Austin Clarke (novelist)

Austin Clarke was born in 1934 in St. James, Barbados, where he received his early education in Anglican schools.[2] He taught at a rural school for three years. In 1955 he moved to Canada and attended the University of Toronto's Trinity College for two years.[2][3]

Clarke was a reporter at the Timmins Daily Press and the Globe and Mail before joining the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a freelance journalist. He subsequently taught at several American universities, including Yale University (Hoyt fellow, 1968–70), Duke University (1971–72), and the University of Texas (visiting professor, 1973) and helped establish black studies programs at several universities.[4][5][3]

In 1973 he was designated cultural attaché at the Barbadian embassy in Washington, DC. He was later General Manager of the Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation in Barbados (1975–77).[6] He was writer in residence at Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec (1977), and at the University of Western Ontario (1978).[4] He became a Canadian citizen in 1981.[2] From 1988 to 1993 he served on the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada.[7]

He was not the first Canadian writer of African origin, that distinction belonging to 19th-Century author Amelia E. Johnson. However, George Elliott Clarke says that Austin Clarke was "the author of African descent in English, in Canada, that anyone who was interested in being a writer would have to be aware of, to challenge as well."[3] In September 2012, at the International Festival of Authors, Clarke was announced as the winner of the $10,000 Harbourfront Festival Prize "on the merits of his published work and efforts in fostering literary talent in new and aspiring writers".[8][9] Previous recipients of the award (established in 1984) include: Dionne Brand, Wayson Choy, Christopher Dewdney, Helen Humphreys, Paul Quarrington, Peter Robinson, Seth, Jane Urquhart, and Guy Vanderhaeghe. Clarke was reported as saying: "I rejoiced when I saw that Authors at Harbourfront Centre had named me this year's winner of the Harbourfront Festival Prize. I did not come to this city on September 29, 1959, as a writer. I came as a student. However, my career as a writer buried any contention of being a scholar and I thank Authors at Harbourfront Centre for saving me from the more painful life of the 'gradual student.' It is an honour to be part of such a prestigious list of authors."[10]

An outspoken intellectual, he avoided talking about multiculturalism, hoping his own term omniculturalism could be accepted by people from both the political left and right.[3] He ran as a Progressive Conservative candidate in the 1977 Ontario general election.[2]

Clarke died on June 26, 2016, at the age of 81 in Toronto.[11][12][13][14]

• 1980, Casa de las Américas Prize, Cuba
• 1992, Toronto Arts Award for Lifetime Achievement in Literature
• 1997, Lifetime Achievement Award from Frontier College in Toronto
• 1998, Member of the Order of Canada.
• 1999, Martin Luther King Jr. Achievement Award for Excellence in Writing.
• 1999, W. O. Mitchell Literary Prize
• 2002, Giller Prize, for The Polished Hoe [2]
• 2003, Commonwealth Writers' Prize
• 2009, Toronto Book Award, for More.
• 2012, Harbourfront Festival Prize

• Austin Clarke interview by Linda Richards, January magazine, November 2002.
• Famous Canadian Immigrant Authors
• Austin Clarke's entry in The Canadian Encyclopedia
• Order of Canada citation
• "Austin Clarke", English-Canadian Writers, Athabasca University.
• Carol Brennan, "Austin C. Clarke", Gale Contemporary Black Biography.
• "Austin Clarke fonds - Search Research Collections". McMaster University Library. William Ready Division of Archives and Research Collections. Retrieved 4 June 2020.