Throughout his career, Caryl Phillips has searched out the migrant figure who, when subjected to the mechanics of difference, faces isolation, rejection and even explicit hostility. In this way, Phillips has anticipated the numerous troubling aspects of global politics in the twenty-first century: the hardening of borders due to fundamentalist ideologies, the divisive tactics of terror and fear, and the tensions between the West and its new “others.”
Phillips has also anticipated newly articulated theories about cosmopolitanism from writers like Appiah who has argued that difference has been overplayed in recent decades and that global obligations must be given the same consideration as affiliations of blood. Phillips’ writings come close to advocating Appiah’s recommendation of universalism with difference, though Phillips’ universalism is of a different sort. The form of Phillips’ works, where he juxtaposes multiple stories from different times and places, suggests parallels and interconnections between various forms of oppression even as it absolutely insists upon the uniqueness of each individual story. In continually exploring links across time and space, Phillips pieces together an understanding of the workings of discrimination and potentially sheds light on the causes of the religious intolerance being acted upon today.
The paper explores the consistent and prophetic nature of Phillips’ vision by looking at the experiences of migrant characters in his various writings and by considering how their stories speak to larger issues of freedom and rights by being embedded in works that contain disparate but connected narratives.