising nine children
for her body for twenty years permanently fat
for the time she pawned her machine for my sister’s
Senior Cambridge fees
and for the pain she bore with the eyes of a queen

and she cried also because she loved him.”

Reading the Caribbean means you read the world.

11/31
#TheSealeyChallenge

[Shirley Cooper · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was after reading this book that I started researching my mother's death and writing and speaking about my abusive childhood. I realised that I really was becoming my mother. I had not only moved into the area in which she years but I my reltionships were uncannily similar to hers. With all that I had to change my life.