(Re)Locating Madness and Prophesy: An Interview with Kei Miller

Abstract

In this interview, Kei Miller explains how madness in Jamaica differs from madness in England and how the figure of the “mad” person in Caribbean literature is usually depicted. He also reveals his motivations for portraying and giving interiority to such persons, including the Rastaman in The Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion (2014) and Adamine in The Last Warner Woman (2010). In the second part of the interview, Miller talks at length about the connection between madness and diaspora. He argues that the immigrant, like the colonizer, tries to change the new landscape into something that resembles “home,” which is “a madness in and of itself.”