Trinidad
Trinidad is the larger and more populous of the two major islands of Trinidad and Tobago. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is often referred to as the southernmos ...
ian-born British writer and memoirist. Her novels have been much acclaimed, winning awards including the 2013
Port of Spain
Port of Spain (Spanish: ''Puerto España''), officially the City of Port of Spain (also stylized Port-of-Spain), is the capital of Trinidad and Tobago and the third largest municipality, after Chaguanas and San Fernando. The city has a municip ...
, Trinidad, in 1965, to an English father and mother of French, Italian, Maltese and Lebanese descent. Roffey was educated at St Andrew's School in
Maraval
Maraval is one of the northern suburbs of Trinidad's capital, Port of Spain, a valley in northern Trinidad in Trinidad and Tobago. It is situated at the bottom of the hills of Paramin and located east of the Diego Martin valley to which it is conn ...
, Trinidad, and then in the UK at St Maur's Convent, and
St George's College, Weybridge
St George's Weybridge is an independent mixed Roman Catholic co-educational Josephite day school in Surrey, taking pupils from 3 to 18. St George's Weybridge is made up of St George's Junior School (3–11) and St George's College (11–18).
...
. She graduated with a BA in English and Film Studies from the
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a public research university in Norwich, England. Established in 1963 on a campus west of the city centre, the university has four faculties and 26 schools of study. The annual income of the institution f ...
in 1987, and later completed an MA and PhD in Creative Writing at
Lancaster University
Lancaster University (legally The University of Lancaster) is a public university, public research university in Lancaster, Lancashire, Lancaster, Lancashire, England. The university was established in 1964 by royal charter, as one of several pla ...
. Between 2002 and 2006 she was a Centre Director for the
Arvon Foundation
The Arvon Foundation is a charitable organisation in the United Kingdom that promotes creative writing. Arvon is one of Arts Council England's National Portfolio Organisations.
Andrew Kidd is the Chief Executive Officer, Patricia Cumper is Ch ...
.
Roffey is an experienced creative writing tutor and has taught for numerous creative writing providers and organisations, including The National Writers Centre, First Story, The Arvon Foundation and English PEN. She is a Professor of Contemporary Fiction at Manchester Metropolitan University, teaching creative writing on the novel route MA.. Since 2013, she has been a literary activist and advocate for emerging writers in Trinidad, teaching for COSTAATT,
Bocas Lit Fest
The NGC Bocas Lit Fest is the Trinidad and Tobago literary festival that takes place annually during the last weekend of April in Port of Spain. Inaugurated in 2011, it is the first major literary festival in the southern Caribbean and largest li ...
and privately in Port of Spain, where she set up the St James Writers’ Room in 2014 and numerous other writing workshops since. She has also co-led writing retreats in Trinidad in collaboration with other Caribbean writers such as Professor Loretta Collins-Klobah in partnership wit Mount Plaisir Estate in
Grande Riviere
Grande Riviere is a village on the north coast of Trinidad located between Toco and Matelot. The area was originally settled by immigrants from Venezuela and Tobago who cultivated cacao and subsistence crops. After falling cocoa prices in the ...
, Trinidad. Roffey has dual nationality, British and Trinidadian. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a co-founder of the group Writers Rebel inside Extinction Rebellion. She is also a mitra of the Triratna Buddhist order.
Works
Roffey has written six novels and a memoir. ''Sun Dog'' (2002), set in west London, is a magical realist tale of psychological estrangement, identity loss and subsequent individuation. ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle'' (2009; shortlisted for the 2010
Orange Prize
The Women's Prize for Fiction (previously with sponsor names Orange Prize for Fiction (1996–2006 and 2009–12), Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction (2007–08) and Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction (2014–2017)) is one of the United Kingdom's m ...
and the 2011
Encore Award
The £10,000 Encore Award for the best second novel was first awarded in 1990. It is sponsored by Lucy Astor. The award fills a niche in the catalogue of literary prizes by celebrating the achievement of outstanding second novels, often neglecte ...
), is the story of European ex-colonials living in Trinidad during the island's early Independence years and their subsequent process of creolisation. It was hailed by
Commonwealth Prize
Commonwealth Writers (established in 2011) is the cultural initiative of the Commonwealth Foundation. It aims to inspire, develop and connect writers across the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth. Its flagship is a literary award for short sto ...
-winner Olive Senior, who said:
:"…it breaks entirely new ground. It is a major contribution to the New Wave of Caribbean writing: energetic, uncompromising, bold in the choice of narrative devices and a great read."
It has been published to critical acclaim in the UK, United States and Europe.
Roffey's 2011 memoir, ''With the Kisses of His Mouth'', is a personal account of a mid-life quest for sexual liberation and self-identification other than the aspirant hetero-normative model. It has been characterised as "a subversive work that transcends the author's personal story: it stands alone in the chasm that has opened between feminist literature and the belles du jour brigade."
Her novel ''Archipelago'', published in July 2012, set in the aftermath of a flood, examines climate change from the perspective of a man from the southern Caribbean. Andrew Miller (
Costa Award
The Costa Book Awards were a set of annual literary awards recognising English-language books by writers based in UK and Ireland. Originally named the Whitbread Book Awards from 1971 to 2005 after its first sponsor, the Whitbread company, then ...
winner, 2011) said: "''Archipelago'' is beautifully done. There's a warmth to it, an exuberance and a wisdom, that makes the experience of reading it feel not just pleasurable but somehow instructive. It's funny, sometimes bitingly poignant. And how well Roffey writes a male central character. A brilliant piece of storytelling." ''Archipelago'' won the 2013
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, inaugurated in 2011 by the NGC Bocas Lit Fest, is an annual literary award for books by Caribbean writers published in the previous year.Bocas Lit Fest
The NGC Bocas Lit Fest is the Trinidad and Tobago literary festival that takes place annually during the last weekend of April in Port of Spain. Inaugurated in 2011, it is the first major literary festival in the southern Caribbean and largest li ...
was announced on 27 April 2013 as the best overall book from all categories.
Roffey's 2014 novel, ''House of Ashes'', is a fictionalised account of the events surrounding the 1990 attempted coup in Trinidad. Ronald Adamolekun, for ''
Wasafiri
''Wasafiri'' is a quarterly British literary magazine covering international contemporary writing. Founded in 1984, the magazine derives its name from a Swahili word meaning "travellers" that is etymologically linked with the Arabic word "safari" ...
'' magazine, said: ''House of Ashes'' will be remembered as the most authoritative fictionalised account of the 1990 Trinidad and Tobago revolution, arguably the darkest moment of the island’s history."
''The Telegraph'' called it "vigorous, grimly absorbing tale", while ''The Observer''′s reviewer concluded: "Roffey's writing is raw and visceral and she thrusts her readers headlong into the very middle of the action, her pen as powerful as the butts of the guns shoved in her hostages' backs."
A fifth novel, ''The Tryst'', published in July 2017, was sold twice, first to Simon and Schuster UK, and then to independent press Dodo Ink. Having worked on it, on and off, for 14 years, Roffey revisits the tale of Adam's first wife, Lilith, and examines the common but taboo issue of celibacy within marriage. Like much of Roffey's work, it weaves magical realism into a contemporary setting. Many well known literary writers, sex writers and sex workers have applauded ''The Tryst''.
DBC Pierre
Peter Warren Finlay (born in 1961), also known as DBC Pierre, is an Australian author who wrote the novel '' Vernon God Little''.
Pierre was born in South Australia, and largely raised in Mexico. He has resided in the Republic of Ireland and ...
said of it: "Not a shade of grey within a mile of this book. What makes ''The Tryst'' an unexploded virus isn't just the quality and brightness of Roffey's writing on sex, even as it uncovers inner glades between flesh and fantasy where sex resides – but the taunting clarity of why those glades stay covered. A throbbing homewrecker of a tale, too late to call Fifty Shades of Red." Hollywood actor Gabriel Byrne said, "The Tryst is a gorgeously written page turner, deceptive in its simplicity. Monique Roffey writes an erotically charged fable that mixes the real with the mythological, a truly unsettling and disturbing novel. She writes about lust and sex in a way that is thrillingly sexy and beautiful."
Rowan Pelling
Rowan Dorothy Pelling (born 17 January 1968) is a British journalist, broadcaster, writer and stand-up comedian who first achieved note as the editor (or "editrice", to use her term) of a monthly literary/erotic magazine, the ''Erotic Review''. ...
, editor of ''
The Amorist
''The Amorist'' is an English-language erotic magazine launched in 2017 in the United Kingdom. History
Rowan Pelling, after working as a columnist at the ''Daily Telegraph'', a journalist at ''Private Eye'', and an editor of the ''Erotic Review ...
'', also said: "''The Tryst'' is a sly, feral, witty, offbeat erotic novella that unsettles the reader, even as it arouses. There are sex scenes of breath-taking audacity. What would any of us do if an irresistible sex daemon broke and entered our domestic lives, leaving havoc in her amoral wake? Monique Roffey knows that the real question about human desire is whether we even recognise our deepest yearnings. How can anyone resist what they have never even dreamt of?"
''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' was first published in April 2020 by Peepal Tree Press and won the Costa Fiction Award 2020 and the Costa Book of the Year, 2020. It was nominated for seven awards in total, being shortlisted for the Rathbones/Folio Prize, 2021, The Goldsmiths Award, 2020 and the Republic of Consciousness Award, 2021. It was published in paperback by Vintage books, in June 2021. It was a Radio 4 Book of the Week in August 2021. Film Four and Dorothy Street Pictures have bought the screen adaptation rights. Roffey's sixth novel ''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' (2020) won the Costa Book of the Year award, announced in January 2021.
A writer of dual nationality and perspective, Roffey writes about sex, fatherhood, the Caribbean, mermaids, Lilith and other outcasts, be they the terminally awkward August Chalmin (in ''Sun Dog''), the left-behind Europeans in Trinidad (George and Sabine Harwood in ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle''), a cursed mermaid, a celibate wife or indeed herself. Stylistically, her books can be linked in terms of post-modern narrative choices, in that they often weave together magical realism, real-life historical characters and events, biography and autobiography to tackle themes of alienation and otherness.
Publications
Books
*''Sun Dog'' (2002), Scribner, Simon & Schuster UK
*''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle'' (2009), Simon & Schuster UK
*''The Global Village, Tell Tales'' (co-editor; 2009), Peepal Tree Press.
*''With the Kisses of His Mouth'' (memoir; 2011), Simon & Schuster UK
*''Archipelago'' (2012), Simon & Schuster UK
*''House of Ashes'' (2014), Simon & Schuster UK
*''The Tryst'' (2017), Dodo Ink''
*''The Mermaid of Black Conch'' (2020), Peepal Tree Press
Orange Prize
The Women's Prize for Fiction (previously with sponsor names Orange Prize for Fiction (1996–2006 and 2009–12), Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction (2007–08) and Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction (2014–2017)) is one of the United Kingdom's m ...
, shortlisted for ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle''
*2011:
Encore Award
The £10,000 Encore Award for the best second novel was first awarded in 1990. It is sponsored by Lucy Astor. The award fills a niche in the catalogue of literary prizes by celebrating the achievement of outstanding second novels, often neglecte ...
, shortlisted for ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle''
*2013:
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, inaugurated in 2011 by the NGC Bocas Lit Fest, is an annual literary award for books by Caribbean writers published in the previous year.Orion Book Award
''Orion'' is a quarterly, advertisement-free, nonprofit magazine focused on nature, culture, and place addressing environmental and societal issues.
It has published such authors as Wendell Berry, Barry Lopez, Terry Tempest Williams, Michael Po ...
, shortlisted for ''Archipelago''
*2015:
Costa Book Awards
The Costa Book Awards were a set of annual literary awards recognising English-language books by writers based in UK and Ireland. Originally named the Whitbread Book Awards from 1971 to 2005 after its first sponsor, the Whitbread company, then ...
shortlisted for ''House of Ashes''
*2015:
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, inaugurated in 2011 by the NGC Bocas Lit Fest, is an annual literary award for books by Caribbean writers published in the previous year.Goldsmiths Prize
The Goldsmiths Prize is a British literary award, founded in 2013 by Goldsmiths, University of London, in association with the ''New Statesman.'' It is awarded annually to a piece of fiction that "breaks the mould or extends the possibilities of ...
, shortlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch''
*2021: Costa Book of the Year award for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch''
*2021:
Rathbones Folio Prize
The Rathbones Folio Prize, previously known as the Folio Prize and The Literature Prize, is a literary award that was sponsored by the London-based publisher The Folio Society for its first two years, 2014–2015. Starting in 2017 the sponsor is ...
, shortlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black''
*2021:
Republic of Consciousness Prize
The Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses is an annual British literary prize founded by the author Neil Griffiths. It rewards fiction published by UK and Irish small presses, defined as those with fewer than five full-time employees ...
Ondaatje Prize
The Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize is an annual literary award given by the Royal Society of Literature. The £10,000 award is for a work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry that evokes the "spirit of a place", and is written by someon ...
(for writing that evokes the "spirit of a place"), longlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch''
*2021: OCM Bocas Fiction Award, shortlisted for ''The Mermaid of Black Conch''
*2022: Elected a Fellow of the
Royal Society of Literature
The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by George IV of the United Kingdom, King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, th ...
Further reading
* .
* Owen, Katie. "A Man for All Seasons; New Fiction". Review of ''Sun Dog'', by Monique Roffey. ''The Times'', 15 June 2002: 14.
* Woodhead, Cameron. Review of ''The White Woman on the Green Bicycle'', by Monique Roffey. ''Age'', 27 June 2009: 26.