Help: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical

Subject: RE: Help: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical
From: GUEST,Philippa
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 11:46 AM

Thanks for doing the web searching for me, and it has certainly turned out to be an interesting story. Maybe we can find more information also on Jekyll as well as on McKay

Subject: RE: Help: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical
From: katlaughing
Date: 24 Jun 02 - 10:36 PM

Oh, Dicho, it's okay, I didn't even see anything about his brother, so I just figured you were adding something...I didn't know beans about him until this and, then, only what google came up with.:-)

Subject: RE: Help: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical
From: Dicho (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 Jun 02 - 07:22 PM

Kat, you are right. I saw that both Claude McKay and his elder brother were both poets and jumped to a conclusion.

Subject: RE: Help: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical
From: katlaughing
Date: 24 Jun 02 - 06:52 PM

I've found at least this one book listed by Jekyll:

Jamaica Song and Story, by Walter Jekyll, with an introduction by Alice Werner. Publications Folk-Lore Society 55, London, 1907.

More about McKay here.

It says Jekyll was an ex-patriate Englishman who became KcKay's first mentor.

Subject: RE: Help: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical
From: Dicho (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 Jun 02 - 06:31 PM

It could well be the author himself or, his older brother. He was a poet as well as a novelist, 1889-1948. See:www.poets.org, website of the Academy of American Poets. A biography is there.

Subject: RE: Help: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical
From: katlaughing
Date: 24 Jun 02 - 06:31 PM

There is an extensive article about McKay and his books at this site. It says he was black, Jamacian born and that he fashioned Gensir after his childhood mentor, Walter Jekyll. Quite interesting, thanks for bringing this up.

kat

Subject: Jamaican folklorist - real or mythical
From: GUEST,Philippa
Date: 24 Jun 02 - 03:34 PM

A little while ago, I read a novel called "Banana Bottom" by Claude McKay. The book was first published in 1933. The central character is a Jamaican girl who is fostered by white missionaries and sent to school in England, and the cultural conflicts she has when she returns home. The book makes much mention of people singing and making up songs, often songs that satirise local events. Lines of songs are quoted, though you have to imagine sounds and rhythms.

The author has a preliminary note saying "This story belongs to the Jamaican period of the early nineteen hundreds, and all the characters, as in my previous novels, are imaginary, excepting perhaps Squire Gensir."

Squire Gensir is an immigrant white man who is learned, irreligious, and sympathetic to the common people of his adopted land. He has a library of classical literature and he also collects local folklore. So I wonder if there was some folklorist who served as a model for Squire Gensir. Or if the author himself identifies with his character of Squire Gensir. I know nothing about Claude McKay - and haven't tried researching this author via the wwweb or any other source.