(Re)making men, representing the Caribbean Nation: authorialIndividuation in works by Fred D’Aguiar, Robert Antoni, andMarlon James

This dissertation proposes that West Indian contemporary male writers develop
literary authority, or a voice that represents the nation, via a process of individuation.
This process enables the contemporary male writer to unite the disparities of the
matriarchal and patriarchal authorial traditions that inform his development of a
distinctive creative identity. I outline three stages of authorial individuation that are
inspired by Jung’s theory of individuation. The first is the contemporary male writer’s
return to his nationalist forebears’ tradition to dissolve his persona, or identification
with patriarchal authority; Fred D’Aguiar’s “The Last Essay About Slavery” and
Feeding the Ghosts illustrate this stage. The second is his reconciliation of matriarchal
(present) and patriarchal (past) traditions of literary authority via his encounter with his
forebears’ feminized, raced shadow; Robert Antoni’s Blessed Is the Fruit evidences this process. The third is the contemporary male writer’s renunciation of authority defined
by masculinity, which emerges as his incorporation of the anima, or unconscious
feminine; Marlon James’s The Book of Night Women exemplifies this final phase of his
individuation.