We at JWIL mourn the premature passing of Professor Jennifer Rahim (UWI – St. Augustine). Her work is part of a rich tradition of gifted Caribbean writers who were also brilliant scholars. Her commitment to teaching and mentorship of Caribbean students and newer writers continues to bear fruit. A poet as well as writer of fiction and criticism, she was the winner of the 2018 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature for her 2017 fiction collection, Curfew Chronicles. A prolific writer, her poetry collections were Between the Fence and the Forest (2007), Approaching Sabbaths (2009) which was awarded a Casa de las Américas Prize, Redemption Rain (2011), Ground Level (2014) and Sanctuaries of Invention (2021). Her short story collection Songster and Other Stories was published in 2007.
Her scholarly work appeared in many key Caribbean publications including Anthurium, Small Axe, Caribbean Review of Gender Studies, and JWIL. Her article on poetry as an enterprise of recovery in the work of Olive Senior and Lorna Goodison was published in JWIL‘s April 1999 issue. Her essay on the challenges to heteronormativity posed by Alfred Mendes’ Black Fauns (1935) and Jamaica Kincaid’s My Brother (1995) appeared in JWIL‘s April 2005 issue.
Peepal Tree Press founder and managing editor, Jeremy Poynting, who was working closely with Rahim on her forthcoming novel, Goodbye Bay, marks her invaluable contribution to Caribbean letters movingly here.
