A. L. Hendriks

Arthur Lemiere Hendriks was a Jamaican poet, writer, and broadcasting director (known as Micky Hendriks in his broadcasting career). He was born in 1922 in Kingston, Jamaica, to a Jamaican father and a French mother. He was father to five daughters and two sons. Mr. Hendriks died in 1992 at the age of 69.

Hendriks was educated at Jamaica College and briefly at Ottershaw College, Surrey and wrote poetry. He was particularly well known for his contributions to the Christian Science Monitor, The Daily Gleaner, and BIM (Barbadian Literary Magazine). He also contributed as a columnist and literary critic to the Daily Gleaner. After working as General Manager of the Jamaica Broadcasting Company he became a television director in London. He became a freelance writer in 1971. His early collections of verse, which include On This Mountain (1965) and These Green Islands (1971), made use of rigorously economical forms to frame their imaginative commentaries on a wide range of personal and social concerns. The long title sequence of The Islanders (1983), a vivid evocation of the human and natural aspects of the Caribbean, marked the emergence of more musically flexible modes of verse. His principal subsequent collections are The Naked Ghost (1984) and To Speak Simply (1988), a selected edition of his poetry containing much previously uncollected material. Much of his best work from the early 1980s onward achieves striking dramatic effectiveness through his accomplished use of Jamaican patois. Among his other publications is the historical survey Great Families of Jamaica (1984).

Read more: A. L. Hendriks (Arthur Lemière Hendriks) Biography - (1922– ), (Arthur Lemière Hendriks), On This Mountain, These Green Islands, The Islanders, The Naked Ghost - JRank Articles http://www.jrank.org/literature/pages/4362/A-L-Hendriks-(Arthur-Lemi%C3%A8re-Hendriks).html#ixzz1cCaJR2yh He entered broadcasting when he became Director of Caribbean Broadcasting in Barbados, Thompson Television in London and Trinidad and Tobago Television. In 1965, he was working as General Manager and Consultant to the Jamaican Broadcasting Company.He wrote the poem 'The Baptist' which was published in Bite In 2 by Cecil Gray.

Works

• These Green Islands, and Other Poems (Bolivar Press, 1971)
• To Speak Simply: Selected Poems 1961-1986 (Hippopotamus Press, 1988)
• On this mountain: and Other Poems (Deutsch, 1965)
• Check (Headland Publications, 1988 - compilation with Harris and Hendricks)
• Naked Ghost and Other Poems (Outposts Pubns., 1984)
• The Islanders, and Other Poems (Savacou Co-operative, 1983)
• Muet (Outposts Pubns., 1971)
• Madonna of the Unknown Nation (Workshop P, N4, 1974)
• Great Families of Jamaica (1984)