Seepersad Naipaul was the father of writers V S Naipaul, Shiva Naipaul and Savi Naipaul Akal, and married into the influential Indo-Trinidadian Capildeo family.
14 Facts About Seepersad Naipaul
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Seepersad Naipaul was only allowed to attend elementary school; his brother was sent to work in the cane fields for 8 cents a day, while his sister remained illiterate.
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Seepersad Naipaul's journalism was noted for his acute observations of Trinidadian society and his prose, which "boldly creolised reporting styles and showed his sons the possibilities of combining fiction and non-fiction".
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Seepersad Naipaul's first book, Gurudeva and Other Indian Tales, is a collection of linked comic short stories that was first published in Trinidad and Tobago in 1943.
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The elder Naipaul wanted his son V S Naipaul to try to get his short story collection published in London, hoping any money it earned would help the family escape from poverty in Trinidad.
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Letters from Seepersad Naipaul are featured in Between Father and Son: Family Letters, which collects correspondence between V S Naipaul and his family, dating from around the time Vidia won a scholarship to Oxford University until after the older Naipaul's death.
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Seepersad Naipaul was initially charged with reporting on the lives of the East Indians on the island.
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In one article, written in 1933, Seepersad Naipaul describes a rabies epidemic infecting local animals and the superstitious owners who, rather than vaccinate their animals, sacrifice them to avoid "the wrath of Kali".
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Seepersad Naipaul was reportedly distressed that he had been forced to do something he didn't believe in and, according to his son V S Naipaul and others, this triggered a mental breakdown a few months later.
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On 2 February 1953, after their father had a heart attack, Kamla Seepersad Naipaul wrote to her brother Vidia, who was still in Oxford.
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Seepersad Naipaul demanded that, in order to save their father's life and the lives of their siblings, he send an encouraging letter to Seepersad urgently, and that he find a London publisher for The Adventures of Gurudeva, and Other Stories.
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Seepersad Naipaul hoped the sale of his book would alleviate the family's financial difficulties at the time.
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Aaron Eastley has argued that Seepersad Naipaul's writing influenced other local writers to express themselves.
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For example, she explains how her mother coped with her father's early death, succeeding in sending all seven children to university, and how she and Seepersad Naipaul imparted a sense of independence in the girls from a young age.