The BBC’s excellent arts magazine radio program The Strand invited several writers and poets to compose “open letters” to Barack Obama on the occasion of his inauguration.
The two that most impressed and moved me were those by journalist, author, broadcaster Aminatta Forna, and Nobel Laureate poet Derek Walcott.
The Devil that Danced on the Water, Ms. Forna’s masterpiece of memoir cum history cum reportage, is riveting while you read it and haunting long after you’ve finished. Three days after the election, POTUSE Obama was photographed carrying a copy of Derek Walcott’s collected poems.
All the “Open letters to a new president” may be heard here.