Keith Smith eulogised as 'The Casual Genius'

Sunity Maharaj on Saturday described her friend and colleague, Keith Smith, as the "Casual Genius" committed to discovery of his country and self and to getting the country to appreciate and celebrate its value.

Maharaj paid triubute to the iconic journalist at his funeral at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Independence Square. Smith died from cancer on Monday at the age of 65.

Maharaj said three months ago she and Smith pondered at what she would say at his passing and she came up with the headline - Casual Genuis.

"He chuckled one of those heh-heh chuckles and we dropped it. In any case, I'm sure the word 'genius' embarrassed him because to Keith, the work that he did was not only the most ordinary thing in the world but sheer suckeye: Writing what he saw, what he heard, what he felt, what he thought?" she said.

Maharaj, a former editor at the Trinidad Express, said Smith was one of the lucky ones to escape the curse of a history, "that has left us a legacy of psychic dispossession, self-contempt , insecurity and division which, to this day, endure as the challenges of modern Trinidad and Tobago".

She described his view of Trinidad and Tobago as one of unending wonder where people triumphed against the odds.

Maharaj noted that Smith's discovery of self and country happened over 30 years in his columns like his self-titled column, Taxi Talk, On The Road and other reporting devices he used.

"Keith Smith exalted us, celebrated us, lifted us up and showed us our best selves, as people who are extraordinary in our ordinariness and worthy of the fascination of a gifted mind.

"In this, he was sustained by a network of minds outside the newsroom, who fed his own sense of hope and possibility. In some ways, you might say the columns of Keith Smith and Lloyd Best (Maharaj's late spouse) were mirror images in two different languages," Maharaj said.

"If Trinidadians of every class, corner, faith and race could laugh with each other, and see just how much they were each other, he argued, there would be less room for division to exploit," she stated.

She said executives and publishers appreciated Smith's judgement, insights and understanding of the society noting that the love he fed his readers was founded in his family circle including his mom, his sister Katherine and brother Gregory.

"Today, we can celebrate Keith Smith because our newsrooms were places that could harness the off-the-wall energies of the creative personality, because they were places where redemption was possible, where difference was celebrated, and where finding one's voice was a point of graduation," Mahaaj stated..