Paule Marshall explores the multidimensional experiences of West Indian-Americans in finely crafted fiction that has, since 1950, deepened in complexity and meaning. Her three novels form a unique contribution to Afro-American literature because they capture in a lyrical, powerful language a culturally distinct and expansive world. Her work, just as she has claimed, "stands as testimony to the rich legacy of language and culture" passed on in "the wordshop of the kitchen" by the women in her immigrant community.

Born in Brooklyn to Samuel and Ada Burke, who emigrated from Barbados shortly after World War I, Marshall grew up in a culture with firm roots in the Caribbean. Precisely because of the interaction between Barbadian and American culture in her community, she developed at an impressionable age a sense of ritual, of shapes and forms of culture; moreover, she acquired an appreciation for the Caribbean, especially Barbados, which she...