Anthony Kellman

Anthony Kellman (born 24 April 1955) is a Barbados-born poet, novelist, and musician. In 1990, the British publishing house Peepal Tree Press published his first full-length book of poetry, Watercourse, which was endorsed by the late Martiniquan poet Edouard Glissant and which launched Kellman’s international writing career. Since 1990, he has published three novels, four CD recordings of original songs, and four additional books of poetry, including Limestone: An Epic Poem of Barbados, the island’s first published epic poem which covers over four centuries of Barbadian life. In 1992, he edited the first full-length U.S. anthology of English-language Caribbean poetry, Crossing Water, and in 1993, he received a U.S. National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellowship. Kellman is the originator of the Barbados poetic form Tuk Verse, derived from melodic and rhythmical patterns of Barbados’s indigenous folk music. Early life Kellman was born in Whitehall, Saint Michael, Barbados, and attended Combermere Secondary School. At the age of eighteen, he left for England, where he worked as a troubadour, playing pop and West Indian folk music on the pub and folk club circuit. He also became in