What is the significance of the title of Small Island?

The title, Small Island, identifies
both Jamaica and the United Kingdom simultaneously. The lives of the four main
characters become intertwined because, as members of the same Commonwealth, they are
fighting in a war together. Racial relations are very tense, however, in Second World
War England. The title may suggest how cramped the British feel as waves of Caribbean
soldiers arrive to help out in the war effort. After the war is over, this cramped
feeling persists because some of the Caribbean soldiers decide to settle abroad. Gilbert
is one of those soldiers; and Hortense, his roommate/wife, decides to make the permanent
move to England with him. Their sometimes unpleasant experiences with the white British
citizens is evidence for this reading.