A Way in the World

"Lebrun's political resolution was very far from this sensationalism. It enabled him, not to embrace the period of slavery, but to acknowledge it without pain, and, presenting it in his own way, to make a claim for its universality, and even its precedence."

V.S. Naipaul's A Way in the World is a marriage of sorts between The Enigma of Arrival and In a Free State. The autobiographical narrator reflecting on his writing and Trinidad is juxtaposed with a pan-Caribbean vision of Trinidad's presence in much larger historical developments through a story suite. Columbus, C.L.R. James, Raleigh, Francisco Miranda, Venezuela, Trinidad & Tobago, an unnamed East African country resembling Uganda, and other locales are connected through this rather ambitious project, unfortunately marketed as a novel in the US. 

Like the best of The Enigma of Arrival, Naipaul's autobiographical narrator's experiences in a rapidly changing Trinidad he no longer recognizes, combined with a strange pan-Caribbean perspective, connecting with yet dissociating himself with a C.L.R. James-inspired radical, Lebrun, Miranda's constant reinvention, a fellow West Indian from Guadeloupe living in Francophone West Africa, and a co-worker in the civil service before Naipaul left Trinidad for Oxford in 1950. In one unexpected admission, the Naipaul-like narrator even admits to the influence of George Lamming and other Caribbean peoples on his writing! So, perhaps Derek Walcott was wrong to suggest Naipaul completely turned his back on the "Negroid" creative genius of the Caribbean?

But, I digress. A Way in the World is a Naipaul work I will return to in the future. The use of Amerindian symbolism, autobiographical aspects, and Naipaul's intriguing self-distancing from a larger Caribbean "radical" collective identity or movement are fascinating, but the work was dragged down by the lengthy Miranda episode on the "Gulf of Desolation" between early English Trinidad and Venezuela. Surprisingly clear and unafraid to juxtapose brutality of slavery, indentured labor, and the South American independence struggles, Naipaul somehow loses his way. The final chapter continues a circular or cyclic theme of identity or movement, but seemed only relevant to the previous chapters in the text as an unsubtle critique of black nationalism, what Naipaul seems to suggest is a "racial sacrament" of black nationalism or racial politics. 

So, as an overall read, A Way in the World contains some compelling narratives, but begins to lose its way in the penultimate and final chapters. The characterization of the fictionalized C.L.R. James character is likewise intriguing, but fundamentally misrepresents James/Lebrun to fit Naipaul's worldview. One can, to a certain extent, understand Naipaul's desire to avoid becoming part of a larger group or collective, to be able to reinvent oneself through identity or writing, but the Naipaul perspective cannot be divorced from incorrect or misleading views on race and anti-colonial politics.