The new edition of C.L.R. James’ The Life of Captain Cipriani, reprinted with the pamphlet it was later abridged to, The Case for West Indian Self-Government, brings crucial, if now little-known, texts for Caribbean nationalist movements back into print. By providing both texts in one slim volume, this book offers a rare glimpse of both history and a historian in the making.
Brereton fills in the background of this “first effort to analyse history and politics through biography” (2) by offering a “political biography” of her own. James was born in 1901 in a lower-middle-class black Trinidadian family of Barbadian origin, studied at a prestigious school from 1911 till 1918, and taught until he left for London in 1932. By the 1920s, Brereton notes, James admired Cipriani as a leader of the pro-labour and anti-colonial movement. He likely wrote the first text between 1929 and 1931 in Trinidad, following extensive consultation and interviews with Cipriani, before setting out for England. He abridged the text on the advice of Leonard Woolf, to publish it as a pamphlet with Hogarth Press, London, in 1933. Brereton summarizes some of the reactions to the texts in her introduction—while West Indian dailies were largely welcoming, James’ friends and other reviewers were critical of this hagiographical account of Cipriani’s life, its erasure of the Indo-Trinidadian population and the disjointed nature of a text that strings together anti-racist arguments with large block quotes from government documents.
James’ texts may still be productively read as an anti-colonial account with a micro-historical bent, as opening a window on the limitations of colonial rule through the political career of one man. Emerging from an incipient nationalism that does not draw on an imagined glorious past for its constitutive elements, this text is involved in the creative and arduous task of crafting a nation from whole cloth. James weaves together three argumentative strands throughout the texts—first, he establishes colonial rule as detrimental to governance, by showing how white colonial, creole, and black subjects were constrained by this structure. Second, he shows that black subjects were capable of governing themselves through the labour movement. Thereby, he establishes his third claim of the irrevocable modernity of the black subjects deemed “savage” by racist colonials. These strands are loosely held together through the life of Cipriani, who entered politics relatively late, after seeing the discrimination the Trinidad regiment was subject to during World War I, and then proceeded to lead the Trinidad Workingmen’s Association and hold the post of Mayor of Port of Spain, Trinidad’s capital city.
In the first section of the texts, James offers a rare reversal of the anthropological gaze, subjecting a colonizing power to a critical racialized gaze. The anti-colonial intention of this perspective turns our attention to the racialized groups’ location within the social structure, rather than physical or cultural attributes, and the perceived psychological impact of this location. Citing several “advocates of negro inferiority and the necessity for trusteeship” (51), James points out that the professions are mostly filled with men of colour though white men continue to hold the superior positions. The gradations of colour, once created by coercive relations between masters and slaves, now prevent combination in a setting where the social hierarchy is based on colour. The abridged pamphlet likewise begins with an account of the racial groups but starts with the racist allegations against black people. This inversion of the order of description in the biography suggests that James was writing to a different audience through the pamphlet printed in London—one that might come with some of the prejudices he laid out early in the chapter. He seems to be leading them to see the absurdity of their position, before pointing out the incompatibility of these racist allegations with British claims to liberality.
After the account of social groups, James turns to Cipriani’s life in the first text as exceptionally devoted to the emancipation of the West Indies. Cipriani was born in 1875 into a wealthy and influential family of Corsican descent. He lost his parents while young and, for 20 years, took care of estates and racing horses until the war broke out in 1914. During his struggles for the right of Trinidadians to enlist, then over the manner his regiment was treated, he became increasingly unhappy with how “unhappy European exiles” were chosen over “efficient colonials” (68). Cipriani returned in 1919 to take over as the president of the Trinidad Workingmen’s Association. This formerly defunct but now revived body had shown much progress in the 13 years since resuscitation. James shows how the Association served to shorten working hours, establish a Compensation Law for injuries and deaths and was working toward forming Trade Unions and self-government. James shows the excessive ongoing effort required to push an inert local colonial government to act—to explain, in admittedly tedious detail, the extensive discussion and lobbying during Cipriani’s tenures as president of the Association and as Mayor of Trinidad’s capital city, Port of Spain. In the debate around the introduction of divorce legislation, James sees more proof of government incompetence and does not spend much time on the “many violent … foolish things” (148) he acknowledges Cipriani said. By arguing that the ability to participate in the democratic process is already indicated by the labour movement, he shifts the ability to govern from a racial characteristic to the social one of being in touch with the people, rather than shunning them as abhorrently Other.
The Life carries an intimate air of having been written for an audience familiar with the story being told. The asides, the air of explaining the familiar, the thoughts that trail off, the feel of a dossier that is bringing some additional documents to an ongoing tale, all suggest that this was written for Trinidadians or at least a sympathetic audience. All these, of course, could also indicate that the author was a novice. Furthering this effect is the final chapter of Life briefly describing, almost as an afterthought, the physique and demeanour of the man for those who might not know him.
Aspiring writers and historians who have been moved by Black Jacobins can find hope for their own endeavours in this flawed but crucial first work. The grand historical vision that informs James’ best-known work—rendering the Haitian revolution as an aspect of the nearly contemporaneous French revolution, while paying close attention to the minutiae of wartime endeavours and governance, with political leaders as fallible humans involved in a grand political project—is foreshadowed in these texts in significant ways. Cipriani continues to be held in high esteem in popular historiography, though Brereton and other historians are less convinced of his significance. James himself believed that the Life had “done its work” of preparing “the way for the successful achievement of self-government in the West Indies” (18-19). It remains of significance for the study of anti-colonial movements and the history of democracy.
