Product Description

Jamaica used to be the source of much of Britain's wealth, an island where slaves grew sugar and the money flowed out in vast quantities. It was a tropical paradise for the planters, a Babylonian exile for the Africans shipped to the Caribbean. Since independence in 1962, it has gradually become associated with a new kind of hell, a society where extreme violence has become ordinary and gangs control the areas where most Jamaicans live. Ian Thomson's brave new book explores a country of lost promise, a country that most older Jamaicans in Britain cannot recognise as their own.Once a beacon of optimistic third world politics, the island is now sunk in corruption, hopelessness and drug wars. Jamaica's music was once the lilting anthem of idealists everywhere; now it is a repetitive glorification of homophobia and violence. Thomson walks the streets and rides the buses that most middle class Jamaicans, let alone white visitors, avoid like the plague. He describes poverty, the reality of gang rule and police brutality. He meets Jamaicans who are trying to make a difference, and astonishingly complacent members of the elite. This is an unforgettable portrait of a country that has had a huge influence on British culture, for good and ill.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #31313 in Books
• Published on: 2009-05-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Review
"If you are planning to go to Jamaica, don't buy a guidebook, buy The Dead Yard, it takes you to the heart of Jamaica before you even get on the plane. Ian Thomson has captured the tension, the politics, the heat, the chaos, the beauty and the music of Jamaica. That's difficult to do, but in my opinion he did it because he got down with the people, he took risks, but Jamaicans do that every day." --Benjamin Zephaniah

Review
"The Dead Yard is an awesome rendering of oral history and raw social exposure. Ian Thomson strips Jamaica bare, and takes the island to the cleaners. An amazing performance."

Review
"A bitter-sweet mix of reportage and analysis from Jamaica. Ian Thomson is the best kind of writer: observant, inquisitive, oblique, phlegmatic. He gets in close and very concisely describes what he sees ... A really splendid read."

Customer Reviews

An interesting potpourri of reportage and analysis on Jamaica
The island of Jamaica - its colonial connections with Britain, economy, touristy charms, crime and way of life have always fascinated outsiders. That is why it has been the subject of many written works beyond its shores. This attempt by author Ian Thomson maybe one among many, but its a highly relevant one.

He begins by recollecting an encounter in Jamaica where he's asked if another book on Jamaica obsessing about either its golden beaches or guns was really needed. It is perhaps why Thomson has skipped a cliché-ridden work in his own attempt to report and analyse the sunny isle. His reportage and analysis is often a bit mixed-up but this should not be held against him given the difficulty, sensitivity of the subject and enormity of the task.

Thomson bases his research on stories, suggestions and personal interactions with myriad informants, acquaintances and contacts on the Island. He offers a pragmatic outside-in glimpse into life and attitudes of the Caribbean nation. No subject is taboo for the author. The uncomfortable truth about slavery, immigration to Britain from Jamaica in the 50s and 60s, differing attitudes of generations to Jamaica's past and present and its often uncomfortable relationship with Britain are all there.

Critically speaking with such a broad-based subject as an entire nation's peoples, some stories are bound to be more interesting than others. However, I feel the book is heavily weighted towards accounts provided by the Island's older generation. It would perhaps have more engaging if the author could have interacted with more younger and middle-aged people than appears to be the case.

That said, this book spread over twenty-six chapters is not an armchair narrative penned from the comfort of an air-conditioned hotel room. For purposes of research Thomson visited Jamaica several times not restricting his travels to Kingston alone, but to downtrodden rundown parts of the Island as well. It is these areas which are never mentioned on travel guides or pictured on post-cards where crime is rife and drugs and murder are the norm.

If you have Jamaican connections some parts of the book may well be uncomfortable. However, if you plan on visiting or doing business in the Island of Jamaica, it would be well worth your while to read this book. For those looking for a general read on Jamaica, I am happy to recommend it as I find it to be among the better and honest ones on Jamaica.

Jamaica
For those who may have only read about Jamaica in the James Bond spy thrillers by Ian Fleming, The Dead Yard: Tales of Jamaica offers a more realistic insight into life on the Carribean Island. Thomson details the most famous aspects of Jamaica, the music and its culture, as well as the Island's history, including the slave trade operated by Britain. He visits Kingston, as well as some of the more rundown parts of the Island where murder is commonplace and the authorities have lost control. In the 50s and 60s many Jamaican people began to immigrate to the UK hoping for a better life. In some instances Thomsons states that they did not achieve this aim and they actually later returned to the Island. Several interviews are conducted with residents who left and then returned. Sometimes this does become a little repetative with Thomson going over the same ground. It is also a shame that he was not able to interview more younger people to get their perspective on Jamaican life. The cover states that this book replaces the need for a travel guide, if you plan to visit the Island. I would not say this is the case, but it does make a good tag line.An interesting read.

Fantastic, but often uncomfortable read. Couldn't put it down!
I was really surprised by how gripping were the stories of Jamaican people. I didn't expect the book to be so interesting. There are a lot of surprising facts (at least for me), and I didn't realise just how much the recent history of Britain and Jamaica is intertwined.

As a Briton, I found some of the book really uncomfortable to read. The Jamaican slavery run by Britain, and our plundering of their resources for the Empire, was definitely not our finest hour. And to make matters worse, when Jamaica needed our help (as part of the Commonwealth), we didn't. And to top this, thousands of Jamaicans signed up to help the British Army fight the Nazis in World War Two. As a British person reading these accounts, I couldn't help feeling a tinge of shame.

That said, I was geniunely shocked to read that some of the elder Jamaicans felt nostalgic about those days. But they were comparing those days to the Jamaica of today where extreme violence is almost normal and even murder has become a 'non-crime'.

Reading the book, it appeared to me that the root of the problems was the two-party government system (a British artefact) which is riddled by corruption.

I really enjoyed the chapter about the roots of Jamaican music and how it has influenced British music, although I think the author is a bit unfair on Dancehall music, accusing it of diluting the original Jamaican sound.

What the author does really well in this book is to demonstrate the uneasy but intertwined relationship that different constituent parts have in Jamaica; how violence and music seem to go hand-in-hand. He gets across to the reader how much of the Jamaican people have resigned themselves to coping with the tensions of the island and that the situation is unlikely to change until the political mess is cleared up.

The accounts are superbly written, and the author paints a vivid picture of Jamaica, and you can almost hear the Jamaican creole when you read the paragraphs of speech by Jamaican locals.

Exceptionally good book! If you are visiting Jamaica at any time, don't buy one of those country guide books. Read this book instead!