Dear Editor,

As the Naipaul furor threatens to reach an almost puerile level, please indulge me a short reply to Mr. Ravi Dev.

1. My letter [ please note: links provided by LOSP web site ] did not demean Naipaul's work, and whether one agrees with it or not, the letter by Abu Bakr was a cleverly constructed critique.

2.My letter was essentially making the point that most of the animosity directed at Naipaul is propelled by the caustic and demeaning statements he makes, many of them outside of his books. For his adherents not to see it that way suggests myopia of some sort.

3. Mr. Dev is clearly misinformed as to what I have produced in my musical career (Big Bamboo and Bongo Man are not my genre) in that I have done precisely what he says Naipaul proposes for creating our own culture. In such songs as "Hooper and Chanderpaul", "Is We Own", "Civilisation", "Sink the Schooner", "Play De Ting", "Cocoa Man", etc., I have consciously written from the stance of a Caribbean attempting to forge its own multi faceted culture with no centrist domination. Perhaps, if I had his address, I could send Ravi some CDs so he could hear for himself.