Derek Walcott

Facts

Derek Walcott

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Derek Walcott
The Nobel Prize in Literature 1992

Born: 23 January 1930, Castries, Saint Lucia

Died: 17 March 2017, Gros-Islet, Saint Lucia

Residence at the time of the award: Saint Lucia

Prize motivation: “for a poetic oeuvre of great luminosity, sustained by a historical vision, the outcome of a multicultural commitment”

Language: English

Prize share: 1/1

Life

West Indian poet and playwright Derek Walcott made his debut as an 18-year-old with In a Green Night. For many years he divided his time among Saint Lucia; Boston University, where he taught; and Trinidad, where he managed a theater. Walcott also worked as an artist and combined his poetry with painting in the volume Tiepolo’s Hound (2005).

Work

Derek Walcott’s works often deal with Caribbean history, while he simultaneous searches for vestiges of the colonial era. Western literary canon is revised and given a completely new form, as in the poetry collection Omeros (1990). In his writing Walcott explores the complexity of living and working in two cultures.

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