Seepersad Naipaul
Seepersad Naipaul (1935)
Born	1906 Trinidad and Tobago
Died	1953 Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago
Occupation	Journalist and author
Language	English and Hindustani
Nationality	Trinidadian and Tobagonian
Citizenship	British
Years active	1929–1953
Notable works	The Adventures of Gurudeva
Children	V. S. Naipaul, Shiva Naipaul
Relatives	Nadira Naipaul

Seepersad Naipaul (/ˈnaɪpɔːl, naɪˈpɔːl/; 1906–1953) was a Trinidadian writer. He was the father of V. S. Naipaul and Shiva Naipaul and married into the influential Indo-Trinidadian Capildeo family.

Career

Seepersad Naipaul worked as the first Indo-Trinidadian journalist for the Trinidad Guardian. His only book, The Adventures of Gurudeva, is a collection of linked comic short stories that was first published in Trinidad and Tobago in 1943 (under the title Gurudeva and Other Indian Tales). The elder Naipaul wanted his son "Vido" (as he called him) to try to get his story collection published in London, in the hope that any money it earned would help the family escape from the poverty in which they lived in Trinidad and Tobago. The book was not published in London until after Seepersad's death.^[1]

Between Father and Son: Family Letters (edited by Gillon Aitken), correspondence with V. S. Naipaul, and other family members, dating from around the time Vidia won a scholarship to Oxford University until the older Naipaul's death, was published in 1999, and extracted in The New Yorker.^[2]

References