This admixture, through the generations, causes “confusion,” confusion being an oft-repeated thematic tag. The Malheureuse family thus inherits the blood of both murderer and victim, European colonist and enslaved African. It focuses on a family named Malheureuse, descendants of a French carpenter who murdered a slave named John Bull and whose children had children with enslaved women. On an obvious level, it presents as a multi-generational novel that covers the history of Grenada from the French colonial period beginning in the 1650s to the decade following the American invasion in 1983. The Colour of Forgetting (1995) by Grenadian novelist Merle Collins is a uniquely inventive novel that fits the West Indian mold, that is, it fits no mold. My introduction to Merle Collins 1995 novel The Colour of Forgetting, a West Indian masterpiece now freshly republished by Peepal Tree Press in the U.K.

The Colour of Forgetting, An Introduction Today I intend to remain awake as long as possible because in all probability as soon as I fall asleep I shall forget everything or I will be dead. “I always wake at 6am to the din of pots clattering in the kitchen below. The first lines were hauntingly familiar as if he had read them before. “Don’t turn off into any of the other bedrooms or you’ll get lost again.” But the tone was imperative, even mildly coercive. Keep the notepad with you.” The handwriting was exuberant, plunging descenders, extravagant ascenders, generous vowels like small breasts, tiny hearts for dots and periods. The bathroom is straight ahead when you go out the door. He had a red book in one hand and a notepad in the other. There was an insistent metallic pounding in the distance. The wind shrieked against the window panes. The dog scratched insanely at the door to be let out. It always said 6am, which puzzled him a little.

He knew it was 6am because there was a clock next to the bed. Moss woke at 6am to the din of pots clattering in the kitchen below. I have a new story “Angle of List” up at the estimable UK magazine Minor Literature. “Angle of List” New Story | Minor Literature

Doug young screenwriter