The Literary Page
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The Literary Page is being established to celebrate, encourage, and promote literature, storytelling, poetry, biography, and the written word in all its forms. It will be headed by a Literary Specialist who will guide the development of this section and help shape its future direction. At this stage, we are placing the page on the website to indicate our intentions and our commitment to making literature an important part of the work of FIPA Global. Additional content, features, and opportunities for participation will be introduced as the page develops.
We believe that literature plays a vital role in society because it helps us understand ourselves, our communities, and the wider world. Through stories, essays, biographies, poetry, and other forms of writing, people are exposed to new ideas, cultures, experiences, and ways of thinking. Literature encourages reflection, imagination, empathy, communication, and critical thinking—qualities that are essential for personal growth, informed citizenship, and effective leadership. By creating a dedicated Literary Page, FIPA Global hopes to support writers, readers, and lovers of literature while contributing to a richer intellectual and cultural life.
Why FIPA Global publishes The Value of a Scar
FIPA Global believes that ideas do not live only in classrooms, seminars and policy discussions. They live in families, workplaces, communities—and in stories.
Fiction gives us a different way of thinking about the choices people make, the assumptions they carry, the mistakes they make and the values they pass from one generation to another. The Value of a Scar does this through the ordinary life of a Caribbean family: a father and son, a marriage, an extended family, two very different dogs, and the small decisions that sometimes reveal much larger truths.
As an illustrated Caribbean novelette, it also reflects FIPA Global's commitment to encouraging Caribbean voices and creating work that can travel beyond the region while remaining recognisably rooted in it.
We publish The Value of a Scar because thoughtful stories can do something that instruction alone cannot: invite readers to enter another person's world, make their own judgments, and perhaps leave seeing something differently.
The Value of a Scar
by B. C. Calder
Two dogs, one broken promise, and a family learning that the scar is part of the structure.
Douglas gave up teaching Shakespeare to sell roof bolts and real estate, and his father has never let him forget it. Now money is tight, and the new phone he promised his twelve-year-old son Nigel isn't coming. In the house there's a sulking boy, a pregnant wife with a quiet way of winning every argument, and a well-meaning family full of opinions. In the yard there are two dogs: Czar, the handsome Rottweiler everyone admires, and Zed, the scarred, flat-headed shelter dog nobody wanted.
Over one Kingston summer, a broken promise becomes a series of small, surprising lessons. They come from a grandmother's greasy pot, a stranger who sees beauty where others see damage, and a dog who refuses to be anything but himself.
Warm, wry, and beautifully illustrated, The Value of a Scar is a Caribbean story about fatherhood, family, pride and the worth of imperfect things. It's the first in a new series following this family through the years.
Why FIPA Global publishes this story:
Good judgment isn't only learned in seminars and policy rooms. It's practised at kitchen tables, in small businesses, and in the conversations families find hardest to have. The Value of a Scar is everyday critical thinking in story form, and FIPA Global is proud to bring it to readers across the Caribbean and its diaspora.
An image of Marcia and Douglas, a married couple
The story continues...
The Value of a Scar introduces a family whose story is only beginning.
Future stories move beyond Douglas's household into other homes, relationships and workplaces—and across the Caribbean, including the country where Douglas's Trinidadian mother was born.
The years bring new characters and new complications: romance and mystery; workplace dilemmas; the sometimes astonishing decisions and antics of a thoroughly spoilt adult man; and a bright teenage girl who is increasingly convinced that the world she will inherit will be very different from the one her parents prepared her for.
Some familiar characters grow older. Children become teenagers. Relationships change. New households open their doors. And, as in real life, people occasionally surprise us by becoming better—or considerably worse—than we expected.
At its heart, the series is about people: how they think, what they value, the choices they make, and what happens when different generations, personalities and ideas about life collide.
Board of Advisors Member Dr. Joanne Collins-Gonsalves receives astonishing News about her Book
Dr. Joanne Collins-Gonzales has received happy news. Her book on Iris de Freitas Brazao, has been featured by the University of London as one of the 'three fascinating items from the collection of 312,000 volumes within the holdings of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (IALS) Library. The book was showcased across the University of London Senate House Library's major social media pages on June 26, 2024. The book was highlighted as part of a series of events to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the School of Advanced Study which was formed in 1994.
Article: From UWI Today, May 26, 2026
