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Peter Abrahams: Humble, humorous, brilliant, witty .even at 90
KIMONE THOMPSON, Observer senior reporter thompsonk@jamaicaobserver.com
Monday, March 23, 2009
You may not know Peter Abrahams in person and you may be too young to remember his radio commentaries back in the 1970s, but once you cross the sylvan threshold at Coyaba, the pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place, at least a little bit.
An animated Peter Abrahams at his residence in the hills of Rock Hall last Thursday.
The intertwined worlds of the writer and the painter are the first things that greet you. Then it's the marriage of the old and the new, the antique and the technologically advanced, and finally, the hilltop view. It's only a glimpse, but it's an introduction to the man, the legend, Peter Abrahams.
That introduction deepens somewhat when you take a closer look. Large, colourful canvasses, mostly done by Daphne, Peter's wife of more than 50 years, hang from the walls and spill over onto the room dividers.
Black and white family photos also decorate the walls of Coyaba's living area, and greeting cards (plus a magazine clipping of US president Barack Obama) stand prominently in one corner.
Veteran broadcaster Fae Ellington (centre) with Peter and Daphne Abrahams at Coyaba last Thursday.
Added to this are numerous copies of literary, political, leisure and other types of works stacked atop each other on small tables or lined against shelves, and the ping pong table piled high with copies of the country's two national dailies.
All this complimented by relics of a Jamaica past - a coal iron and outdated kerosene oil lanterns.
That was the scene last Thursday of an intimate celebration of Abrahams' 90th birthday. A small group of friends and professional acquaintances, including South African High Commissioner to Jamaica Faith Doreen Radebe, journalists from the RJR Communications Group where Abrahams plied one of his two trades, and personnel from Ian Randle Publishers, gathered to pay tribute to the accomplished author and journalist who has called Jamaica home since the mid-1950s.
"In my early years at the RJR News Centre, fresh out of school and everything, I remember seeing this man - Peter Abrahams - coming up the stairs on his way to the newsroom and everyone would be in awe of him. We were even afraid because 'this is Peter Abrahams and he's going to be doing a recording for news commentary'," reflected RJR's Kathy Barrett.
South African High Commissioner to Jamaica Faith Radebe with Peter Abrahams at his house last Thursday. (Photos: Matshidiso Raphadu)
"I'm not too sure how it evolved, but we just had this friendship and we were always talking and I'd look through his commentaries and it has constantly been there. We reacquainted ourselves fairly recently but because of the early interaction and his willingness to sit down and talk with you regardless of where you were in the field of journalism, regardless of who you were, that made such an early impact on my days as a journalist," she continued, pointing out Abraham's emphasis on perfection.
From across the table, in almost inaudible tones, Abrahams replied: "You continue it."
Editorial assistant at Ian Randle, Latoya West had apparently picked up on the author's tendency to shun fanfare and limelight when she said, "I know you don't think of yourself as a celebrity, but you are important to us."Maybe it was the way he kept insisting "I'm not making a speech" or maybe it was when he blurted out in the middle of a tribute, "I'm not bawling. I did cataract surgery on the eyes, that's why they get watery. They are just washing themselves. I'm not bawling".
Whatever it was, you did get the impression that the South African-born Abrahams, with strong pan-Africanist beliefs, is as humble as he is humorous, brilliant and witty, even at 90.
"It's a blessing to have you here, sharp as ever, engaging us, challenging us to think and to carry on the struggle until one of these days, maybe 2075, we will be free and Africa will take its place among the world powers," added West.
For her contribution, High Commissioner Radebe presented Abrahams with a framed token of traditional South African craft - braided and coiled straw encircled by intricate configurations of coloured beads.
"You are an icon to the South African people [and] an icon to Jamaica," said the diplomat. "They have spoken so well about you that I am proud to be South African.
Your history shows us you are full of knowledge and what we can draw out from you. This little token is one thing we want you to remember about South Africa. It is in recognition of what you have done and what you are still are going to do."
As soon as he peeled back the red and silver wrapping hiding the gift, Abrahams exclaimed: "Oh, bless you! Oh, bless you!"
"I'm glad you're doing this before I'm dead and I do appreciate it," he said, before asking his wife to "find a good place" to display the art.
Television Jamaica's chief executive officer, Kay Osbourne was also present at Coyaba on Thursday.
"I've been Peter's mentee for more than 30 years," she said. "The thing about your commentaries was that you had to stop, regardless of the noise around you. You stopped because you had to listen so you could hear what Peter was saying because what he was saying was important. You would not listen to him while doing other things at the same time."
"You had to," added veteran broadcaster Fae Ellington.
"The thing I remember, said Earl Moxam, who met Abrahams at RJR in 1992, "is he always typed his commentary on two single sheets of letter-sized paper and he never went over the two pages by even one word. Always on two sheets of paper, and I think you always did the commentary in one take."
On becoming a nanogenarian, Abrahams says: "I didn't expect it. The odds were against it. I could have been killed in the East African war; I could have been killed in the Second World War or on one of the assignments."
"You have to move a little slower, you can't run down the hill anymore, I can't do a lot of things I used to do, I have stopped driving, but I don't feel any way," he said.
Abrahams' career in the fields of writing and journalism has spanned well over 50 years and includes more than a dozen books and countless articles in British, United States and Jamaican newspapers such as the Daily Worker, the New York Herald Tribune and the West Indian Economist.
His books include:
Dark Testament (Allen&Unwin, 1942);
Song of the City (1945);
Mine Boy (Crisp, 1946);
The Path of Thunder (Harper, 1948);
Wild Conquest (Harper, 1950);
Return to Goli (Faber&Faber, 1953);
Tell Freedom: Memories of Africa (Knopf, 1954);
A Wreath for Udomo (Knopf, 1956);
Jamaica: An Island Mosaic
(Indian Univ. Press, 1957);
This Island Now (Faber&Faber, 1966);
The View from Coyaba (Faber&Faber, 1985); and The Coyaba Chronicles: The Black experience in the 20th Century (Ian Randle, 2000).
KIMONE THOMPSON, Observer senior reporter thompsonk@jamaicaobserver.com
Monday, March 23, 2009
You may not know Peter Abrahams in person and you may be too young to remember his radio commentaries back in the 1970s, but once you cross the sylvan threshold at Coyaba, the pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place, at least a little bit.
An animated Peter Abrahams at his residence in the hills of Rock Hall last Thursday.The intertwined worlds of the writer and the painter are the first things that greet you. Then it's the marriage of the old and the new, the antique and the technologically advanced, and finally, the hilltop view. It's only a glimpse, but it's an introduction to the man, the legend, Peter Abrahams.
That introduction deepens somewhat when you take a closer look. Large, colourful canvasses, mostly done by Daphne, Peter's wife of more than 50 years, hang from the walls and spill over onto the room dividers.
Black and white family photos also decorate the walls of Coyaba's living area, and greeting cards (plus a magazine clipping of US president Barack Obama) stand prominently in one corner.
Veteran broadcaster Fae Ellington (centre) with Peter and Daphne Abrahams at Coyaba last Thursday.Added to this are numerous copies of literary, political, leisure and other types of works stacked atop each other on small tables or lined against shelves, and the ping pong table piled high with copies of the country's two national dailies.
All this complimented by relics of a Jamaica past - a coal iron and outdated kerosene oil lanterns.
That was the scene last Thursday of an intimate celebration of Abrahams' 90th birthday. A small group of friends and professional acquaintances, including South African High Commissioner to Jamaica Faith Doreen Radebe, journalists from the RJR Communications Group where Abrahams plied one of his two trades, and personnel from Ian Randle Publishers, gathered to pay tribute to the accomplished author and journalist who has called Jamaica home since the mid-1950s.
"In my early years at the RJR News Centre, fresh out of school and everything, I remember seeing this man - Peter Abrahams - coming up the stairs on his way to the newsroom and everyone would be in awe of him. We were even afraid because 'this is Peter Abrahams and he's going to be doing a recording for news commentary'," reflected RJR's Kathy Barrett.
South African High Commissioner to Jamaica Faith Radebe with Peter Abrahams at his house last Thursday. (Photos: Matshidiso Raphadu)"I'm not too sure how it evolved, but we just had this friendship and we were always talking and I'd look through his commentaries and it has constantly been there. We reacquainted ourselves fairly recently but because of the early interaction and his willingness to sit down and talk with you regardless of where you were in the field of journalism, regardless of who you were, that made such an early impact on my days as a journalist," she continued, pointing out Abraham's emphasis on perfection.
From across the table, in almost inaudible tones, Abrahams replied: "You continue it."
Editorial assistant at Ian Randle, Latoya West had apparently picked up on the author's tendency to shun fanfare and limelight when she said, "I know you don't think of yourself as a celebrity, but you are important to us."Maybe it was the way he kept insisting "I'm not making a speech" or maybe it was when he blurted out in the middle of a tribute, "I'm not bawling. I did cataract surgery on the eyes, that's why they get watery. They are just washing themselves. I'm not bawling".
Whatever it was, you did get the impression that the South African-born Abrahams, with strong pan-Africanist beliefs, is as humble as he is humorous, brilliant and witty, even at 90.
"It's a blessing to have you here, sharp as ever, engaging us, challenging us to think and to carry on the struggle until one of these days, maybe 2075, we will be free and Africa will take its place among the world powers," added West.
For her contribution, High Commissioner Radebe presented Abrahams with a framed token of traditional South African craft - braided and coiled straw encircled by intricate configurations of coloured beads.
"You are an icon to the South African people [and] an icon to Jamaica," said the diplomat. "They have spoken so well about you that I am proud to be South African.
Your history shows us you are full of knowledge and what we can draw out from you. This little token is one thing we want you to remember about South Africa. It is in recognition of what you have done and what you are still are going to do."
As soon as he peeled back the red and silver wrapping hiding the gift, Abrahams exclaimed: "Oh, bless you! Oh, bless you!"
"I'm glad you're doing this before I'm dead and I do appreciate it," he said, before asking his wife to "find a good place" to display the art.
Television Jamaica's chief executive officer, Kay Osbourne was also present at Coyaba on Thursday.
"I've been Peter's mentee for more than 30 years," she said. "The thing about your commentaries was that you had to stop, regardless of the noise around you. You stopped because you had to listen so you could hear what Peter was saying because what he was saying was important. You would not listen to him while doing other things at the same time."
"You had to," added veteran broadcaster Fae Ellington.
"The thing I remember, said Earl Moxam, who met Abrahams at RJR in 1992, "is he always typed his commentary on two single sheets of letter-sized paper and he never went over the two pages by even one word. Always on two sheets of paper, and I think you always did the commentary in one take."
On becoming a nanogenarian, Abrahams says: "I didn't expect it. The odds were against it. I could have been killed in the East African war; I could have been killed in the Second World War or on one of the assignments."
"You have to move a little slower, you can't run down the hill anymore, I can't do a lot of things I used to do, I have stopped driving, but I don't feel any way," he said.
Abrahams' career in the fields of writing and journalism has spanned well over 50 years and includes more than a dozen books and countless articles in British, United States and Jamaican newspapers such as the Daily Worker, the New York Herald Tribune and the West Indian Economist.
His books include:
Dark Testament (Allen&Unwin, 1942);
Song of the City (1945);
Mine Boy (Crisp, 1946);
The Path of Thunder (Harper, 1948);
Wild Conquest (Harper, 1950);
Return to Goli (Faber&Faber, 1953);
Tell Freedom: Memories of Africa (Knopf, 1954);
A Wreath for Udomo (Knopf, 1956);
Jamaica: An Island Mosaic
(Indian Univ. Press, 1957);
This Island Now (Faber&Faber, 1966);
The View from Coyaba (Faber&Faber, 1985); and The Coyaba Chronicles: The Black experience in the 20th Century (Ian Randle, 2000).
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