‘Jamaica blessed to have witnessed talents of Professor Baugh’

Jamaica and the region have lost a distinguished son, literary icon, author, and public orator in Professor Edward Baugh, who died on Sunday morning.

News of the death of the renowned and well-loved educator, with the velvet voice, whose artistry earned him many accolades over the years – including one of the nation’s highest awards, the Order of Distinction (Commander class) – yesterday left the academic and literary communities in a cloud of sorrow.

The scholar, poet, and mentor to hundreds of students at The University of the West Indies was 87.

The Portland native leaves behind an enviable legacy of high-calibre gold in literature, which has shaped the teaching of the subject, locally, regionally, and globally for decades.

Prime Minister Andrew Holness, in a statement on his social media page, shared that “Professor Baugh’s impact on Jamaican literature and his insightful contributions to postcolonial Caribbean poetry have left an enduring mark on our cultural heritage”.

Holnes added: “As a nation, we were blessed and privileged to have witnessed the immense talent of Prof Baugh.”

The prime minister, while expressing condolences to the grieving family, hailed Baugh as a revered poet, biographer, and prominent scholar in post-colonial Caribbean poetry.

“May the enduring legacy of his literary contributions and profound insights offer solace during these challenging times, and may his soul find eternal peace,” Holness said further.

Sports and Culture Minister Olivia Grange, in expressing sadness at Baugh’s passing, reiterated that Jamaica has lost a literary giant.

“Professor Baugh will be remembered for a distinguished academic career during which he focused on West Indian literature, especially the study of Anglophone Caribbean poetry, and in particular, the work of Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott.

“He began writing poetry from as far back as his days at Titchfield High School,” she said, noting that he had taken advantage of scholarships to pursue English literature at the University College of the West Indies (UCWI), postgraduate studies at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, and PhD studies at the University of Manchester.

Principal of the Mona Campus Professor Densil Williams described Baugh’s passing as a profound loss to the academic community, especially to those in the literary field.

“He was an outstanding poet, orator, and scholar in the arts,” Williams said while extending condolences to Baugh’s immediate friends, family, and colleagues.

An ‘immense loss’

Professor emeritus Dr Norval Edwards, who had not only taught alongside the eminent professor, but was also one of his students, as well as his mentee and role model, added that his passing was an “immense loss” not only for Jamaica, but the wider Caribbean region.

“Jamaica and the wider Caribbean have lost an intellectual giant, an erudite and brilliant scholar, an exemplary teacher, and anyone who has been taught by him would have been touched and inspired by his brilliance.

“He transmitted a genuine deep love for the subject, he brought passion and fire - the fire of creativity; the fire of intellectual curiosity - he brought that to his students, and I have never in all of my years of experiencing different teachers in different institutions experienced a lecturer who was more inspiring than him,” he said.

Edwards also lauded Baugh as a pioneer figure in establishing “the road map of modern Anglophone Caribbean studies” as well as introducing the study of West Indian literature at The UWI in 1970.

“In many ways, Prof Baugh’s research and scholarship have, basically, functioned to map the emergence and importance of Caribbean literature. He has, by virtue of his own work, established sterling critical standards for later generations of critics to aspire to,” he added.

Edwards said Baugh was not only a “virtuoso critic”, one of The UWI’s best orators, but a fine poet and an internationally renowned scholar on the works of St Lucian Poet and playwright Derek Walcott and Jamaican poet and essayist Lorna Goodison.

But he noted that Baugh, despite his achievement and continued excellence, displayed consistent humility and inspired several generations of students to strive for excellence and pursue Caribbean literature.

36 years with UWI

Baugh’s 36-year association with The UWI began at the Cave Hill campus in 1965.

He spent three years at the Barbados headquarters of the institution before returning home to Jamaica to work at the Mona campus.

During his tenure, he served as head of the Department of English, vice-dean and dean of the Faculty of Arts and General Studies, and public orator.

He was made a professor of English in 1978.

As a public orator, Baugh brought to the position his inimitable combination of eloquence, perceptive wit, and subtle innuendo, delivered with his distinctive drawl, and demonstrating the finest examples of classical rhetoric.

It was a role that he revelled in, perhaps because of its dramatic elements, for he was also a lover of the theatre and as a student at Titchfield High had acted in a few plays, and later, at the UCWI, performed in productions staged by the University Players.

During his long and productive professional life, Baugh amassed an impressive body of work that included a range of critical essays and sentient poems that forced the reader to unearth their deep strata of meaning.

He was the author of four critically acclaimed anthologies: A Tale from the Rainforest (1988), I Was a Teacher, Too (1991), It Was the Singing (2000), and Black Sand: New and Collected Poems (2013). He was considered an authority on renowned West Indian poet and Nobel Prize laureate Derek Walcott, whose work he assessed in Derek Walcott: Memory and Vision (1978) and in the volume Cambridge Studies in African and Caribbean Literature (2012).

Baugh was also an instrumental figure at the Institute of Jamaica, where he served on the Council of the Institute directors and also at the Jamaica Cultural Development Commission.

His accolades include a Jamaica national honoree (Commander, rank of the Order of Distinction – CD), the UWI Vice-Chancellor Award for Excellence in Teaching and Administration (1995), the Institute of Jamaica Silver Musgrave Medal (1998), the UWI Guild of Graduates’ Pelican Award (1999), and the Institute of Jamaica Gold Musgrave Medal in 2012.

Baugh is survived by his widow, Sheila, and two daughters, Sarah and Katherine.

tanesha.mundle@gleanerjm.com