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Arthur Lemière Hendriks (1922–1992) was aJamaican poet, writer, and broadcasting director (known asMicky Hendriks in his broadcasting career). He was particularly well known for his contributions toThe Christian Science Monitor,The Daily Gleaner, andBIM. He also contributed as a columnist and literary critic to theDaily Gleaner.
A. L. Hendriks was born in 1922 inKingston, Jamaica, to a Jamaican father and a French mother. Hendriks was educated atJamaica College and briefly at Ottershaw College inSurrey, England. After joining the family business for a few years he enteredbroadcasting in 1950. He became Director of Caribbean Broadcasting inBarbados andTrinidad and Tobago Television. In 1961, he was General Manager of theJamaica Broadcasting Corporation, after which he became a television director inLondon.[citation needed] In the late 1960s he moved toBermuda, where he was resident director of Thomson Television. After this, he settled in England. He became a freelance writer in 1971. He wrote both poems and short stories and traveled widely throughout the Caribbean. The BBC'sCaribbean Voices program featured his work several times.[1]
His early collections of verse, which includeOn This Mountain and Other Poems (1965),Muet - Poems (1971), andThese Green Island and Other Poems (1971), made use of rigorously economical forms to frame their imaginative commentaries on a wide range of personal and social concerns. The long title sequence ofThe Islanders (1983), a vivid evocation of the human and natural aspects of the Caribbean, marked the emergence of more musically flexible modes of verse. His principal subsequent collections areThe Naked Ghost (1984) andTo Speak Simply (1988), a selected edition of his poetry containing much previously uncollected material. Much of his best work from the early 1980s onward achieves striking dramatic effectiveness through his accomplished use ofJamaican patois. His poem "The Baptist" was published inBite In 2 by Cecil Gray. Among his other publications is the historical surveyGreat Families of Jamaica (1984).
He was the father of five daughters and two sons. He died in 1992 at the age of 69. He was married several times.
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