Book Title: Marcus Garvey
Author: Suzanne Francis-Brown/ Jean-Jacques Vayssieres
Reviewer: Beverly Hamilton

Over the years there has been a continual call for the work of Marcus Garvey to be taught in schools. For this to happen, books on the subject are needed to target different age groups. This book targets the 7-12 age group.

This is not a textbook to be used in the teaching of Garvey. it is more like a supplementary reader. It's like a storybook. At its launch, it was revealed that the illustrations came first and the text, later. The artist had done a set of drawings for another book about OLaudah Equiano, a former slave who later figured prominently in the abolition movement in England. The process is evident in that the book is beautifully illustrated. There are drawings on every page which are enhanced by other visuals such as pictures of archival material - a UNIA share, a poster advertising a public meeting. The visuals are overwhelming and have a dominating effect.

Common myth

The book has an illustrator and it has a writer. What is missing is an historian or Garvey specialist and this shows throughout the text. Indeed, the first impression on reading the text is that the writer is yet to come to a full understanding of what Garvey is about. Very early, it repeats one of the common myths that the movement was about taking people back to Africa.

The author relies heavily on the text written by ED Cronon, one of the earliest writers on the life of Garvey. Indeed, there are times when the text lifts phrases directly from Cronon's book Black Moses. The main problem with that is Cronon's work came out in the 1950s and Garvey scholarship has advanced significantly since that time.

Inaccuracies

There are a number of inaccuracies which a Garvey editor would have picked up. It is said that Garvey in his early life helped establish an organisation called the National Club. Two historians who I consulted have denied this. Robert Love, one of Garvey's earliest mentors studied in the US, not in England as is stated in the text. Garvey could not have corresponded with Booker T. Washington as he came across his work in 1914 and Washington died in late 1915. The party founded by Garvey in Jamaica was the People's Political Party, not the People's Progressive Party as appears in the text.

The author seems not to realise that two of Garvey's publications had almost the same name - The Blackman newspaper started in 1929 and the Black Man magazine started in 1933.

I found a certain reluctance to deal with the whole question of racism in its differentfacets, which was the main factor which fuelled the Garvey movement.

It is also questionable whether the schemata of the book really works. It starts in a story form, a child, selling a newspaper in the area of the docks and coming across Garvey while in his public life in Jamaica. Garvey stops to speak to him. This is used as the background to launch into the Garvey story which is told by that child, when he becomes an old man. But the Garvey story takes on its own life and one forgets that it is being told in this way. This causes a jolt whenever references are made by the story teller. For example, after descibing Garvey's early life and travels to Central America and England, we are told that that is when the old man (as a child) meets Garvey.

Again, when Garvey returns to Jamaica after deportation from America the first person is once again used when the story teller says he joined in the welcoming crowd. The story telling really comes alive in the last section which deals with the return of Garvey's body and his legacy to the world. However, that is the first time that we learn that there was a listener who engages the story teller in discussion about Garvey's legacy.

Anything written about Garvey is to be welcomed though, and so this book will form part of the growing literature on the national hero.