Laureates of the Caribbean

Laureates Of the Caribbean is a foot-stomping, hand-clapping, finger-snapping inducing gayelle where poetry is the bois. It is the festival's highest commendation to our storytellers who weave words in metaphor and feeling into stanza. Laureates of the Caribbean is the lion who does not roar in pentameter; is how we make love with words, is how we fight when the weapons of our warfare are the one-drop and dubstep…is the peculiar kinda way we twist our pain into a passionate lyrical dance to a song that plays to the rhythm that beats in a Caribbean heart only. 

As the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival’s only ode to the oral tradition of the Caribbean, this year at Festival 5 we are shaking the four corners of Caribbean civilization to bring the best poets of our time to Brooklyn in a unique blend of verse, music, poetry and spoken word.

The BCLF is a celebration of culture as expressed through the pen of the storyteller and the voice of the poet. It is a platform designed to support and facilitate vibrant conversations about Caribbean identity via a series of readings of classic and contemporary stories, workshops, events, and talks through an annual capstone festival and a developing plan for year-long programming. 

IT IS FREE, AND OPEN TO ALL MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC.