Lorna Goodison, distinguished and dignified

Lorna Goodison could be described as the quintessential scribe and a consummate professional in the literary sphere. The long list of accolades and honours signifies a distinguished and dignified career, it would be difficult to deny anywhere across the shores of Kingston, Jamaica, and the World.

The Kingston native began her sojourn into the artistic world by dabbling in painting and writing from as early as her teenage years, and it was then that the bug bit, as her artistic and creative-writing skills, combined to give her a home.

As the years went on, Goodison began her adult life by teaching art, before deciding to embark on a professional writing career in the early 1990s.

That decision took her overseas where she began teaching part of the year at various North American universities, including the University of Toronto and the University of Michigan.

Lorna’s early writings were published, often anonymously in the Sunday Gleaner, even while attending art school. When she did start to publish under her name, she did so in the Jamaica Journal which specialised in scholarly articles on the arts, history, literature and culture.

Once she had committed herself to the writing life, Lorna began to publish full collections of her poetry and also read them to audiences, mainly overseas. Her first volume ‘Tamarind Season’ was published in 1980 and thereafter she never looked back, producing a stunning 12 other collections.

A series of short stories would also follow and so too came a plethora of awards, from the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 2019 for her most famous poem ‘I am becoming my Mother’, to Poet Laureate of Durham and Jamaica.

A national honour of Order of Distinction (Commander Class) was also bestowed on the daughter of nine siblings, which includes her famous sister Barbara Gloudon.

Married to Ted Chamberlin, Goodison retired after teaching for 20 years in An Arbor as the Lemul Johnson Professor of African and American Studies.