Book Review…Tales of raw intensity hit the mark

May 11, 2014 News

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Book: Haiti Noir 2: The Classics

Dr Glenville Ashby, Contributor

Just when you thought you have read it all and have experienced the best of literary brilliance, there comes along an unrivalled work of narrative intensity, penned with a spellbinding authenticity. Haiti Noir 2 is just that work of art.
An anthology of existential exigency, “Noir” probes into the soul of a people and nation like no other offering…. except  with the exception of Marc Jacob’s “What a friend we have in Jesus.” Unlike the latter, though, this is a compilation offering a litany of woes on a personal and national level. Noir bleeds lust, violence, resistance, failed insurrections, greed, angst, desperation, duplicity and even some wry and twisted humour.
Every class strata is touched by despair, and every writer is the consummate griot, tugging away at the reader’s emotions with colour and realism.
The stage is already set for an explosion with the opening salvo, “Preface to the life of a bureaucrat”, staged in the 1930s in an uppercrust setting that is riddled with shadism, colour and bloodline. The protagonist, though, wishes to ride the wave of his own creativity, but fails. Despair sets in and he must decide if he must surrender his pride and his personal ambition to patronage and fall into the ranks of the entitled and well-heeled. It is a decision that preys on his conscience. Suicidal thoughts are not too far in the distance.11
And what is Haiti without its mystique, mystery and magic.  ”A Strange Story,” The Enchanted Second Lieutenant,” “Oresca,” and “A white House with Pink Curtains in the Downstairs,” intrigue and dance to the other worldly imaginations of the hougan (obeah woman) and villagers who are steeped in superstition.
But the very loins of this compilation are narrated in “Children of Heroes.” It is unmistakably wrenching and a tale that trumps all comers for its high voltage emotion and rawness. Here, the author tackles a domestic pathology that is wrought with imminent death.  It is told through the words of a frightened child, a witness to the deserved death of his father – at the hands of his sister.  Was he an accomplice, equally culpable? Did his father die from the blow delivered by his sister or the fall made possible as he had clung to his son’s legs?
In a twist of fate, Corazon was felled by the daughter he favoured. “Despite what people say we didn’t go out looking for it. It wasn’t cooked up in advance. Violence attracts more violence and when Mariela lifted up that wrench, she had become a kind of robot handpicked by Providence……The brutal end to a man who pummelled his wife ceaselessly seems almost a fitting end.
A jolt of disturbia is painfully felt in “Things I know about Fairy Tales.” In “Heading South,” carnality is drenchingly erotic, with an energy that is almost tactile. But this is no mere tale of unbridled passion. There is an occult message. A gigolo named after the loa, Legba (known as the Trickster), unleashes a sexual volcano of unimaginable magnitude on a Christian woman, an encounter nudged on by her Christian husband who later is unable to resist Legba. Beneath the veneer of unbound lust, there is a religio-spiritual message. Is it a collision between Haiti’s Vodun and Christianity with the latter proving futile against the atavistic energy of the loas.
And in the oral tradition of Haiti, the pride and revolutionary ethos of a people is forever present, etched in the cosmos and in something far more tangible. This is a unique artistry. In “Reve Haitien,” weapons are bough to ignite an insurrection against a dictatorial oligarchy. The “mulatoo,” conjuring images of Che is convinced that a small cache of weapons in the hands a determined army of resistance will wrestle the levers of power from the few.
“Honour and courage count for nothing…those people in the palace are cowards, okay? When the real fighting starts I assure you they will run. They will pack their blood money in their valises and run.”
In the end, Che’s fate becomes his.
Other failed revolutions in “The Mission,” and “Dame Marie” with its transcendental overtones characterise the indomitable spirit unmoved by ruthlessness. The struggle for the soul of Haiti simmers and boils, an ebb and flow of revolutionary fervour that arguably flies in the face of reason. The Haitian spirit is formidable, sacred at times but also incorrigible and rooted in the profane. Despair does the unthinkable.
For authorship and narration, Haiti Noir 2 is a rare gem, the result of a team of writers that display an enviable range of talent. Tone, colour, cadence, words and structure all cascade with goose-step precision. “Noir” is a pulsating socio-psychological commentary of an island-nation entwined in a paradoxical struggle to fulfill a historical will. But, alas, Haiti still buckles under its own weight, always.  Some argue that it is a nation poisoned and enslaved by the very hands that liberated it centuries ago. Who knows?  The jury is still out on this perplexing case.

Feedback: [email protected] or follow him on Twitter@glenvilleashby
Haiti Noir 2: The Classics
Edited by Edwidge Danticat
Publisher: Akashic Books, New York, 2014
ISBN – 13: 978 -1-61775-193-6
Available: amazon.com
Rating: Highly recommended

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