The Guyana Prize... Without Access To Good Literature?

FOLLOWING the announcement of the proposed Guyana Prize for new publications in literature, we published a letter from “Book Lover” (and Stanley Nathan has also written in our last issue) commenting on the prize. We believe that any genuine effort to encourage, recognise and reward creative work is, very welcome and will do a great deal for Guyanese literature. But it is not to be believed that a monetary award will alone bring about a positive turn-around in the current crisis in Guyana’s creative output. In at least two national competitions in 1986, the adjudicators have had to express disappointment in the quality of much of the work entered. Such developmental stimuli must be accompanied by the creation of a necessary climate including a return to, the habit of reading good literature which has come under serious siege of late “from some harsh bread-and-butter issues and the blunt absence of books and other reading material from the country. Local writers are thereby deprived of exposure to styles, techniques, models and criticisms. Guyanese living in Britain, for whom access to the world’s literature is not such a problem and to whom other facilities are available, will be further rewarded if they win the prize by being paid fifteen times more prize money than those resident at home who might win. American residents stand to earn ten times more and Jamaican residents twice as much. We also note the absence of any award for dramatic literature. The Guyana Commemorative Commission had agreed some time ago to offer prizes for unpublished works and we wonder if that has been lost sight of. We hope that the authorities will put their minds to other factors necessary for creative development.