Martin Carter Biography

Martin Wylde Carter (7 June 1927 – 13 December 1997) was a Guyanese poet and political activist. Widely regarded as the greatest Guyanese poet, and one of the most important poets of the Caribbean region, Carter is best known for his poems of protest, resistance and revolution. Carter played an active role in Guyanese politics, particularly in the years leading up Independence in 1966 and those following immediately after. He was famously imprisoned by the British government in Guyana (then British Guiana) in October 1953 under allegations of "spreading dissension", and again in June 1954 for taking part in a PPP procession. Shortly after being released from prison the first time, Carter published his most well-known poetry collection, Poems of Resistance from British Guiana (1954).