When the British took over Malta in 1800, after having helped the Maltese overthrow their French occupiers, they initially paid little attention to the Carnival. In a letter to his superiors in London two years later, dated 10 March 1802, the British Civil Commissioner in Malta, Charles Cameron, mentioned the celebration in tones that immediately make clear the way the newly-arrived British viewed the Maltese, who had just voluntarily placed the islands under their dominion. He stated:
You will see by my public dispatch the applications of the remaining sum set apart for the relief of the poor, when the price of corn was raised—this has been an act of the greatest popularity, as much as allowing the celebration of the Carnival which the Maltese had been deprived of for seven years, and to which they bear the most childish enthusiasm—it went without a single accident or even complaint. (TNA CO 158/3, 27v.)
The ‘childish enthusiasm’ that Cameron speaks of indicates the complete indifference of the newly-installed British administrators towards what was, and up to a certain extent still is, one of the main popular celebrations in the Maltese islands. The British were confronted by a celebration that in the nineteenth century was not part of their annual calendar of festivities. Carnival before Lent was not a British tradition, and it meant little to the troops recently stationed in Malta or in other parts of the colonies where it was celebrated.1 The use of the term ‘childish’ seems to denote two things: the fact that the British did not understand or associate with pre-Lenten Carnival celebrations—certainly not those held outdoors—and that what was not understood was deemed inferior and demeaned. Colonies under British domination tended to celebrate Christmas, which was considered a time of both formal and licentious celebration. In contrast, colonies following Catholic traditions, such as Malta, those under French or Spanish rule, or British colonies that included the presence of workers from the latter territories, such as Trinidad , also celebrated Carnival (Cowley 1998, 11). These territories generally distinguished between formal and decorous celebration at Christmas, and ‘nonsense’ and revelry in the other festivity (Abrahams 1972, 277).
The development of Carnival, like that of all other events in the empire, can, at one level, be read against the background of the macro-history of British colonial domination and the economic and political interests of empire. Within the framework of colonial discourse, Malta’s diminutive size means that its particular history, like that of other small, colonised countries or lands, has been engulfed by the sheer size and importance of other domains of the empire which represented a primary source of imperial wealth. Although the British Empire ‘spanned every continent except Europe’ (Crow, Banfield 1996, 1), its European territories, Gibraltar, Malta, and Cyprus, were situated at the periphery of Europe, and peopled by European whites who, as other colonised peoples, also had an individual identity, language and customs. The Napoleonic Wars had made the British realise the importance of the Mediterranean Sea for their commercial and military interests. Imperial governments kept these territories because they represented cheap and practical solutions to the transport of the raw materials at the basis of the products generating wealth for Britain, often referred to as the ‘mother-country’. They were also strategic sites for protecting the sea-lanes to the remunerative parts of the empire. The difference though, was that unlike the farther-flung colonies, these small territories were weighted with a European lifestyle and education before the British ever set foot on them. Their culture was, therefore, not as radically different as, for example, that of islanders in the Caribbean or of African tribes. From the outset of British occupation in the Mediterranean, two types of ‘historiography’ appeared: ‘imperialist’ on the one hand, and ‘“patriotic”, “liberal” or “nationalist”’ on the other (Frendo 2012, 24).
For many British colonisers, the Maltese were ‘white but not quite’ (Bhabha 1994, 86). Gayatri Spivak’s expression, the ‘Other of Europe’ ([1988] 2001, 1438), may be turned on its head to refer not, as the Indian scholar intended, to ‘the exploiters’ side of the international division of labor’ but rather, in this case, to incorporate those European realities that were considered ‘Other’ by the exploiters. British attitudes, as well as official texts and British residents’ or travellers’ descriptions of Malta, contributed to the creation of this European ‘Other’ and to the obliteration of signs of Europeanness, even going so far as to place Malta in Africa.2 Many pictures that circulated in Britain and the colonies in cheap popular literature—such as the weekly illustrated newspaper The Graphic, destined chiefly for a British public—often depicted Maltese as either poor, lazy, religiously fanatical, or simply different through dress or customs, perpetuating thereby the colonial stereotype of the subaltern who required British intervention to walk down the road of civilisation. However, George Cornewall Lewis , one of the two Commissioners sent to report on the islands in 1836, described the situation in these terms:
The Maltese are narrow, uninteresting, frivolous and illiterate for the most part; but their manners and deportment are, almost without exception, unobjectionable, and very superior to those of some of the vulgar English wives of naval men and Government officers, who find themselves in an unwonted position of power and importance, and therefore think it incumbent on them to trample on the Maltese with all the weight of their vulgarity. (1870, 71)
Under British rule, the Maltese had to familiarise themselves, for the first time in their history, with British and Protestant traditions, customs, etiquette and fashions. More importantly, they had to appropriate for themselves a place in political and social decision-making—albeit minor, and often questioned, disregarded or done away with. The process of cultural and political adaptation that Malta and the other peripheral states had to undergo as a consequence of colonial domination provides an interesting study into the mechanisms of power and aspiration in a colonial setting, where ‘closeness’, ‘sameness’ and ‘distance’ and ‘difference’ assume meanings which can then be laid, both in contrast and complementarity, against the more general perspective of imperial colonial history. Borrowing from Spivak’s extension of her original term ‘the Other of Europe as Self’ (2001, 1439), the Carnival events in Malta during British colonisation may be seen as manifestations of the European Other as Self. Carnival as a subaltern social text was caught up in the construction of ‘Other’, viewed initially by the British as a tangible sign of inferiority. Progressively, it was transformed by the Maltese into the affirmation of ‘Self’, through political and social power games within its playful context, as well as through open confrontation.
Cultural Transformation vs. Cultural Continuity
Although the various societies under British rule were, as a matter of course, constantly adapting to changes from both within and beyond their borders, the British colonial experience directed and speeded up the process of cultural transformation across the globe. Change was due mainly to the economic exigencies of empire, which necessitated a certain degree of imposed uniformity across the vast territories governed by Britain. This type of cultural intervention affected a wide range of social areas. It included the fostering of a common language across the empire in order to facilitate its administration that was regulated by the Colonial Office. Necessities and general policies in every corner of the various colonies were determined in a way that assured and safeguarded the empire’s interests, even when initiatives had beneficial effects on the local communities, such as health measures that included the installation of drainage and water works.
This type of cultural transformation ran parallel to the changes brought about from within the indigenous social contexts. Culture, therefore, was an area of contention between imperial interest for rapid social change and indigenous effort to preserve cultural autonomy, also in reaction to the standardisation of British norms and ways of doing things. Many of the countries in which Carnival was celebrated were subject to colonialism. Each individual country’s adaptation to colonial rule, and eventual emergence from colonisation to independence , was also an experience that was shared across the globe. This book sets out to show how Carnival, whose cultural lineage could not be ascribed to British influence, maintained continuity through the steady development of tradition, but also developed in relation to British presence which impinged, either directly or indirectly, upon what was displayed. The main concern of this book is to trace the historical development of the Carnival under British rule within the Maltese community, but it shall also try, wherever possible, to establish connections with other Carnival realities in order to highlight common responses to the interests of empire. Through the examination of Carnival play, it shall establish national and transnational socio-political positions in relation to British or other dominant powers. It also traces connections regarding colonial response to these manifestations either through rejection or adaptation.
This book starts out from the premise that transcultural phenomena are not simply those that are related to economic cultural interests determining movement—including cultural movement—and exchange across the globe. They are also constituted by cultural realities within different countries that experience similar historical conditions, giving rise to manifestations that are heterogeneous in form, but share certain underlying concerns. Although communities celebrating pre-Lenten Carnival in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were linked by the time of celebration, as well as by the type of dominating regime, the cultural forms taken up by the different traditions were determined by the specific historical and socio-political circumstances of each particular community. The ways Carnival was used either to express overt celebration or underlying protest or even hostility was linked to individual communities’ precise socio-historical framework. Consequently, the type of play generated for and during Carnival differed radically according to the community celebrating it.
Social Stratification and Power
Carnival, like other social practices, is subject to the operations of power. While people are exaggerating their actions, transforming their appearance, making fun of their fellows, and lampooning the powers that be, they are also playing with power. Power is not only situated at the higher echelons of political and social administration, but also permeates all levels of the social system and influences all areas of social action. To wield power means to retain control. Carnival, which is originally intended to shake off, albeit for a short period of time, the shackles of power imposed from above, is not simply a moment of innocent fun, recreation and collective participation. Through the celebration of Carnival, the underlying seriousness of what is expressed can be transposed to a level that may be apprehended by all within the ‘safe’ dimension of revelry and enjoyment.
The history of a people, under colonial rule or otherwise, is the history of the articulation among the different social groupings that it is composed of. Carnival is supposed to be a dynamic theatrical event that blurs the distinctions between these social clusters, as all are plunged into the individual and collective pursuit of mass merriment which allows, in part, for the momentary blending of one group into another. Up to a certain extent, identification with a specific social group becomes less clearly distinguishable because participants are covered by the mantle of disguise and travesty. This is certainly true to the extent that all the participants, whether situated at the top or bottom of the social hierarchy , are aware of the real social structure that exists beyond the Carnival. In fact, revolt and uprising in Carnival only insinuate themselves in those interstices where the underlying social structure or political authority is being questioned in the permanent order of things.3 However, as Peter Van Koningsbruggen states, with reference to the Trinidadian Carnival:
Carnival can also function as a mechanism which reinforces class and ethnic boundaries. Through role-changing and other means, carnival can bring to light an opposition in society which is experienced as irreducible, thereby representing this opposition afresh as beyond dispute and as generally characteristic of the society involved. (1997, 13)
This book focuses on the power games behind collective participation and social distinction that were played out during Carnival under British rule. It contends that the politics of colonialism permeated the Carnival from the outset of the British period in Malta. The extent to which the British were prepared to interfere in Maltese affairs, as well as the power struggles between the Maltese themselves, can be witnessed not only in the macro-historical events affecting the islands, but also in more micro-historical realities, such as Carnival. The various chapters of this book will endeavour to show, from different perspectives, how through seemingly harmless modes of play, Carnival, as a site of public expression, provided the space for vibrant forces to exhibit varying identities that differed from those that the powers that be wanted to impose. Consequently, Carnival may be seen as a site of struggle over who is to direct and control public representation, and reflects the enforcement of, or subjugation to, power beyond the site of play. The book sets out to show the ways in which the playful, theatrical, participatory aspects of the Maltese Carnival also played an important political role through the ways they were appropriated by countervailing forces seeking to control or influence power. Through play, these forces sought either to affirm an existing order or to question and even resist it.
Although post-colonial literary studies have explored social stratification through the examination of subjects such as colonial and post-colonial literature, less effort has been made to seize the living reality within an action-based cultural dynamic. The rich possibilities offered by the way Carnival events—masquerades, processions, balls—were actually ‘staged’ are seldom captured through a theatrical perspective. Examining the socio-political aspects of the Carnival in Malta through the lens of its theatrical qualities—role play, costume, use of space—allows for a novel, nuanced understanding of the relations of power by focusing on a small peripheral European community which rarely assumed violent confrontational opposition with respect to the British powers. Th...