Jean "Binta" Breeze

Jean "Binta" Breeze
Pictured in 2007
Born	1957 Hanover, Jamaica
Occupation	Writer, dub poet
Genre	Poetry

Jean "Binta" Breeze MBE (born 1957) is a Jamaican dub poet and storyteller. She has worked also as a theatre director, choreographer, actor and teacher. She has performed her work around the world, in the Caribbean, North America, Europe, South-East Asia and Africa, and been called "one of the most important, influential performance poets of recent years".

Breeze was born and raised in rural Jamaica, and studied at the Jamaican School of Drama in Kingston with Michael Smith and Oku Onuora. She first visited London early in 1985, at the invitation of Linton Kwesi Johnson, to make her debut UK performance at the International Book Fair of Radical Black and Third World Books on 19 March that year. Returning to London in September 1985, she taught Theatre Studies at Brixton College, but after two years' teaching she left in order to be able to perform full-time.

She has since also written in various media. Her first book of poetry, Ryddim Ravings, was published in 1988 by the Race Today Collective. She went on to write the screenplay for Hallelujah Anyhow, a co-production of the British Film Institute and Channel 4. She also released several albums, contributing to Woman's Talk (1986), and recording Tracks in 1991 with Dennis Bovell's Dub Band.

She has suffered from schizophrenia since her early 20s and has written poetry about what she herself calls "madness". In April 2006, on the BBC Radio programme The Interview, Breeze gave her perspective on mental illness and advocated increased attention to the needs of schizophrenics who do not have a "talent" like hers.

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