The novel depicts a young man struggling to care for a mother suffering from dementia and through this plot examines the nuances of migration, origins, and acculturation the intersection of race, racism, and class the ability to remember personal and national pasts and the pain of personal loss and loneliness. His first novel, Soucouyant, is inspired by his real-life experience of being raised by a black mother and a South Asian father, both of whom immigrated to Canada from Trinidad and worked, respectively, as domestic and factory labourers. His commitment to the dissemination and study of black voices and stories is further evident in his co-founding, along with Wayde Compton and Karina Vernon, of Commodore Books, the first dedicated black Canadian press in Western Canada.Īs in his academic work, his creative work grapples with issues of diaspora, migration, racism, class, belonging, and the connections between them. As one of the first doctoral candidates to complete a dissertation on black Canadian literature and as an intellectual active in discussions of black diasporic literature, Chariandy brings attention not only to racialized experiences and storytelling but to the study of specifically Canadian black literature. After earning his doctorate, he moved to Vancouver where he is an English literature professor at Simon Fraser University. As a scholar of black diasporic and black Canadian literature, Chariandy has been an important contributor to the growing but still-neglected field of Black Studies in Canada.ĭavid Chariandy was born and raised in what is now the Scarborough section of Toronto, attended Carleton University in Ottawa for his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees, and York University in Toronto for his PhD, which he completed in 2002. Chariandy’s academic research and creative pursuits have made him one of the most prominent voices in discussions of contemporary black Canadian literature. His second novel, Brother, is forthcoming.

Most notably, Soucouyant was longlisted for the 2009 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and the 2007 Scotiabank Giller Prize and was shortlisted for the 2007 Governor General’s Award for Fiction.

His first novel, Soucouyant (2007), received the attention of prestigious awards committees and enthusiastic critical reviews.

David Chariandy is a professor of English literature at Simon Fraser University and a very promising creative writer.

Brother by David Chariandy