This book extends our understanding of the Black Atlantic, a term coined by Paul Gilroy to describe the political, cultural and creative interrelations among blacks living in Africa, the Americas, and Europe. Gilroy famously locates the beginning of Black Atlantic history in the Middle Passage, the mass transportation of slaves from Africa to the Caribbean. Campbell argues that that history in fact predates the Middle Passage and focuses on pre-colonial (i.e. Medieval and early Renaissance) English literary constructions of blacks, Africa and the Caribbean, and the effects of those constructions on post-Independence Caribbean literature. In this way, the book situates the Middle Passage within larger historical and cultural processes, rather than as the centre and origin of Black Atlantic history.