Writer's Room
This is from a column for The Guardian in 2007, for which they photographed writers' rooms and asked the writer to say a few words.
Where Time Stands Still
Simon Schama's book Rough Crossings records the lives of those who suffered as slaves on Bunce Island. Caryl Phillips, who has adapted their stories for the stage, recalls his pilgrimage to 'this miserable place'.
Blood at the Root
So horrific are the images conjured up by 'Strange Fruit' that Billie Holiday always performed it with her eyes closed. Caryl Phillips, who used the title for his first play, traces the song's dark history.
The Price of the Ticket
In 1953, James Baldwin, a hard-up writer in Paris, published the extraordinary novel Go Tell it on the Mountain. Four years later he sailed home to the United States to immerse himself in the civil rights movement. Caryl Phillips explores the historic consequences of his return.
Finding Oneself at Home
Both Angela Carter and Natsume Soseki found new insights into their respective homelands when living abroad. Caryl Phillips reflects on the role of the writer as 'outsider.'
Northern Soul
Caryl Phillips returns to Leeds to see how the city of his youth has changed.
Growing Pains
A boy learns about family secrets and life in race-conscious Britain, in an autobiographical story by Caryl Phillips.
The Power of Love
Luther Vandross died earlier this month, aged only 54. Caryl Phillips pays tribute to one of the most popular and influential soul singers of the 20th century.
To Ricky With Love (Introduction to Vintage edition of To Sir With Love by E.R. Braithwaite)
E. R. Braithwaite's classic tale of a West Indian teacher in an East London school, To Sir With Love, still has much to tell us about race and class in Britain.
The Height of Obsession
Last year, Caryl Phillips found himself bragging to a bar full of students about how he had climbed Kilimanjaro. By the end of the evening, he had agreed to do it again, with novelist Russell Banks - but this time by a more difficult route. Here is the story of their ascent to the highest point in Africa.
Do You Come Here Often?
Caryl Phillips salutes Lucas Radebe, the South African who set the standard on and off the pitch for African footballers in England.
Lost Generation
At the end of the 1970s, black British theatre was booming. So why hasn't a play by a black writer appeared in the West End since then?
Obituary: Constance Webb
Writer wife of C. L. R. James.
Foreword to Book of Voices (In support of Sierra Leone PEN)
Necessary Journeys
Twenty years ago, Caryl Phillips was an aspiring writer fleeing Britain's race and class stereotypes. Seeking a richer sense of identity he embarked on an odyssey across Europe and beyond.
Kingdom of the Blind
Britain became a multicultural society in the 1950s, but, with a couple of exceptions, white playwrights and novelists do not seem to have paid much attention. Caryl Phillips asks why are there so few black characters in British fiction.
Women Writing the West Indies 1804-1939: A Hot Place Belonging to Us (A review of a book of the same title by Evelyn O'Callaghan)
West Indian Intellectuals in Britain (A review of a book of the same title edited by Bill Schwarz)
The Silenced Minority
Something About Her (A review of Not Without Love by Constance Webb)
A Beacon in Dark Times
A poet writing 150 years ago defined the Statue of Liberty as 'the mother of exiles.' As America prepares to celebrate Thanksgiving next week, Caryl Phillips reflects on the very different welcome its immigrant communities receive today.
American Tribalism
I arrived in Amherst, Massachusetts in the fall of 1990 with the understanding that I would be spending a year teaching in a liberal arts college. I had not thought about exactly who I would be teaching, beyond the fact that they would be Americans. When I walked into my classroom on that first morning I was greeted by a rainbow coalition of faces; black, white, brown, yellow. Even at an institution as famously conservative as Amherst College, diversity seemed to be a wonderfully natural part of the make-up of the campus culture.
Distant Voices
Civil war devastated Sierra Leone in the 1990s, and today it is the poorest country in the world. Caryl Phillips travels to the capital, Freetown, and meets the writers struggling to make a living there, to record past events, and to understand how they might contribute to the future.
Out of Africa
Chinua Achebe, father of modern African literature, has long argued that Joseph Conrad was a racist. Caryl Phillips, an admirer of both writers, disagrees. He meets Achebe to defend the creator of Heart of Darkness but finds their discussion provokes an unexpected epiphany.
Confessions of a True Believer
Shusaku Endo was a Japanese Catholic whose fiction explored the conundrum of his faith. He was an unlikely inspiration for Caryl Phillips, who analyses the enduring appeal of a great novelist.
People of the Year
Ignored, resented jeered and mocked—a youngest sister moves coolly to greatness.