John Hearne belongs to the generation of Jamaican novelists who produced a substantial body of their work in the 1950s. With five novels published between 1955 and 1961, and his last one to date (The Sure Salvation) in 1981, Hearne's position among Caribbean writers seems secure, even if certain critics attribute to him a peculiar place somewhat outside mainstream Jamaican writing.

John E. C. Hearne was born on 4 February 1926 in Montreal, Canada, to Jamaican parents (Maurice V. and Doris May Hearne), who returned with him to Jamaica two years after his birth. He lived in Jamaica until age seventeen and attended Jamaica College. During World War II he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force, a venture about which he is reluctant to talk. On 3 September 1947 he married Joyce Veitch; they were later divorced. The studies in education he undertook at the University of Edinburgh (1947-1949) and London University (1949-1950) marked him...