Roger Mais, who had a powerful social impact in Jamaica as author and painter. Some of his powerful books were 'Brother Man' and 'The Hills Were Joyful Together'. - File

Howard Campbell, Gleaner Writer

IN AN era when firebrands such as Alexander Bustamante struggled in the field and Norman Manley argued in the courts, RogerMais let his pen do the talking.

He may be not as well known as those national heroes, but Mais had a major social impact as an author and painter. In fact, he can be considered Jamaica's version of Jack Kerouac, the American who influenced the Beat Generation of the late 1950s.

It has been 53 years since Mais' powerful book, Brother Man, was published. As did his first novel, The Hills Were Joyful Together, it examined social conditions in colonial Jamaica.

Interesting read

What makes Brother Man such an interesting read is its hero, a Rastafarian, or 'beard man', as they were called. Considered outcasts since their nascence in the early 1930s, Rastafarians were scorned even more following the murder of a young man and the rape of his girlfriend, by a 'beard man' named Whoppy King in 1951.

Rastafari reconstructed

In Brother Man, Mais brought this prejudice to light and projected the Rastafarian as a person of peace: it seemed he saw the role they would play in a post-colonial Jamaica. Within 10 years of the book's publication, ghetto youth and middle-class children were drawn to the Rasta message, and by the 1970s, a full-fledged Rasta revolution was taking place in Jamaica.

Mais' work, said his close friend and protg John Hearne, is timeless.

"Artists like Roger are always there to be brought to life again with a new generation that reads or looks or listens to their work for the first time," Hearne wrote in The Gleaner in 1988. "Any schoolboy can build a better aeroplane than the Wright brothers but nobody can write anything like The Hills Were Joyful Together."

Mais, according to Gleaner art critic Winston G. Wright, was a "belligerent oppositionist", who was not afraid to take on the Establishment. In 1944, he criticised the British throne in a powerful article, 'Now we know', for which he was sentenced to six months' imprisonment for sedition.

The Kingston-born Mais' first real job was as a tallyman with the United Fruit Company. He entered journalism, working for The Gleaner and Public Opinion, for which he wrote several provocative articles.

Roger Mais died from cancer in June 1955 at age 49, just weeks after his third book, Black Lightning, was published.

In 1968, he was awarded the Musgrave Gold Medal. Ten years later, the Government recognised his work with the Order of Jamaica for political development.