Carl Ruthven Offord, novelist, short-story writer, and newspaper editor and publisher, is best known in the literary world for his existential treatment of the problems southern blacks faced when the migrated north and for his fictional treatment of Fascist activities in Harlem during World War II.

Born in Trinidad, West Indies, on 10 April 1910 to upper middle-class parents, Offord was one of five children. His father, George Offord, a machinist, was from a family of talented engineers. His socialite mother, Ottie Simmonds Offord, died while her children were still young. The family was separated, and Carl lived with his paternal grandmother, while George Offord migrated to the United States.

Without either parent's direct supervision Offord was at the mercy of a grandmother who made her disapproval of his late mother apparent. Her attitude did not encourage him to stay in school, and he left at age eleven. Even then...