A Book Review – J. W. Chinapen, Educator and Poet

By Petamber Persaud

By Karma Chinapen
Outskirts Press, Inc
Denver, Colorado, 2009

There are several ways to present a biography. However, in whatever form a biography is presented, it ought to be educational, interesting and inspirational.
Sometimes a chronological presentation is warranted, a form that could be a bit dull. ‘J. W. Chinapen, Educator and Poet’ is a chronological presentation of the life and work of an unpretentious Guyanese patriot, a chronological biography with never a dull moment. Too soon comes the end of the book – the only shortcoming of the writing. A shortcoming that is redeemed by the poetry of Chinapen at the end of the book, which is like the icing on the cake and a balm to the soul.
‘J. W. Chinapen, Educator and Poet’ is made up of a preface that tells how the biography materialised, eight chapters and three appendices.
Chapter One captures the essence of the man and the following chapters expand on various aspects of the man’s life and work. Chapter Two tells of his early life. Chapters Three, Four and Five tabulate his teaching career at various parts of the country. Chapter Six expands on one of the more important part of this life – his poetry. Chapters Seven and Eight tell of his family life and of his retirement years.
One significant element of this biography is the listing of Chinapen’s contemporaries at the many important junctures in the life of the man; these lists are very important as references and as primary sources of information in the educational, cultural, youth and literary history of Guyana.
The three appendices sum up the life and work of the man. For instance, in appendix one, his unpublished poems surfaced for the first time; poems that are as polished gems as the published poems which are reprinted in appendix two. The published poems appeared in a collection titled ‘Albion Wilds’ which won the Cheddi Jagan Gold Medal for Literature. And the reading will reveal untold wealth of beauty, charm and inspiration. The poems complement the written part of the biography.
This is what the biography says about Chinapen:
Youth Leader, teacher/educator, artist, poet, Jacob Wellien Chinapen was born on June 17, 1908 at Albion, a little-known village on the Corentyne Coast of Berbice, and went on to score a number of firsts in various endeavours of life in the colony of British Guiana. He also immortalised his birthplace in his only published book of poems, ‘Albion Wilds’.
It must be noted that Chinapen entered a world controlled by a sugar plantation mentality, ruled by the innovative British and influenced by the church. Examples of how pervading that control of the church was could be seen in the first or Christian name/s of many Indians even unto to this day. However, he grew up at the tail end of indentureship (of Indians from India to British Guiana, 1838 – 1917). This meant that he was greeted by a situation where ‘freed’ Indians were already making an impact on the society other than in the field. Not that life was any easier for Indians but being a resourceful people they grabbed at slight concessions, creating opportunities for themselves.
Chinapen was educated at the Albion Canadian Mission School where religious instruction and Christian dogma was fare of the day. He later attended the Berbice High School in New Amsterdam. He started his teaching career at his alma mater as a Pupil Teacher and was among the first batch of graduates from the Teacher’s Training College, 1928 – 1930, going on to serve schools in Demerara and Berbice – East and West Coasts. While he was attached to Broad Street Government School, he gained valuable teaching experience under Lugard Dolphin, a highly respected master in the art of teaching. (That institution was later renamed Dolphin Government.)
Chinapen’s first promotion as Headmaster was at Lachmansingh Memorial Government School at Bush Lot, West Coast Berbice, where through his leadership the school won the first Woolford Efficiency Shield in 1947.
It was at this school in Bush Lot, Chinapen came into contact with and was a positive influence on the late Cleveland Hamilton who was later to pen the lyrics of the ‘Song of the Republic’. Hamilton, writing to A. J. Seymour on the latter’s 70th birth anniversary, described that association with ‘Chinaps’ like this, ‘Chinapen, you will agree, was one of the most talented persons in his or your or our generation. He was a teacher of excellence and dedication, an artist of the first order, and a poet whose fragile, gossamer lyricism has seldom been equalled. It carried with it a purity that was – or is – almost transcendental’.
In 1950, Chinapen was transferred to Messiah Canadian Mission School on the Corentyne Coast where he spent some 13 years. In 1957 the institution became the centre of a new approach to education, The Project Method. Chinapen was there to execute that programme, another first, a pioneer in education.
Occasions new demand new attitudes,/ prime duties teach, new measures motivate (taken from ‘A Reverie’).
Chinapen’s love for nature and respect for human resources constrained him to organise and direct a successful Youth Club, the first of its kind in the area.
May you preserve throughout your destined span/ this trilling urge to live creatively (taken from ‘To Veka’).
He understood the spirit of youth a sailor now traversing seas unknown/a motorist careering round the bend (taken from ‘To Veka’) and undertook the harnessing of that energy.
It was not surprising therefore for his continued promotion of youth activities he became the first, yet another first, president of the Upper Corentyne Regional Youth Council.
Chinapen started writing in 1931 when ‘the horizon of his youthful life was darkened by ominous clouds’. He sought refuge in the famous ‘Gitanjali’ by Rabindranath Tagore whose works he read regularly until his death. Four short years after he started to write, Chinapen’s poems were deemed good enough to be included in the first anthology of Indian poetry, ‘An Anthology of Local Indian Verse’ edited by Charles Ebenezer James Ramcharitar-Lalla, 1934, featuring 5 Indian poets.
Chinapen’s published poems were steeped in local flavour but their form was influenced by Wordsworth, Gray, Keats, and Mathew Arnold. His sonnets were well crafted, set to music.
In fact, Chinapen referred to his trip to England in 1961 as his ‘pilgrimage’, taking time off from his studies to see places of literary interest such as the Tintern Abbey, Stoke Poges Church and the haunts of the Scholar Gipsy.
Despite the Victorian influence, Chinapen was able to, according to A. J. Seymour, ‘marry the best of his cultural heritage coming from the east with the life of the land of his birth and therefore bridge the differing matrices which belong to the different continents and different ways of life’ (Forward to ‘Albion Wilds’). This is seen in ‘Crossing the Berbice one Evening’ Surya (the sun) his course too is ending/Tree-tops his last rays attending…
His crowning achievement in poetry came in 1960 when he won the Cheddi Jagan Gold Medal for Literature – the highest literary award in Guyana – for his book of 26 poems, ‘Albion Wilds’. What was significant about that award was that the government of the day, at that early stage of the development of a Guyanese consciousness, placed priority on literature.
Some of his poems became so popular that about five were set to music and placed in the repertoire of national songs including ‘Crossing the Berbice one Evening’, ‘Guyana! Loved Guyana’ and ‘Arise Guyana’. ‘On the beach at No. 63’ closely wrought in Christian mysticism became a hymn to this a highly religious nation. And strange, as I thus contemplated round-/I felt I stood upon some hallowed ground./O vision immanent! It dawned on me/Christ trod the peaceful sands at Sixty-three!
The pun on the word ‘Albion’ should be noted – the title for this first book, paying homage to both his birthplace and to Britain (also called Albion), equating a small village to a superpower. Chinapen was always loyal to Guyana, his patriotism ringing out from ‘Guyana! Loved Guyana!’ – let me in thy service/stand firm and suffer long/and with my brothers fashion/a nation great and strong
‘I’ve lived a full life’ are words that could describe the sojourn of JW Chinapen on earth. He died in 1971.
This biography, ‘J. W. Chinapen, Educator and Poet’, written by his son, Karma Chinapen, comes at a time when the written and known history of Guyana is being put to the test from different angles and could render enormous contribution to the dialogue. But more importantly, it brings into focus the life and work of a significant Guyanese voice that was one time ignored in the literary history of this country.

(Available at Barnes and Noble as well as on Amazon.com, online access is outskirtpress.com/jwchinapen)

Responses to this author telephone (592) 226-0065 or email: oraltradition2002@yahoo.com