JENNIFER RAHIM (1963-2023) was an award-winning Trinidadian poet, fiction writer, and literary critic. She held a BA (1987) and PhD (1993) in English Literature, and an MA in Theology (2016). After joining the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine in 1997 as a lecturer in the Department of Liberal Arts, she went on to teach a range of courses at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels, including creative writing, literary criticism, and feminist theory. She died unexpectedly in March 2023 in her Island home of Trinidad, leaving behind a substantial body of published work.
Rahim’s six books of poetry include:
• Sanctuaries of Invention (2021)
• Ground Level (2014)
• Redemption Rain (2011)
• Approaching Sabbaths (2009), awarded the 2010 Casa de las Américas Prize
• Between the Fence and the Forest (1999)
• Mothers Are Not the Only Linguists (1992), won the Writers Union of Trinidad & Tobago Writer of the Year Award
Rahim’s poems have appeared in several Caribbean and international journals and anthologies, such as The Caribbean Writer, Small Axe, The Trinidad and Tobago Review, The Graham House Review, The Sisters of Caliban, Crab Orchard Review, and Atlanta Review.
In addition to the previously mentioned awards, Rahim’s other awards include:
• The New Voices Award of Merit (1993) for outstanding contributions to the New Voices journal
• The Gulf Insurance Writers Scholarship (1996) to attend the Caribbean Writers Summer Institute, University of Miami
• The OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature (2018) for her novel Curfew Chronicles.
The revisions of the manuscript of her final novel, Goodbye Bay, was published posthumously by Peepal Tree Press (UK) in July 2023. Her collected poems, containing a substantial amount of recent work, is scheduled for publication in 2024.
See Author's Page at Peepal Tree Press.