Black British Literature The Lonely Londoners Essays

Black British Literature The Lonely Londoners Essays Black British Literature The Lonely Londoners Essay Black British Literature The Lonely Londoners Essay Introduction In this take-home exam, I will outline some very typical criteria for Black British Literature respectively Samuel Selvons The Lonely Londoners. Selvon wrote this novel in the year 1956 and it was the first book that focused on poor black immigrants from the West Indies who belong to the working-class in London. These people are also known as the Windrush Generation because they were the first large group of post-war West Indies immigrants who were brought to the United Kingdom by a ship that was called the MS Empire Windrush. In these times there were no restrictions for immigrants by law, because the United Kingdom was looking for people who wanted to work in England, as a consequence of the lack of so many people who died in the Second World War. Samuel Selvon himself is a Trinidadian author and The Lonely Londoners is his most recognized piece of writing. He, as well as his fictional characters in the book, moved to London in the 1950s. Therefore The Lonely Londoners belongs in t he sub-genre of migration novels. His remarkable work is said to be the debut of Black British writing and so I will talk about some major aspects that are typical for this genre. Analyzing The Lonely Londoners Those migration novels are usually autobiographical and deal with the topic of the first generation of immigrants, their home as well as their exile and the life then and now, whereas with now I mean the time when the book was written. A quote from the very beginning (page 1) perfectly underlines the assumption that this book is going to tell something about the immigrants new home and where they are coming from: â€Å"One grim winter evening [], Moses Aloetta hop on a number 46 bus at the corner of Chepstow Road and Westbourne Grove to go to Waterloo to meet a fellar who was coming from Trinidad on the boat-train.† The quote tells us from where and how those people come to England and referring to the term â€Å"fellar†, Im going to