Marlene L. Daut
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781781381847
- eISBN:
- 9781781382394
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781781381847.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History
This chapter considers the French abolitionist Alphonse de Lamartine’s verse drama, Toussaint Louverture (1850), showing how writing that narrates the life of Louverture as not simply a ‘colonial ...
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This chapter considers the French abolitionist Alphonse de Lamartine’s verse drama, Toussaint Louverture (1850), showing how writing that narrates the life of Louverture as not simply a ‘colonial family romance,’ but as an “interracial” family romance further demonstrates anxieties about the psychological effects of the plantation system. Attempts to explain Louverture’s life using a grammar beholden to the “mulatto/a” vengeance narrative, and especially that of the tragic “mulatto/a,” suggests that the epistemological problems created by slavery and revolution engendered an Oedipal tendency in people of color who, in the revolutionary hour, might either symbolically or literally occasion the death of their parents and vice versa when faced with a choice between their family and the nation.Less
This chapter considers the French abolitionist Alphonse de Lamartine’s verse drama, Toussaint Louverture (1850), showing how writing that narrates the life of Louverture as not simply a ‘colonial family romance,’ but as an “interracial” family romance further demonstrates anxieties about the psychological effects of the plantation system. Attempts to explain Louverture’s life using a grammar beholden to the “mulatto/a” vengeance narrative, and especially that of the tragic “mulatto/a,” suggests that the epistemological problems created by slavery and revolution engendered an Oedipal tendency in people of color who, in the revolutionary hour, might either symbolically or literally occasion the death of their parents and vice versa when faced with a choice between their family and the nation.
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9781846314971
- eISBN:
- 9781846316517
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/UPO9781846316517.006
- Subject:
- History, Imperialism and Colonialism
This chapter examines narratives of the kidnappings that haunted leaders of the Haitian Revolution as well as their families, with special emphasis on the families of Toussaint Louverture and Henry ...
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This chapter examines narratives of the kidnappings that haunted leaders of the Haitian Revolution as well as their families, with special emphasis on the families of Toussaint Louverture and Henry Christophe. It interprets these narratives as a paradigm for Haitian engagement with manuscript and print culture itself that repeatedly inscribes threats to speakers' basic autonomy and security, mapped over forced movement between metropolitan and colonial spaces. The chapter discusses the emblematic nature of kidnapping in the imagined communities of the African diaspora, arguing that the liminal and urgent depictions of kidnappings in the families of Louverture and Christophe vividly revisited the Middle Passage as a founding history of forced migration. Drawing on the work of Benedict Anderson, it explores how layers of African diasporan and Haitian revolutionary kidnappings intruded into the connection between novel and nation in the imagining of New World communities.Less
This chapter examines narratives of the kidnappings that haunted leaders of the Haitian Revolution as well as their families, with special emphasis on the families of Toussaint Louverture and Henry Christophe. It interprets these narratives as a paradigm for Haitian engagement with manuscript and print culture itself that repeatedly inscribes threats to speakers' basic autonomy and security, mapped over forced movement between metropolitan and colonial spaces. The chapter discusses the emblematic nature of kidnapping in the imagined communities of the African diaspora, arguing that the liminal and urgent depictions of kidnappings in the families of Louverture and Christophe vividly revisited the Middle Passage as a founding history of forced migration. Drawing on the work of Benedict Anderson, it explores how layers of African diasporan and Haitian revolutionary kidnappings intruded into the connection between novel and nation in the imagining of New World communities.
Marlene L. Daut
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781781381847
- eISBN:
- 9781781382394
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781781381847.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History
The Haitian Revolution (1791–1804) was an event of monumental world-historical significance, and here, in the first systematic literary history of those events, Haiti's war of independence is ...
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The Haitian Revolution (1791–1804) was an event of monumental world-historical significance, and here, in the first systematic literary history of those events, Haiti's war of independence is examined through the eyes of its actual and imagined participants, observers, survivors, and cultural descendants. The 'transatlantic print culture' under discussion in this literary history reveals that enlightenment racial 'science' was the primary vehicle through which the Haitian Revolution was interpreted by nineteenth-century Haitians, Europeans, and U.S. Americans alike. Through its author's contention that the Haitian revolutionary wars were incessantly racialized by four constantly recurring tropes—the 'monstrous hybrid', the 'tropical temptress', the 'tragic mulatto/a', and the 'colored historian'—Tropics of Haiti shows the ways in which the nineteenth-century tendency to understand Haiti's revolution in primarily racial terms has affected present day demonizations of Haiti and Haitians. In the end, this new archive of Haitian revolutionary writing, much of which has until now remained unknown to the contemporary reading public, invites us to examine how nineteenth-century attempts to paint Haitian independence as the result of a racial revolution coincide with present-day desires to render insignificant and 'unthinkable' the second independent republic of the New World.Less
The Haitian Revolution (1791–1804) was an event of monumental world-historical significance, and here, in the first systematic literary history of those events, Haiti's war of independence is examined through the eyes of its actual and imagined participants, observers, survivors, and cultural descendants. The 'transatlantic print culture' under discussion in this literary history reveals that enlightenment racial 'science' was the primary vehicle through which the Haitian Revolution was interpreted by nineteenth-century Haitians, Europeans, and U.S. Americans alike. Through its author's contention that the Haitian revolutionary wars were incessantly racialized by four constantly recurring tropes—the 'monstrous hybrid', the 'tropical temptress', the 'tragic mulatto/a', and the 'colored historian'—Tropics of Haiti shows the ways in which the nineteenth-century tendency to understand Haiti's revolution in primarily racial terms has affected present day demonizations of Haiti and Haitians. In the end, this new archive of Haitian revolutionary writing, much of which has until now remained unknown to the contemporary reading public, invites us to examine how nineteenth-century attempts to paint Haitian independence as the result of a racial revolution coincide with present-day desires to render insignificant and 'unthinkable' the second independent republic of the New World.
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9781846314971
- eISBN:
- 9781846316517
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/UPO9781846316517.002
- Subject:
- History, Imperialism and Colonialism
In ‘Hegel and Haiti’, Susan Buck-Morss argued that Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's dialectic of master and slave was considerably informed by his reading of news stories about the slave revolution in ...
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In ‘Hegel and Haiti’, Susan Buck-Morss argued that Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's dialectic of master and slave was considerably informed by his reading of news stories about the slave revolution in Saint-Domingue during his time in Jena. This chapter examines the Haitian Revolution as public relations, focusing on how Toussaint Louverture entered the media sphere and the French reception of Haitian correspondence and proclamations. It discusses the ‘politics’ of a decolonisation discourse articulated in French, Toussaint's legacies primarily in texts in the Ancien moniteur and the Gazette de France between 1797 and 1802, and his use of French rather than Creole. The chapter also shows how Toussaint established a field of sympathy in order to navigate around the racism inherent to the metropolitan tolerance of colonialism and slavery, and concludes by looking at Léger Félicité Sonthonax's access to the press after his return to France.Less
In ‘Hegel and Haiti’, Susan Buck-Morss argued that Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's dialectic of master and slave was considerably informed by his reading of news stories about the slave revolution in Saint-Domingue during his time in Jena. This chapter examines the Haitian Revolution as public relations, focusing on how Toussaint Louverture entered the media sphere and the French reception of Haitian correspondence and proclamations. It discusses the ‘politics’ of a decolonisation discourse articulated in French, Toussaint's legacies primarily in texts in the Ancien moniteur and the Gazette de France between 1797 and 1802, and his use of French rather than Creole. The chapter also shows how Toussaint established a field of sympathy in order to navigate around the racism inherent to the metropolitan tolerance of colonialism and slavery, and concludes by looking at Léger Félicité Sonthonax's access to the press after his return to France.
Graham T. Nessler
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781469626864
- eISBN:
- 9781469626888
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469626864.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
This chapter details the military history of Hispaniola from 1795, when the French Republic ejected the rival Spanish empire from the island, to 1801, when Toussaint Louverture unified the island ...
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This chapter details the military history of Hispaniola from 1795, when the French Republic ejected the rival Spanish empire from the island, to 1801, when Toussaint Louverture unified the island under his rule. This is the first of two chapters to focus on the rise and governance of Louverture, a former slave who rose rapidly through the military ranks and, like his eventual nominal superior Napoleon Bonaparte, parlayed his military triumphs into political power. As Toussaint formulated an independent foreign policy, repelled British invaders from Hispaniola, and waged a brutal civil war against rival André Rigaud, Santo Domingo factored centrally into his strategic thinking, diplomacy, and military leadership. This chapter details these dynamics and culminates in Toussaint’s successful but short-lived invasion of Santo Domingo, which exacerbated a growing rift between the black general and France’s ruler, Napoleon Bonaparte.Less
This chapter details the military history of Hispaniola from 1795, when the French Republic ejected the rival Spanish empire from the island, to 1801, when Toussaint Louverture unified the island under his rule. This is the first of two chapters to focus on the rise and governance of Louverture, a former slave who rose rapidly through the military ranks and, like his eventual nominal superior Napoleon Bonaparte, parlayed his military triumphs into political power. As Toussaint formulated an independent foreign policy, repelled British invaders from Hispaniola, and waged a brutal civil war against rival André Rigaud, Santo Domingo factored centrally into his strategic thinking, diplomacy, and military leadership. This chapter details these dynamics and culminates in Toussaint’s successful but short-lived invasion of Santo Domingo, which exacerbated a growing rift between the black general and France’s ruler, Napoleon Bonaparte.
Graham T. Nessler
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781469626864
- eISBN:
- 9781469626888
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469626864.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
After taking control of the central state apparatus in Santo Domingo, Toussaint attempted to create a profitable plantation economy by imposing restrictive labor regimes on former slaves and offering ...
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After taking control of the central state apparatus in Santo Domingo, Toussaint attempted to create a profitable plantation economy by imposing restrictive labor regimes on former slaves and offering economic incentives to plantation entrepreneurs. This chapter details the efficacy of these efforts along with that of Toussaint’s attempts to eliminate slaving in both parts of Hispaniola during this time. This part of the work grapples with Toussaint’s place in Dominican history and the role of Santo Domingo in his broader political and economic vision. This vision increasingly clashed with that of Napoleon, who in late 1801 deployed a huge military expedition to Hispaniola (and other key colonies) in order to reassert Paris’s authority. Though this expedition succeeded in deposing Toussaint, it set in motion processes that fatally undermined Napoleon’s dream of creating a new French empire in the Western Hemisphere.Less
After taking control of the central state apparatus in Santo Domingo, Toussaint attempted to create a profitable plantation economy by imposing restrictive labor regimes on former slaves and offering economic incentives to plantation entrepreneurs. This chapter details the efficacy of these efforts along with that of Toussaint’s attempts to eliminate slaving in both parts of Hispaniola during this time. This part of the work grapples with Toussaint’s place in Dominican history and the role of Santo Domingo in his broader political and economic vision. This vision increasingly clashed with that of Napoleon, who in late 1801 deployed a huge military expedition to Hispaniola (and other key colonies) in order to reassert Paris’s authority. Though this expedition succeeded in deposing Toussaint, it set in motion processes that fatally undermined Napoleon’s dream of creating a new French empire in the Western Hemisphere.
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9781846314971
- eISBN:
- 9781846316517
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/UPO9781846316517.001
- Subject:
- History, Imperialism and Colonialism
This book examines the literature that arose from the Haitian Revolution, focusing on political manuscripts issued by former slaves turned revolutionary leaders, including correspondence, ...
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This book examines the literature that arose from the Haitian Revolution, focusing on political manuscripts issued by former slaves turned revolutionary leaders, including correspondence, proclamations, and manifestoes. In particular, it looks at the French and Creole African diasporan texts dating from the era of the Haitian Revolution (1791–1803) until the Haitian independence (1804–1806) of the Dessalines era. The book focuses on early African diasporan literature in the context of independence and postcolonial transition in Haiti, rather than on the presumed posterity of slavery that provides the background for much of the early African American tradition. It explores the narrative structures arising from defensive awareness of hegemonic incursions, especially the dialogues recreated by General Toussaint Louverture between himself and his political rivals, to Jean-Jacques Dessalines's rhetorical construction of colonial identity around the contagion of conquest and guilty mastery. The book also discusses the culture and politics of the Haitian Revolution as well as the libertine sphere in the French colony of Saint-Domingue.Less
This book examines the literature that arose from the Haitian Revolution, focusing on political manuscripts issued by former slaves turned revolutionary leaders, including correspondence, proclamations, and manifestoes. In particular, it looks at the French and Creole African diasporan texts dating from the era of the Haitian Revolution (1791–1803) until the Haitian independence (1804–1806) of the Dessalines era. The book focuses on early African diasporan literature in the context of independence and postcolonial transition in Haiti, rather than on the presumed posterity of slavery that provides the background for much of the early African American tradition. It explores the narrative structures arising from defensive awareness of hegemonic incursions, especially the dialogues recreated by General Toussaint Louverture between himself and his political rivals, to Jean-Jacques Dessalines's rhetorical construction of colonial identity around the contagion of conquest and guilty mastery. The book also discusses the culture and politics of the Haitian Revolution as well as the libertine sphere in the French colony of Saint-Domingue.
Elizabeth Fenton
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195384093
- eISBN:
- 9780199893584
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195384093.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, American, 19th Century Literature
This chapter shows that anti-Catholicism contributed to antebellum writers’ confrontation of slavery. Abolitionist documents of this period often equated the plight of the African American with that ...
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This chapter shows that anti-Catholicism contributed to antebellum writers’ confrontation of slavery. Abolitionist documents of this period often equated the plight of the African American with that of the persecuted Protestant. At the margins of this anti-Catholic abolitionist rhetoric, however, stands the specter of the free, black Catholic. Recognizing the prominent position Haiti held in the minds of Anglo-Americans, the chapter argues that Haitian Catholicism threw a wrench in the abolitionist schema. The chapter reads Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1853) alongside contemporary biographies of Toussaint Louverture and Herman Melville’s novella Benito Cereno (1855) to show that liberal Protestants of the period presented African American citizenship as a product of the rejection of Haiti and its Catholicism. The chapter argues that although Stowe and Melville equally engage with the project of aligning slavery with Catholicism, where Stowe finds hope in such a project, Melville finds only the end of liberal politics.Less
This chapter shows that anti-Catholicism contributed to antebellum writers’ confrontation of slavery. Abolitionist documents of this period often equated the plight of the African American with that of the persecuted Protestant. At the margins of this anti-Catholic abolitionist rhetoric, however, stands the specter of the free, black Catholic. Recognizing the prominent position Haiti held in the minds of Anglo-Americans, the chapter argues that Haitian Catholicism threw a wrench in the abolitionist schema. The chapter reads Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1853) alongside contemporary biographies of Toussaint Louverture and Herman Melville’s novella Benito Cereno (1855) to show that liberal Protestants of the period presented African American citizenship as a product of the rejection of Haiti and its Catholicism. The chapter argues that although Stowe and Melville equally engage with the project of aligning slavery with Catholicism, where Stowe finds hope in such a project, Melville finds only the end of liberal politics.
Deborah Jenson
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9781846314971
- eISBN:
- 9781846316517
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/UPO9781846316517
- Subject:
- History, Imperialism and Colonialism
The Haitian Revolution has generated responses from commentators in fields ranging from philosophy to historiography to twentieth-century literary and artistic studies. But what about the written ...
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The Haitian Revolution has generated responses from commentators in fields ranging from philosophy to historiography to twentieth-century literary and artistic studies. But what about the written work produced at the time, by Haitians? This book presents an account of a specifically Haitian literary tradition in the Revolutionary era. It shows the emergence of two strands of textual innovation, both evolving from the new revolutionary consciousness: the political texts produced by Haitian revolutionary leaders Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines; and popular Creole poetry from anonymous courtesans in Saint-Domingue's libertine culture. These textual forms, though they differ from each other, demonstrate both the increasing cultural autonomy and the literary voice of non-white populations in the colony at the time of revolution. Unschooled generals and courtesans, long presented as voiceless, are revealed to be legitimate speakers and authors. These Haitian French and Creole texts have been neglected as a foundation of Afro-diasporic literature by former slaves in the Atlantic world for two reasons: they do not fit the generic criteria of the slave narrative (which is rooted in the autobiographical experience of enslavement); and they are mediated texts, relayed to the print-cultural Atlantic domain not by the speakers themselves, but by secretaries or refugee colonists. These texts challenge how we think about authorial voice, writing, print culture, and cultural autonomy in the context of the formerly enslaved, and demand that we reassess our historical understanding of the Haitian Independence and its relationship to an international world of contemporary readers.Less
The Haitian Revolution has generated responses from commentators in fields ranging from philosophy to historiography to twentieth-century literary and artistic studies. But what about the written work produced at the time, by Haitians? This book presents an account of a specifically Haitian literary tradition in the Revolutionary era. It shows the emergence of two strands of textual innovation, both evolving from the new revolutionary consciousness: the political texts produced by Haitian revolutionary leaders Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines; and popular Creole poetry from anonymous courtesans in Saint-Domingue's libertine culture. These textual forms, though they differ from each other, demonstrate both the increasing cultural autonomy and the literary voice of non-white populations in the colony at the time of revolution. Unschooled generals and courtesans, long presented as voiceless, are revealed to be legitimate speakers and authors. These Haitian French and Creole texts have been neglected as a foundation of Afro-diasporic literature by former slaves in the Atlantic world for two reasons: they do not fit the generic criteria of the slave narrative (which is rooted in the autobiographical experience of enslavement); and they are mediated texts, relayed to the print-cultural Atlantic domain not by the speakers themselves, but by secretaries or refugee colonists. These texts challenge how we think about authorial voice, writing, print culture, and cultural autonomy in the context of the formerly enslaved, and demand that we reassess our historical understanding of the Haitian Independence and its relationship to an international world of contemporary readers.
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9781846318467
- eISBN:
- 9781846317828
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/UPO9781846317828.002
- Subject:
- History, Imperialism and Colonialism
This chapter examines Germaine de Staël's complex representation of fathers in relation to slavery and abolition, focusing on her own father, Jacques Necker, who features in many of her works. In ...
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This chapter examines Germaine de Staël's complex representation of fathers in relation to slavery and abolition, focusing on her own father, Jacques Necker, who features in many of her works. In particular, it looks at the conflict experienced by Staël between paternal figures of authority on the one hand and the rights of women and slaves on the other. Staël claims to have loved, throughout her life, God, her father, and freedom, a claim analysed in the chapter, which offers a reading of her early short stories, including Mirza, Histoire de Pauline, and Corinne. It discusses symbolic allusions to slavery in Corinne and considers biographical and historical works in which Staël constructs her father as the personification of benevolence and concern for the welfare of others. Finally, the chapter compares Staël to Isaac Louverture, the son of the Haitian revolutionary leader Toussaint Louverture, in terms of their relationship with their fathers.Less
This chapter examines Germaine de Staël's complex representation of fathers in relation to slavery and abolition, focusing on her own father, Jacques Necker, who features in many of her works. In particular, it looks at the conflict experienced by Staël between paternal figures of authority on the one hand and the rights of women and slaves on the other. Staël claims to have loved, throughout her life, God, her father, and freedom, a claim analysed in the chapter, which offers a reading of her early short stories, including Mirza, Histoire de Pauline, and Corinne. It discusses symbolic allusions to slavery in Corinne and considers biographical and historical works in which Staël constructs her father as the personification of benevolence and concern for the welfare of others. Finally, the chapter compares Staël to Isaac Louverture, the son of the Haitian revolutionary leader Toussaint Louverture, in terms of their relationship with their fathers.
Nick Nesbitt
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781846318665
- eISBN:
- 9781846317934
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781846318665.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
Caribbean Critique seeks to define and analyze the distinctive contribution of francophone Caribbean thinkers to perimetric Critical Theory. The book argues that their singular project has been to ...
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Caribbean Critique seeks to define and analyze the distinctive contribution of francophone Caribbean thinkers to perimetric Critical Theory. The book argues that their singular project has been to forge a brand of critique that, while borrowing from North Atlantic predecessors such as Rousseau, Hegel, Marx, and Sartre, was from the start indelibly marked by the Middle Passage, slavery, and colonialism. Chapters and sections address figures such as Toussaint Louverture, Baron de Vastey, Victor Schoelcher, Aimé Césaire, René Ménil, Frantz Fanon, Maryse Condé, and Edouard Glissant, while an extensive theoretical introduction defines the essential parameters of ‘Caribbean Critique.’Less
Caribbean Critique seeks to define and analyze the distinctive contribution of francophone Caribbean thinkers to perimetric Critical Theory. The book argues that their singular project has been to forge a brand of critique that, while borrowing from North Atlantic predecessors such as Rousseau, Hegel, Marx, and Sartre, was from the start indelibly marked by the Middle Passage, slavery, and colonialism. Chapters and sections address figures such as Toussaint Louverture, Baron de Vastey, Victor Schoelcher, Aimé Césaire, René Ménil, Frantz Fanon, Maryse Condé, and Edouard Glissant, while an extensive theoretical introduction defines the essential parameters of ‘Caribbean Critique.’
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9781846314971
- eISBN:
- 9781846316517
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/UPO9781846316517.010
- Subject:
- History, Imperialism and Colonialism
This book has documented the rise of a mediated Haitian literature consisting of texts produced by leaders of the Haitian Revolution, particularly Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines, as ...
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This book has documented the rise of a mediated Haitian literature consisting of texts produced by leaders of the Haitian Revolution, particularly Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines, as well as lyrical representations of courtesans' experience. It has examined the voluminous correspondence written by Louverture to navigate diplomatic relations, communicate military plans, and justify his schemes, and has also considered Dessalines's letters in relation to the courtesans' poetic claims. Moreover, the book has analysed the relentless threats faced by Haiti as a new black nation, especially that of being redefined as a French colony given France's lingering colonial presence on the island of Hispaniola.Less
This book has documented the rise of a mediated Haitian literature consisting of texts produced by leaders of the Haitian Revolution, particularly Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines, as well as lyrical representations of courtesans' experience. It has examined the voluminous correspondence written by Louverture to navigate diplomatic relations, communicate military plans, and justify his schemes, and has also considered Dessalines's letters in relation to the courtesans' poetic claims. Moreover, the book has analysed the relentless threats faced by Haiti as a new black nation, especially that of being redefined as a French colony given France's lingering colonial presence on the island of Hispaniola.
Maria Cristina Fumagalli
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781781381601
- eISBN:
- 9781781382349
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781781381601.003.0005
- Subject:
- Literature, World Literature
This chapter discusses Carlos Esteban Deive's historical novel Viento Negro, bosque del caimán (Black Wind, Bois Caiman, 2002), which deals with the slave revolt of 1791 and its consequences for the ...
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This chapter discusses Carlos Esteban Deive's historical novel Viento Negro, bosque del caimán (Black Wind, Bois Caiman, 2002), which deals with the slave revolt of 1791 and its consequences for the Spanish side. Deive chronicles Toussaint Louverture's entrance to Santo Domingo and his decision to immediately abolish slavery, recasting it as a fugitive but glorious moment in the shared history of Hispaniola. He reconstructs the effects of the rebellion on Santo Domingo and depicts the borderland as a site for rich cross-cultural exchange. In recasting of Hispaniola's past, Deive revisits dominant discourses related to the magical world of the island and to the representation of Vodou, one of the many manifestations of the process of creolisation which shaped the life and culture of the slaves. In the Dominican Republic, Vodou has long been associated exclusively with Haiti.Less
This chapter discusses Carlos Esteban Deive's historical novel Viento Negro, bosque del caimán (Black Wind, Bois Caiman, 2002), which deals with the slave revolt of 1791 and its consequences for the Spanish side. Deive chronicles Toussaint Louverture's entrance to Santo Domingo and his decision to immediately abolish slavery, recasting it as a fugitive but glorious moment in the shared history of Hispaniola. He reconstructs the effects of the rebellion on Santo Domingo and depicts the borderland as a site for rich cross-cultural exchange. In recasting of Hispaniola's past, Deive revisits dominant discourses related to the magical world of the island and to the representation of Vodou, one of the many manifestations of the process of creolisation which shaped the life and culture of the slaves. In the Dominican Republic, Vodou has long been associated exclusively with Haiti.
Jeremy D. Popkin
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- March 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226675824
- eISBN:
- 9780226675855
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226675855.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
The only truly successful slave uprising in the Atlantic world, the Haitian Revolution, gave birth to the first independent black republic of the modern era. Inspired by the revolution that had ...
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The only truly successful slave uprising in the Atlantic world, the Haitian Revolution, gave birth to the first independent black republic of the modern era. Inspired by the revolution that had recently roiled their French rulers, black slaves and people of mixed race alike rose up against their oppressors in a bloody insurrection that led to the burning of the colony's largest city, a bitter struggle against Napoleon's troops, and in 1804, the founding of a free nation. Numerous firsthand narratives of these events survived, but their insights into the period have long languished in obscurity—until now. This book unearths these documents and presents excerpts from more than a dozen accounts written by white colonists trying to come to grips with a world that had suddenly disintegrated. These writings give us our most direct portrayal of the actions of the revolutionaries, depicting encounters with the uprising's leaders—Toussaint Louverture, Boukman, and Jean-Jacques Dessalines—as well as putting faces on many of the anonymous participants in this epochal moment. The commentary provided here on each selection presents the necessary background about the authors and the incidents they describe, while also addressing the complex question of the witnesses' reliability and urging the reader to consider the implications of the narrators' perspectives. Along with the American and French revolutions, the birth of Haiti helped shape the modern world.Less
The only truly successful slave uprising in the Atlantic world, the Haitian Revolution, gave birth to the first independent black republic of the modern era. Inspired by the revolution that had recently roiled their French rulers, black slaves and people of mixed race alike rose up against their oppressors in a bloody insurrection that led to the burning of the colony's largest city, a bitter struggle against Napoleon's troops, and in 1804, the founding of a free nation. Numerous firsthand narratives of these events survived, but their insights into the period have long languished in obscurity—until now. This book unearths these documents and presents excerpts from more than a dozen accounts written by white colonists trying to come to grips with a world that had suddenly disintegrated. These writings give us our most direct portrayal of the actions of the revolutionaries, depicting encounters with the uprising's leaders—Toussaint Louverture, Boukman, and Jean-Jacques Dessalines—as well as putting faces on many of the anonymous participants in this epochal moment. The commentary provided here on each selection presents the necessary background about the authors and the incidents they describe, while also addressing the complex question of the witnesses' reliability and urging the reader to consider the implications of the narrators' perspectives. Along with the American and French revolutions, the birth of Haiti helped shape the modern world.
Paul Cheney
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780226079356
- eISBN:
- 9780226411774
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226411774.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
Once the French Revolution broke out in in 1789, the elites of Saint-Domingue began fighting amongst themselves over questions of political representation in the metropolitan center and of the extent ...
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Once the French Revolution broke out in in 1789, the elites of Saint-Domingue began fighting amongst themselves over questions of political representation in the metropolitan center and of the extent of rights to be accorded to free people of color. This chapter recounts the years from 1789 to 1803 from the vantage point of the collaboration between planters like Ferron de la Ferronnays and successive revolutionary governments to reestablish control over the countryside and to get the plantation complex moving again. Even after the establishment of an independent Haiti, the landed military elite of that country--which resembled in several essential respects the white elite they succeeded--tried to restart sugar production based upon coerced labor taking place on large plantations. This chapter illustrates the broad failure of this policy over the revolutionary and post-revolutionary decades, as well as the struggles of newly freed slaves, such as those who worked on the Ferron de la Ferronnays plantation, to impose a post-revolutionary social order based upon independent peasant production.Less
Once the French Revolution broke out in in 1789, the elites of Saint-Domingue began fighting amongst themselves over questions of political representation in the metropolitan center and of the extent of rights to be accorded to free people of color. This chapter recounts the years from 1789 to 1803 from the vantage point of the collaboration between planters like Ferron de la Ferronnays and successive revolutionary governments to reestablish control over the countryside and to get the plantation complex moving again. Even after the establishment of an independent Haiti, the landed military elite of that country--which resembled in several essential respects the white elite they succeeded--tried to restart sugar production based upon coerced labor taking place on large plantations. This chapter illustrates the broad failure of this policy over the revolutionary and post-revolutionary decades, as well as the struggles of newly freed slaves, such as those who worked on the Ferron de la Ferronnays plantation, to impose a post-revolutionary social order based upon independent peasant production.
Dustin Ells Howes
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- April 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780199336999
- eISBN:
- 9780190490119
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199336999.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory, Comparative Politics
The signature violent political revolutions since the eighteenth century have been characterized by calls for freedom. The major participants in the American, French, Haitian, and Bolshevik ...
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The signature violent political revolutions since the eighteenth century have been characterized by calls for freedom. The major participants in the American, French, Haitian, and Bolshevik Revolutions had vigorous discussions as to the proper role of violence in liberating people from colonialism, monarchy, slavery, and capitalism. Each of these revolutions in turn influenced violent liberation movements throughout the world, creating independent states in South America, Africa, and Asia. The revolutions varied widely in their use of violence but were typically characterized by internecine violence that included purges and counter-purges, the raising up of tyrants or dictators, and the institutionalization of slavery or some other form of forced labor.Less
The signature violent political revolutions since the eighteenth century have been characterized by calls for freedom. The major participants in the American, French, Haitian, and Bolshevik Revolutions had vigorous discussions as to the proper role of violence in liberating people from colonialism, monarchy, slavery, and capitalism. Each of these revolutions in turn influenced violent liberation movements throughout the world, creating independent states in South America, Africa, and Asia. The revolutions varied widely in their use of violence but were typically characterized by internecine violence that included purges and counter-purges, the raising up of tyrants or dictators, and the institutionalization of slavery or some other form of forced labor.
Beverly Bell
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801452123
- eISBN:
- 9780801468322
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801452123.003.0027
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
This epilogue discusses the fate of three individuals who have figured prominently in the efforts of social movements to improve the plight of Haitians after the earthquake: Tibebe, who still lives ...
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This epilogue discusses the fate of three individuals who have figured prominently in the efforts of social movements to improve the plight of Haitians after the earthquake: Tibebe, who still lives in poverty but has “been inspired” with a flood of poetry; Suze, a women's rights advocate who constantly answers 911-type calls from women like Tibebe; and Djab, a community organizer who is involved with the Toussaint Louverture Front. The chapter argues that Haitians will remain trapped regardless of the changes brought about by social movements as long as the rules of global political and economic power persist. It emphasizes the need for close collaboration between peoples from Haiti and other countries in order to have the chance to create another world and disprove Margaret Thatcher's claim that “there is no alternative.”Less
This epilogue discusses the fate of three individuals who have figured prominently in the efforts of social movements to improve the plight of Haitians after the earthquake: Tibebe, who still lives in poverty but has “been inspired” with a flood of poetry; Suze, a women's rights advocate who constantly answers 911-type calls from women like Tibebe; and Djab, a community organizer who is involved with the Toussaint Louverture Front. The chapter argues that Haitians will remain trapped regardless of the changes brought about by social movements as long as the rules of global political and economic power persist. It emphasizes the need for close collaboration between peoples from Haiti and other countries in order to have the chance to create another world and disprove Margaret Thatcher's claim that “there is no alternative.”
