Brother Man

It's interesting to read Brother Man today, when Rastas and things Rastafarian have acquired such cultural charisma that their image, carried abroad by stars such as Bob Marley and other dreadlocked musicians, is now routinely used to advertise Jamaica as a tourist destination. Brother Man — recently reissued by Macmillan (the original publishers of many of Mais's books) to mark its 50th anniversary — was the first Jamaican novel to portray a Rastafarian protagonist in positive terms. Writing in the early 1950s, a mere 50 years ago, Roger Mais captured the way Rastas were viewed then:

The leading newspapers played up the angle that a community of bearded men in their midst, formed together into a secret cult, was a menace to public safety.

People began writing letters to the press. All bearded men should be placed behind barbed wire. They should be publicly washed (?) and shaved! They should be banished to Africa. They should be sterilised.