By Venessa Deosaran
Overseas-based Guyanese Elly Niland is a prolific poet and playwright, admired for her acclaimed work in fusing East Indian Creole, Caribbean and British English to create linguistic and cultural explosions of outstanding literary work within the twentieth century. Elly was born in Guyana in 1954, and has lived in Surrey, England with her husband, an Irishman named Chris, and children since 1971. In an exclusive interview with Guyana Times Sunday Magazine, Elly revealed she was born on the Corentyne coast in her great grandma’s house at Number 36 Village. In the early 60s, she moved from her small country life to live in the buzzing town of New Amsterdam. She moved there when she was about six-years-old and was fascinated with what she saw.
“A huge market and so many people… I saw and I loved it. When you come from a village you don’t see that much people so I really loved it there. A popsicle on a stick was fascinating; in the country side they don’t have that.” New Amsterdam proved to be a whole new world for Elly, but at the age of about 13 she was obligated to migrate to England. Now, she is very nostalgic about life in New Amsterdam as a child and even relates her fondest memories of growing up there to her students.
Rising of an applauded poet
Coming from a huge family with an academic background – her siblings being writers and lawyers – for a young Elly, academia was not her cup of tea; however, that would change after having a family of her own.
“When my little boys read, all I could do when I was in the kitchen was to listen to them. I knew the time was going to come when I would have to help them academically.
“This motivated me to study at a night school and surprisingly I passed. I actually liked what I was doing,” she recalled.
After studying as a mature student at Hillcroft College in Britain, she went on to read for her Modern Arts degree at Kingston University and then to take her PGCE, a British examination to train teachers.
She spent another two years studying Art History and Drama, English and British Political History.
For 23 years now, Elly teaches English Language and English Literature and is known as a “teacher of Arts officer” to college students in England. Her late start in writing as a poet and a playwright does not make her any less effective than other celebrated writers.
Her first collection of poetry, ‘In Retrospect’ was nominated for Best First Book of Poetry, and was runner up for the Guyana Prize for Literature 2004. Her second collection, ‘Cornerstones’, won the Guyana Prize for Literature 2006. Her third collection, ‘East of Centre’, was a notable piece of work filled with 50 pages of poems that are described as “poems that dare to enter the uncomfortable spaces where human frailty and dignity are examined in a felt tension that is poignant, moving and wise.”
Elly Niland teamed up with David Dabydeen to dramatise Harold Sonny Ladoo’s short novel, “No Pain Like This Body”, vividly depicting the terrifying world of a family brutalised by violence, poverty and nature itself. Set in a Hindu community in the Eastern Caribbean in 1905 during the August rainy season, it centres on a poor rice-growing family’s struggle to survive.
“No Pain Like this Body” was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in 2003.
Her critic
In a brief interview with Guyana Times Sunday Magazine, Philip Niland, Elly’s eldest son, said as he grew older he wanted to know about his two very rich cultural backgrounds: Irish and Guyanese. He recalled going home one day from university and complaining about not having any culture.
Then his mother, not the best of cooks, asked one of her friends to teach her to cook pepper-pot. Philip said it was his very first taste of Guyana. Now he and his family would indulge in Guyanese cuisine, which helps in keeping their roots alive. Even their friends would go over to their house in England to feast on Guyanese dishes. This has certainly helped Philip in having a sense of belonging and connecting with his mother’s rich heritage.
He explained how he became her editor: “With the loss of her sisters, bereavement came, and I thought she wasn’t handling it too well. I encouraged her to express her emotions in writing, which she can always look back at and use as inspirational pieces. One day I was handed a large collection of exercise books because she did exactly what I told her to do, expressed her emotions in writing. It was raw when I looked at it, but it was the poetic voice that mattered.” Impartially, Philip did extensive editing and evaluation of his mother’s work, and the pieces were published, receiving many accolades.
Inspiration
Inspiration, Elly said, can be one word, a song or a colour. It is the simple things, she pointed out, that can inspire a person. Her best pieces are written early in the morning: a quiet, inspirational time to have tea and think. She constantly encourages her students to share their work with persons other than relatives, who would criticise their work honestly. Although her son is her critic, he does so with honesty, and looks at her as a writer and not “mum.” Writers are always criticised as many may not agree with their perspective on a certain issue. Elly is not immune to this. She stated when she writes something it does not belong to her anymore but is left up to her readers’ interpretations.
Although not living here, Elly said Guyana lives in her. Her advice to young writers is to do a lot of reading and engage the imagination, using the power of it to journey into a whole new dimension.
Elly’s time is now divided between teaching and working on a collection of short stories in Creole – a Guyana based work, and a publication for young readers. It is a tremendous amount of work but she is working persistently at getting it done. (Taken from Guyana Times Sunday Magazine)