If I Could Write This in Fire: An Anthology of Literature from the Caribbean

Ethnic diversity and the battle to overcome colonial oppression are the two dominant motifs in this uniformly excellent, well-balanced collection of stories and essays from the Caribbean. Smorkaloff, who teaches at NYU's Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, groups the entries into sections on plantation society, colonization and colonial education, inter-Caribbean relations, liberation and so on. The writing ranges widely in theme and tone, from a selection from Austin Clarke's stolid Growing Up Stupid Under the Union Jack that deals with growing up black and being educated British in Barbados to the Latin flourishes of Cheryl Lima's ``Common Stories,'' a whimsical account of the ravages of an extramarital affair between two urban intellectuals. In light of the current Haitian situation, Ana Lydia Vega's ``Port-au-Prince, Below'' is also noteworthy, offering an insider's look at the culture of Haiti that gets beneath the touristy reactions to vacation slides that open each section of the story (``Slide II: `Oh my God, it's so dark, look at all the Blacks over there...'""). Smorkaloff goes the extra mile by providing a section of essays that frame the fiction against the politics and history of the region, as well as bibliographies of all the authors. This fine anthology will intrigue those new to Caribbean literature and may surprise even aficionados with the power and enormous variety of its prose. (Oct.)