Afterword: The Journal of Commonwealth Literature, postcolonial studies, and the provinces

This Afterword to the 50th anniversary issue of The Journal of Commonwealth Literature reflects on the journal’s establishment in Leeds, and the broader place that provincial regions played in generating interest in postcolonial and Commonwealth literatures. Drawing on archival research, it seeks to explore how the shifts in attitudes towards class and race in post-war Britain can be read as contributing to a dissent from a metropolitan literary establishment.