Eric Williams and the Making of the Modern Caribbeam Book

The important West Indian scholar and politician.Born in Trinidad, Eric Williams1911-81) founded the Republicof Trinidad and Tobago's fi rstmodern political party in 1956,led the country to independencefrom the British culminating in1962, and became the nation'srst prime minister. Before enteringpolitics, he was a professor atHoward University and wrote severalbooks, including the classicCapitalism and Slavery. In the fi rstscholarly biography of Williams, Colin Palmer providesinsights into Williams's personality that illuminate his lifeas a scholar and politician and his tremendous infl uenceon the historiography and politics of the Caribbean.Palmer focuses primarily on the fourteen-yearperiod of struggles for independence in the AnglophoneCaribbean, when Williams was at the center of most ofthe confl icts and challenges that defi ned the region.Looking at the ideas of Williams as well as those of hisCaribbean and African peers, Palmer demonstrateshow the development of the modern Caribbean wasinextricably intertwined with the evolution of a regionalanticolonial consciousness.Read More