This paper looks at the use of language(s) in Indo-Caribbean (i.e., West Indian of East Indian descent) writings. West Indian writers are Creole, in every sense of the term: born in (former) British colonies, they have a hybrid culture and a hybrid language. They operate from within a polylectal Creole language-culture continuum which offers them a wide and varied linguistic range (Creole to Standard English) and an extended cultural base ("primitive" oral culture to anglicized written culture). IndoCaribbean writers, however, have access, not only to the Creole languageculture continuum, but also to the pre-colonial cultural, linguistic and religious traditions of their ancestors who came from India in the 19`h century. But if Creole is the mother-tongue of all West Indians, English is the only language they know to read and write. West Indian literature in English constitutes an intricately woven textile of Creole and English : a hybrid writing made possible through the translation of Creole experience into English; oral Creole culture into written English; the Creole language into the English language. In fact, West Indian literature in English can be considered self-translation, for which the presence of the author as the translator gives authority to the hybridized product, a hue extract of the West Indian writer and his Caribbean language-culture.