A Small Place

The first section of the text introduces a main symbol—the library—and a key motif—Antigua’s natural beauty. Kincaid describes the library as “one of those splendid old buildings from colonial times” (9). She has a love-hate relationship with the building because of its connection to colonialism but recognizes it as one of the island’s few houses of education. As the school looks like “some latrines for people just passing by” (7), the library also being in disrepair leaves Antiguans with few options for good education. The library and its sign promising repairs represent the ruins of colonialism that Antiguans have been left to deal with. Kincaid invokes Antigua’s natural beauty here and throughout the text as a device to explore how the harsh reality of life in Antigua is often hidden. Here, the tourist exploits Antigua primarily for its weather and scenery, an act which introduces the theme of Tourism as Neocolonialism. In comparison to the damp and dreary weather of England or North America, the island where “the sun always shines and where the climate is deliciously hot and dry” (4) seems like a paradise. However, Kincaid argues that tourists only superficially interact with this landscape “for the four to ten days [they] are going to be staying there” (4), which prevents them from seeing how such conditions could cause long-term issues of drought and famine for the locals who must always live here. Tourists focus only on their interactions with the island, making the lived experiences of Antiguans invisible.

Kincaid focuses in on the pitfalls of tourism from the very first page. Tourists in Antigua are usually white, either from North America “or, worse, Europe” (4). Kincaid describes the “ugly” kind of pleasure these tourists take in seeing the comparative poverty and “backwardness” of ex-colonial nations. She explains that this twisted pleasure comes from a secret relief that “their ancestors were not clever in the way yours were” (17), a relief that the tourist is from the nation of conquerors and not that of the conquered. She notes that tourists sometimes feel that their vacations contribute to the continued exploitation of nations like Antigua, but they won’t let these feelings “develop into full-fledged unease” (10) because their self-interest in having fun is stronger. Neocolonialism is the use of economic, cultural, or political pressures and systems to continue to control ex-colonies. Kincaid shows that tourism, therefore, as an economic industry Antigua depends on, continues to control Antiguan life by catering to white visitors.

Kincaid reveals that the history of slavery is purposely hidden in Western education and contemporary literature in order to absolve the West of any wrongdoing. She imagines a book of economics that a tourist might read to exemplify her argument. In such books, Western economic development stems from “the ingenuity of small shopkeepers in Sheffield and Yorkshire” (10) and from the invention of the watch, when Kincaid knows that the use of unpaid slave labor is really what “made you bastards rich” (9). Kincaid illustrates how unfair it is that modern English citizens can easily distance themselves from slavery by claiming non-participation, but ex-slave nations like Antigua are reminded of slavery almost every day. Coupled with the lack of acknowledgement for enslaved peoples’ contributions to the West’s growth, Kincaid feels that her people have been almost entirely erased from history. She’s angry that only the freed slave nations have to live with the legacy of slavery, while the enslavers can ignore the problems they caused and claim “they are not responsible” (10) for the actions of their ancestors.

Kincaid briefly touches on the theme of Corruption of Power and Wealth in this section, which she elaborates on in later pages. Emblematic of this corruption are the shockingly expensive cars and houses of those in control of wealth, amid the relative poverty of the common local dwellings. Notorious people with ill-gotten wealth, like a drug dealer and minister’s girlfriend, flaunt their lavish lifestyles in mansions that have “more aerials and antennas attached to [them] than you will see even at the American Embassy” (11). As these people are connected to government ministers or bring money into Antigua, the government doesn’t restrict or arrest them. The expensive Japanese cars that almost everyone drives result from an import monopoly and are so widely used because “the two main car dealerships in Antigua are owned in part or outright by ministers in government” (7). Kincaid derides how the government makes loans more available for cars than for houses because the car industry makes the ministers more money. These examples display how the hoarding of power and wealth leads the ministers to think of themselves first and the needs of the Antiguan people second.

Kincaid illustrates the tourist identity in this section, exploring the purposeful ignorance many visitors uphold while visiting nations like Antigua. Tourists don’t see Antigua as it really is because they refuse to interrogate the uncomfortable aspects of Antiguan reality. Instead of being curious about the poverty they see in Antigua, Kincaid believes, tourists are so focused on themselves and their own pleasure that sights like the damaged library “would not really stir up these thoughts” (7) of inquiry. Taken to the extreme, Kincaid shows that tourists don’t even see Antiguans at all; they see only themselves and “people like [them]” (13)—that is, white people—enjoying what the island has to offer. A tourist who does interact with the local people become “an ugly, empty thing, a stupid thing, a piece of rubbish” (17)—a description Kincaid repeats throughout the text. The tourist becomes a voyeur, an observer of the destitute lives of Antiguans. Tourists have the power and ability to leave the conditions that Antiguans are stuck in, and they can even take pleasure in “visiting heaps of death and ruin” because it makes them “[feel] alive and inspired” (16). Kincaid believes that tourists can be nice people in their own countries, but as soon as they decide to seek enjoyment in the ruined lives of others across the globe, they become detestable.

Kincaid uses several stylistic devices at the beginning of the text and continues to use them throughout the rest of the work. The first is her use of both first- and second-person narration. She employs first person to talk about her own experiences and the common experiences of her fellow Antiguans, using the first-person plural (“we”). She uses the second person (“you”) to both describe a kind of person—the tourist—and to implicate the reader as this kind of person or as having the potential to be this person when they travel. Kincaid places the reader in the position of someone she overtly dislikes, creating feelings of discomfort and responsibility. As the tourist is usually ignorant, the use of “you” forces the reader to acknowledge the realities that a regular tourist wouldn’t. In addition, Kincaid uses parallelism to emphasize her arguments. In this section, she uses parallelism in the repetition of “you see yourself” (13) and “you must not wonder” (13-14), which underscores her theory that tourists are self-centered and uninquisitive. Repetition of such phrases with slight changes creates memorable and impactful passages. Her tone throughout this section is accusative, angry, and sometimes sarcastic toward the feelings of tourists. Her anger underscores most of the text and is what compels her to write about the condition of natives’ lives in Antigua.