Mark McWatt’s multiple prize-winning work of fiction Suspended Sentences: Fictions of Atonement provides an extremely unique way of handling the issue of Guyanese Independence, which is perhaps the most remarkable direct treatment of such a theme in Guyanese literature since Independence. There are other works which are remarkable manifestations of the independence of Guyanese literature, not least among them being the fictional fabric of the Wilson Harris novel and the poetic genius of Martin Carter, unique for their exceptional originality.
Fifty-one years after Independence, Guyana holds a vaulted place internationally for the assertion of its contemporary literature, remarkable for the size of its population as against other nations. Yet McWatt, who before the publication of Suspended Sentences had advanced prominently as a foremost Guyanese poet, brings a