Kamau Brathwaite’s Environmental Sensibilities: An Ecocritical Reading of Born to Slow Horses

Abstract

Postcolonial writers have taken time to explore the consequences of imperial expansion and colonialism on the environmental conditions of the erstwhile colonies. Impacts of postcolonial destruction are felt mostly in all the Caribbean Islands, which were built on plantation and land exploitation. These make Caribbean ecologies become area of interest to creative writers and critics from the region. While writers like Harris and Walcott have attracted praises for concentrating on Caribbean ecologies, little or no interest has been paid to Brathwaite’s works in this direction. The pertinent question is that: it is possible for a writer of Brathwaite’s knowledge of Caribbean history to omit such an important theme in his works as the history of this region is hardly separable from its environment? This paper is an ecocritical reading of selected poetry from Brathwaite’s collection Born to Slow Horses (2005). Three poems in the collection, “The Master of Mary Jones”, “Guanahani”, “Namsetura” and “9/11” were purposively sampled and examined. The poems were subjected to context analysis with the intent to foreground the poet’s concerns with nature and the environment. Braithwaite internationalizes his vision and treat the damaging effects of colonial and imperial activities around the world in continents far away from his Caribbean. The study reveals that Brathwaite’s vision is internationalised and the damaging effects of human interactions with environment become a global concern. This paper concludes that Brathwaite, like other Caribbean poets focuses on Caribbean and world ecology in his works. It is therefore recommended that other Brathwiate’s poetry is open to ecological themes and requires to be explored further in this wise other than those examined in this study and critics should therefore concentrate more on this theme while appreciating these works.