Homecoming

An unforgettable portrait of a generation, which brilliantly illuminates an essential and much-misunderstood chapter of our history.'A remarkable oral history of black postwar British life... Homecoming is an extraordinary and compelling book' Daily TelegraphHomecoming draws on over a hundred first-hand interviews, archival recordings and memoirs by the women and men who came to Britain from the West Indies between the late 1940s and the early 1960s. In their own words, we witness the transition from the optimism of the first post-war arrivals to the race riots of the late 1950s. We hear from nurses in Manchester; bus drivers in Bristol; seamstresses in Birmingham; teachers in Croydon; dockers in Cardiff; inter-racial lovers in High Wycombe, and Carnival Queens in Leeds. These are stories of hope and regret, of triumphs and challenges, brimming with humour, anger and wisdom. Together, they reveal a rich tapestry of Caribbean British lives.Homecoming is an unforgettable portrait of a generation, which brilliantly illuminates an essential and much-misunderstood chapter of our history. A BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week**A Daily Telegraph Book of the Year**

“A remarkable oral history of black postwar British life... Homecoming is an extraordinary and compelling book in which the memories of bus drivers, civil servants, engineers, nurses, RAF and army recruits, teachers, shop stewards and seamstresses jostle with those of journalists, musicians, novelists and poets... The recovered memories in Homecoming are a formidable challenge to those still nostalgic for a lost empire, to all who cling to narrow and parochial definitions of Britishness... The voices in Homecoming sing throughout the book but they also reverberate pain, for so many are recounting stories they do not want to remember.”

A remarkable oral history of black postwar British life… Homecoming is an extraordinary and compelling book in which the memories of bus drivers, civil servants, engineers, nurses, RAF and army recruits, teachers, shop stewards and seamstresses jostle with those of journalists, musicians, novelists and poets... The recovered memories in Homecoming are a formidable challenge to those still nostalgic for a lost empire, to all who cling to narrow and parochial definitions of Britishness... The voices in Homecoming sing throughout the book but they also reverberate pain, for so many are recounting stories they do not want to remember. -- Hazel V Carby Daily Telegraph
Grant is the writer to do justice to [the Windrush Generation’s] lives… he has conducted dozens of interviews, dug into the Mass Observation archives, and combed through semi-forgotten oral histories from the 1960s to produce this anthology of submerged lives that prickles with beautiful, comic and brutal details. Observer
Homecoming by Colin Grant is...by turns sad, painful, warm, revelatory and utterly fascinating. I think we would live in a slightly kinder and better country if everyone read [it]. -- Mark Haddon New Statesman Books of the Year
Drawing on scores of first-hand accounts, Colin Grant offers oral history at its finest. -- Bel Mooney Daily Mail
Hundreds of first hand interviews, archive footage and memoir extracts of the Windrush Generation, beautifully edited into a patchwork quilt of experience and heritage. It's so powerful hearing these voices direct, making for a hopeful and angry, joyful and tear-jerking read. Grazia

Colin Grant is a historian and author of four highly praised books, including Bageye at the Wheel, a memoir about his Jamaican family. He is an Associate Fellow in the Centre for Caribbean Studies, and teaches creative non-fiction writing. He has worked as a BBC radio producer and writes for many publications, including the Guardian, Times Literary Supplement and New York Review of Books.

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