A Small Place

by Jamaica Kincaid Narrated by Robin Miles

Overview

A brilliant look at colonialism and its effects in Antigua-by the author of Annie John



"If you go to Antigua as a tourist, this is what you will see. If you come by aeroplane, you will land at the V. C. Bird International Airport. Vere Cornwall (V. C.) Bird is the Prime Minister of Antigua. You may be the sort of tourist who would wonder why a Prime Minister would want an airport named after him-why not a school, why not a hospital, why not some great public monument. You are a tourist and you have not yet seen . . ."



So begins Jamaica Kincaid's expansive essay, which shows us what we have not yet seen of the ten-by-twelve-mile island in the British West Indies where she grew up.



Lyrical, sardonic, and forthright by turns, in a Swiftian mode, A Small Place cannot help but amplify our vision of one small place and all that it signifies.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Ms. Kincaid writes with passion and conviction . . . [with] a poet's understanding of how politics and history, private and public events, overlap and blur.” —The New York Times

“A jeremiad of great clarity and force that one might have called torrential were the language not so finely controlled.” —Salman Rushdie

“A rich and evocative prose that is also both urgent and poetic . . . Kincaid is a witness to what is happening in our West Indian back yards. And I trust her.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review

“Kincaid continues to write with a unique, compelling voice that cannot be found anywhere else. Her small books are worth a pile of thicker—and hollower—ones.” —San Francisco Chronicle

“This is truth, beautifully and powerfully stated . . . In truly lyrical language that makes you read aloud, [Kincaid] takes you from the dizzying blue of the Caribbean to the sewage of hotels and clubs where black Antiguans are only allowed to work . . . Truth, wisdom, insight, outrage, and cutting wit.” —The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

“Wonderful reading . . . Tells more about the Caribbean in 80 pages than all the guidebooks.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer

Philadelphia Inquirer

Wonderful reading…Tells more about the Caribbean in eighty pages than all the guidebooks.”

Atlanta Journal-Constitution

In truly lyrical language that makes you read aloud, [Kincaid] takes you from the dizzying blue of the Caribbean to the sewage of hotels and clubs where black Antiguans are only allowed to work…Truth, wisdom, insight, outrage, and cutting wit.”

Los Angeles Times Book Review

A rich and evocative prose that is also both urgent and poetic…Kincaid is a witness to what is happening in our West Indian back yards.”

San Francisco Chronicle

Kincaid continues to write with a unique, compelling voice that cannot be found anywhere else. Her small books are worth a pile of thicker—and hollower—ones.”

#1 New York Times bestselling author Salman Rushdie

A jeremiad of great clarity and force that one might have called torrential were the language not so finely controlled.”

New York Times

Ms. Kincaid writes with…a poet’s understanding of how politics and history, private and public events, overlap and blur.”

BookRiot

Kincaid’s essay about her home island of Antigua is honest, sharp, and beautiful…It’s the best kind of place-based writing: complicated and many-layered. Kincaid articulates many truths—about racism and resort communities and the things that visitors often chose not to see about places they visit—in a short and very readable book.”

Product Details

BN ID:	2940195713737
Publisher:	HighBridge Company
Publication date:	07/01/2025
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

If you go to Antigua as a tourist, this is what you will see. If you come by aeroplane, you will land at the V. C. Bird International Airport. Were Cornwall (V. C.) Bird is the Prime Minister of Antigua. you may be the sort of tourist who would wonder why a Prime Minister would want an airport named after him—why not a school, why not a hospital, why not some great public monument? You are a tourist and you have not yet seen a public monument in Antigua. As your plane descends to land, you might say, What a beautiful island Antigua is—more beautiful than any of the other islands you have seen, and they were very beautiful, in their way, but they were much too green, much too lush with vegetation, which indicated to you, the tourist, that they got quite a bit of rainfall, and rain is the very thing that you, just now, do not want, for you are thinking of the hard and cold and dark and long days you spent working in North America (or, worse, Europe), earning some money so that you could stay in this place (Antigua) where the sun always shines and where the climate is deliciously hot and dry for the four to ten days you are going to be staying there; and since you are on your holiday, since you are a tourist, the thought of what it might be like for someone who had to live day in, day our in a place that suffers constantly from drought, and so has to watch carefully every drop of fresh water used (while at the same time surrounded by a sea and an ocean—the Caribbean Sea on one side, the Atlantic Ocean on the other), must never cross your mind.

Videos