YouSaid · the spoken record

Edwidge Danticat

lines on the record: 53
first: 2020-11-04
most recent: 2020-11-04
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Well, this one reminds me very much of Jonathan, who, though he was not Haitian, I probably traveled with him more to Haiti than my own parents when I worked for him. And he always used to say PTPT little by little the bird builds its nest. That was his favorite answer to like if you ask him how he was doing, he would say PTPT Zoazu Foundation. Unfortunately, as you know, he passed away not too long ago. And that was one of his favorites. And that remains very special to me. For that reason, but also what the proverb says, it's really kind of like every journey begins with one step. And so I feel like it's good advice these days to PTPT ish, little by little, the bird builds. Nest”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, a lot of people go to Haiti and I think you have to go with an open mind, right? And I would say try to get out of Port-au-Prince to go outside, go see the countryside. There are, for example, in the south, there's some wonderful grottos or caves, there's some hikes. I think there's to not to try to stay in the urban space, but also to go outside. I think it's Palmer's guide to both Haiti and the Dominican Republic that has some wonderful tips in terms of where to go. And there's some also local traveling groups, like Chauve, if you've never been to Haiti and you don't know anybody in Haiti to try to find the group to accompany you. But to go with an open mind to Try to learn and listen and certainly go outside the urban space into the countryside. I would recommend that.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Of cinema class, but also a class in which the students had an opportunity to film what we were doing. And we were trying to figure out what had been done in Haitian cinema before. And soon after that, not because of us, but there was a kind of explosion of Haitian cinema. There were a lot of films made, some of them wonderful, some not so great, but there were a couple of keepers, you know, that like if we were doing this project now, for example, we would have a lot more to work with, you know, with the films of Raoupek and other filmmakers inside Haiti.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, actually, we taught that class. It was Jonathan Demi and Haitian journalist Jean Dominique. And when Jean was in exile from Haiti, Jonathan wanted to do actually a festival of Haitian cinema. And we used that class as a way of, first of all, finding the films that we would show and then to talk about them. There's a Haitian film, for example, called Anita, which is about a young girl who's a domestic servant in a home, who patient singer Torn is featured in it. And so we would get that film, we would show it, and we'd talk about it. And Shah, who was more versed in Haitian cinema than either of us would speak on it, and then the students would film it. So I hope all of this is in the archives at Ramapu College, but it was both a history.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Think there's always tensions, but not so much because of people who read me. I think it's the same when you come, and I have friends from other groups, it's the same. So you seem to be plucked out of your group, and people think like you consider yourself a representative. I've never considered myself a representative for patients or all Haitians. I don't think I speak for all Haitians, but often in the...”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Working at night, and the older I'm getting, the harder it is to actually stay up all night, but I find that writing at night is really my most productive time because somehow at night you just feel like everybody's safe in bed that I'm responsible for and there's not too many distractions. The internet is always there, but it's just easier to imagine a whole other universe at night. So that's I feel that that's what I'm most productive.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Joy, it was something I loved doing, and I always felt like really blessed to be able to do it. And I still feel that way today.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My first book actually was published when I was 24. That's still early, but I loved writing. I love stories and I loved writing. And for me, it was always fun. And even when I was doing other things, I was, you know, studying at school, but I love to write. And so, you know, it's that saying that people say if you love what you do, you've never worked a day in your life. For me, that was just really I wanted to write and it started with new youth connections, that journal that I started writing for when I was 14 and went through all my books to this day. I never saw myself so much as, I mean, I knew that my book was published early and a lot was made of that, I think, as when you publish when you're young. But for me, it was just always”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Jacques Mel is one thing, there's a wonderful novel by a great Haitian writer Reni Di Pes called Adriana in All My Dreams, which was recently translated by Kayama Glover. And that novel will tell you everything you want to know about Jack Mel. It's sort of a beautiful place and physically led location. It's got both the mountains and the sea. It's got a wonderful waterfall called Bassemble. It's a gorgeous place. And after the dance, the book that I wrote is about Carnival and Jacquemell. And it has a spectacular carnival as well. And there's some wonderful artists who live there actually who I write about after the dance. One of them, Wenal Muse, who still lives there next to a beautiful mountain there.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I have not. I have only been to South Africa and actually this year we were hoping to make a trip to different countries in Africa, but we're obviously not able to. I often feel like I'm 51 now. I feel like I should have already made it, but it's definitely, it's something that I've wanted to do with my family, with my girls, and that hopefully won't get all to do together.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Which means, and it's a great causer in a way, it means two mountains can never meet, but perhaps you and I we can meet again.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, day a morning, gorn. And I actually use that a lot myself. You know, I have a neighbor, one of my neighbors just passed away and she used to use that proverb a lot. And so I think it means that no matter what we can see there's more, I think there's more to everything than what we see. It also speaks to the physical layout of Haiti because it's a very mountainous place. You know, IT and the Arawak called it IT. It actually means land of the mountains. And it's physically true. Like if you're traveling across Haiti, literally, there's always a mountain behind the physically behind the mountain. But in a kind of spiritual sense, it also means that there's always more. And, you know, there's this mountain connected saying that I love. It says”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, this one, I think, is about humility because we have this expression that we say when someone has died who has contributed a great deal to our culture, to the, we say that Amapu has fallen. And Amapu is a self-cotton tree. It's a kind of sacred tree. And it's also a big tree that lasts forever. It's just an institution, Amapu. And so what this one is saying that even it's actually the goat is a kind of meager creature compared to a mapu and there's no way a goat would actually be able to access the leaves to a mapu but when it dies it falls and then it's just saying that we're all i've always heard that proverb as a way of encouraging Humility that we're sort of all vulnerable to all our leaves are vulnerable to the goat if you will.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yep, that's that dehumanization, just those like if you want to what you do, it's I guess it's fake news. It's like it's connected to the fake news, right? If you want to diminish or slight someone, you call them names. That's also a timely one, I think.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Oh, this one, you will not believe how much we hear that these days. And it's something that we say a lot now in the coronavirus era. And you hear it on the radio, you hear people say it when they talk to their neighbors. Simed Koz. That means that really you are the best person to take care of yourself. Like if you want people, if you're saying wear your mask when you go out doing the corona virus era, wash your hands. It's like the best, the most qualified person to take care of you is you. So it's not the doctor, it's not your loved one. It's the owner of the body who takes care of the body. So it's like watch out for yourself. It's very good advice these days.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Oh my god, this Tambuloo. So I actually have a book called After the Dance. It's on Carnival. Yes, for me it means that there are consequences to everything. Like even the most joyful thing, right? Like you have to be prepared for the consequences of things that you've done, you know, and it's something that my mom used to say quite a bit too, like if you have just had a really big celebration or if you waited too late to do your homework because you're having a good time watching a program you like, she was like, you know, after the dance the drum is heavy. So there's always, it's kind of like the morning after hangover situation and the most joyful outcome, but really that their consequences to everything.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“African American friends that I grew up with their children, my children, it's a common, it's certainly a common struggle. And certainly if that cop is not going to be asking you which country you're from when doing these types of encounters.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's not different. I think I believe that Black Lives Matter, of course. And I think maybe as a Haitian American with the history that I've just outlined to you, you know, with having come out of a culture of revolution and the constant fight that Haitians have always had, we can certainly identify with that absolutely. And one thing that's been really wonderful to see with this generation is that As black immigrants, there's no separation, I think, maybe in previous generations, you know, there was that feeling that, oh, this is not my problem. But in the demonstrations, you see patient flags, you see Dominican flags, you see people from the continent. And I think because we realize that this affects all of us, it's my nephews, it's my...”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Best education because he wrote memorization. But what I know is there's such a love for education in Haiti that parents really, really sacrifice a great deal to have their children educated, that every child, of course, deserves an education. So I would love for every child to have that opportunity. I think that would be the most important thing to have like a good education that could serve them and help them to function and grow in their country.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Would give the job to a woman I know who runs an organization called Ase Poiti. And her name is Najin. And Nejin works with schools. Actually, she works with educators. Fire is, first of all, I would make sure people who are better qualified than me were Minister of Education. But one thing I think would be important to actually make sure every single child is educated and to make sure that there is education in Creole because often children just jump into school in French and there's a lot of root memorization. So that would be an important thing, I think, to make sure every child has access to education because in Haiti something like 40% of a parent's income is spent on education and often not the children are not getting”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I think that was a very difficult moment at that time. Those generals in that moment, doing that coup d'etat, thousands and thousands of people had been killed. At that time I worked, I was working on a film called Tomilivi, and we were interviewing many people who had been victimized during the coup d'etat. And one of them was an incredibly brave woman named Aled Bilance, who had survived and being really butchered and lost her arm and other people. And so I think at that time, I mean, President Eysteid was part of that decision and he wanted to return. At that time, I guess that was the right thing to do because people were really, and the generals, they were ready to stay. And people were dying. And so looking back, I think that probably was a really, that was the decision that was made first to and he returned.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Art with Philome Aubin, who's a Haitian artist from the North, has a very famous painting about Chalmas Piral, who was a leader of the Cakos, who fought against the occupation, who was murdered and attached to a door as a kind of frightening. And there were some horror stories, some massacres during the occupation. And what was left behind after the occupation, I think both in Haiti and the Dominican Republic was this military structure that went through the generations.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I would ask them, I don't know, I would not speak for them. I think people always want to be in charge of their fate. And the people who come often from what I know of the U.S. occupation, it wasn't. And, you know, the writers at that time wrote about it. You know, they were like African-American scholars who were living the moment who visited, who wrote about it because it was meant to keep it was meant for influence in the region. One of the heads, I think it's Butler, his name was, who wrote about, who had a Mia Kalpa many years later, who was in charge of not just the occupation of Haiti, but also when at that time where there was a common occupation of Haiti in the DR where he said we were there for City Corps, we were there for money. That was his miakopa. He was like, and so there is the example of, and you've talked about”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So we were set up in a way to fail because this was not meant to exist. And slave people starting their own country was not meant to exist. A lot of people have sit in and historians have said it like, how dare you? And I think to this day, Haiti's being told, how dare you? In many instances, when people, you know, when they've elected their leaders, when we've elected our leaders, then suddenly there's a coup or there's so I think the instability is not fully the fault of Haitians. I mean, we've had our part where people who have decided to turn against their own, but it's also something that has been set up to fail.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Haiti's history started, we started as a country with everything against us right there. Haitian revolution was an impossibility to so many people. So these enslaved people fought the French, the British, you know, the Spanish to start the First Black Republic, the first place in the world really enslaved people overcame their masters and started this nation in a world where slavery was the norm. So Haiti was shunned. We had to pay to the French for this independence until into the next century. And so I think there was so much stacked against us. And then in the early 1900s, you had the very long U.S. occupation and then the dictatorship.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We were reading Animal Farm and it was just really striking, you know, so like all the parallels in terms of like what your eyes are seeing you're not seeing so all that is very familiar in terms of like that whole thing of diminishing the press of course at full autocracy you you're not full then you kind of destroy the people who are giving the news but there are ways now with you know with the social media to do it”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think you're thinking of this whole thing of maybe that expression Tilly Joel, which is like the mouth that we call, I guess would be like Tilly. And that was a way that information is spread. I don't know. I think every culture has that kind of sort of rumor mill, if you will. I don't think that would be unique to Haitians. What I recognize in the whole fake news debate is sort of the gradual slide towards autocracy, certainly that is, those of us who have lived through dictatorship and other moments like that, you recognize the slippery slope, the demonization of media, the sort of forced silencing. The summer I was reading with my girls.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Of like many different ways that people get information. It remains like when we're in the country, if you don't have internet, it remains one way that you get used on the radio. But it's also, people also, I find even the older people in my life get a lot of news through their phones, through WhatsApp, through also through YouTube clips. So there's a constant loop of information now that radio is just one part of whereas for example when I was younger it was the primary if not the only source of information that we had”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Radio remains very important. For example, there are a lot of cultural figures, even younger people in Haiti who emerged out of radio culture and now have transitioned into more social media who do lives and Facebook, but who started out in radio. Radio certainly was very important when I was growing up. There weren't as many other outlets. But now I find, for example, my mother-in-law, who's 85, who lives with us. She's in Haiti most of the time, but in addition to, sometimes she'll watch a YouTube video about something that's happening in Haiti, but it will be a YouTube video of someone in a radio station and she can watch it on YouTube, someone can send a clip on WhatsApp. I think radio now is part of a series.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, but I think if you is it because they're Marasan because there are a lot of novels about twins as well, but they're written by people who are not from Haiti. Like I said, I think I don't object to that as an interpretation, but I don't think that's the only thing.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I didn't think of it that way. There's certainly twin loas in Vaudu, and these girls are twins. I'd always been fascinated by twins. But I think maybe that could be one interpretation, but that wasn't sort of how I started out, but I think that could be one interpretation”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“They have things, but they also, you know, they're members of the family also practice other religions. So to show the whole range of religious practices that there would be in a family like that, some of them also Protestant. And sometimes that actually leads to some conflicts within some families. So I like to show all the nuance of all that.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, it's part of Haitian culture. I try one of the things that when you were asking about the outside gaze of in Haitian literature, I think sometimes it's easy to fall into that trap of like, oh, let me throw in some vodue just to exotify things. So I try to, in my work, I try, you know, I treat it as a worldview. And some people might be practitioners, some people might not be, you know, and I also like to show a whole range of religious practices in my characters because not everybody is monolithic just as they're not in their behavior. They're not monolithic in their religious practice as well. I try to show it as a whole range of religious practice, like in Bretai's memory, for example, you know, the family certainly has, they have their family.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In Kain, for example, I think has worked with a lot of African American collectors, including some in Hollywood, but some ordinary people who collect as well. There's been, I think, also this marriage of African American art in some cases with Haitian art. Laurie Malu Jones, who went to Haiti, who has spent time there and kind of this connection there with some African American artists who are very aware of Haitian art as well.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Oh, I know a lot of African Americans who collect Haitian art, starting with, for example, Ishmael Reed, who his wife had a gallery, people like Danny Glover, and even friends that again, when we traveled with folks to Haiti, a lot of them were African American. And there are quite a few African American collectors. You know, I don't know my friend Kai Fabies, who has a gallery in LA called Galleri and she has quite, it's a wonderful gallery because it's in their home. Her husband Pascal is an artist who's worked with the artist and who do actually a really amazing urban sculptures with discarded like dolls and computer boards and sometimes skulls. They recently had a show here at Mocha.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The home of the sculptures, and now there's a whole industry in those sculptures for sure. And I have, I have to say, they're very hard. I agree. You can't just put that in your suitcase often like you were the paintings the way people used to roll them, but they're gorgeous and now they're almost three-dimensional, you know, like one Christmas we bought one that was like a nativity scene that was just like 3D but there are other, you know, there are a lot of wonderful young artists now that just some of them are moving away from sort of the more primitive naive there's so many whose names are escaping me but there are just wonderful artists worth exploring you mentioned Duval Callier who's outside of Haiti but there are quite a few other young artists who are inside Haiti or doing who use both”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“They're gorgeous. I have some, but the sculptures you're talking about, I think those were started actually. We used to call them, I used to work for Jonathan Demi, the filmmaker, who was a huge collector of Haitian art. And in the office, whenever we acquired those sculptures, when we bought, I traveled a lot to Haiti with him. And when he would buy, he called them Lyotos because the original artist was Lyoto. And when I was growing up, in cemeteries often you didn't, we had meadow flowers really because you would do like a wreath of metal with, and it would be metal from oil drums because that lasted longer, right, as opposed to like if you have a wreath of just like roses that dies quickly. So people would make these beautiful wreaths. And so Leoto was a great, he was from Saint Mark, which is really...”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I think if you stayed there, you would be reducing your possible level of enjoyment, right? Because what's most in that early period, you know, the Santoidar period in the 40s, like the early period when the tourism that you were talking about, when people went to Haiti, what they bought the most was what they call the naive primitive art, which is a super colorful, really beautiful figures, often market scenes. So that traveled very well. But there was always at that same time artists who are a little bit more adventurous, artists who are like somewhat abstract. At the same time that there were these artists who were like, this is what the tourists want. That's what I'm going to produce, right? And so throughout the Caribbean, even if you went to other islands, you would see these paintings. And they became almost a little bit mass produced.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You're talking and I'm working. And I felt like it was so powerful in terms of how you respond to sort of people who talk badly about you. It's like, you know, you're talking, I'm walking, you know, I'm working. And also the tap taps with the art sometimes like we'll have messages of gratitude. A tap-tap might have a message of gratitude to the driver's mother or to whoever contributed a lot of them or to the Jesus to God to the”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“When there's a time when I used to go, we had a program for college students every summer, and I used to love when they land to see the tap tap. So it's just really so striking because it just feels like, oh, I'm in this world full of art, you know. And it's like, they seem to be moving canvases. And what I love personally most about tap tab, even after you get used to the visual feast that they are, I love the sayings on them. And you would see like, you know, of course, basketball stars from here. I mean, I think at some point, like not too long ago, there was like 20 Morrison after she died was on a tap tap. People really soak what's happening around. But the sayings are also great. So there's one of my favorite sayings on the tap tap was”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's the mushroom. That's the key. And actually, you know, I've had, I live in Miami, and that gives me a little more access to Jong. And so I've had to ship to friends throughout the states. And there's a key to it in terms of just how you washing the mushroom and just the right. They try to make a kind of cube thing. But the cube thing is just not the same as just like the actual mushroom that you boil and you squeeze. And if you ever, like, some people, if you're from the north, my friends from the north will put some cashews in that. That's like another level with some cashews.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“If you know anybody who's Haitian on January 1st, go over their house for when we can go over people's houses again, go for Sujumu, which is a squash soup that we drink on the 1st of January to celebrate Haitian independence.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, because we just do, I'm perhaps biased, you know, I just have to say overall in the Caribbean, we have an amazing food. You know, there's wonderful food throughout the Caribbean. But I think Haitian food in particular I love because we have great spices and even if the food is a little fad in some cases, you have like the PCs, which is sort of a pickled cabbage carrot, like a spice, you know, that you sprinkle on top for people who like meat, there's grieo, which is pork, tasso, goat, and there's stuff that even if you're vegan, you can like my moulin, which is cornmeal. I think it's a very rich and wonderful cuisine, but I am biased. And I think if people who have not had Haitian food, you should definitely.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Some are good, you know, some are bad. There's some wonderful ones like Madison Smart Bell's trilogy also's rising in the Haitian Revolution. I think that those were wonderful. There's some really great ones. There's some that are a little cringy. But I wouldn't say to anybody that you can't write about it. I think really writers should be able to write whatever they want. You should expect people to respond. And I think if you do it with nuance and care, that's really important. The temptation, there are some tropes that often sometimes people just fall into when they're writing about Haiti, the zombie situation. Sometimes they approach it like it's never been done before. So I think if you do it with care, if you do it with Nuance. I'm open to reading it.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“An eyelid and I edited these two books Hady Noir and Hatinoir 2, in which we translated many contemporary Haitian writers. And then we have writers now who are Haitian, American, or Haitian Canadian like Roxanne Gay and Miriam Changsi who write directly in English. So it's a literature now that it's a kind of multi-language literature through my immigration and migration. And we have writers who are writing in Chile, in the Dominican Republic, in Spanish. And that's another growing layer of Haitian literature abroad, you know, that the Haitian literature that's so far mostly produced a lot of poetry in Spanish, but there was a novel before by a Haitian writer Nemislin Dusec, who had written one of the first novels about Haitian Spanish. So it's a growing, I mean, it's a linguistic”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's such a topic of discussion often among critics of Haitian literature. What language is Haitian literature written in? And I think now people, I mean, some people, I can't speak for everyone, but I think most people who study Haitian literature will say that it's now a multilingual literature. There's literature in Creole, certainly, which is probably closer to the primary language that most Haitians speak Creole. And that was slow to come. There was always literature in Creole, but not as much as there is now. Haitian literature is mostly written in French. And like you said, we've worked on translating. I've worked with others and translating, for example, a masterpiece of Haitian literature called Lis Pastor Simon by Jacques Stephen Alexi, which we translated with Carol Coates as in the flicker of”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And part of it, I think that tie, that connection is connected to the fact that there is that Haiti is often in crisis and people in the diaspora are often the first line responders, right? And after people in Haiti inside Haiti, you know, after Haitians and Haiti, but the Haitians diaspora, even within our families, if there's an illness, if there's, you know, and that sometimes extends to the larger community. I think there will be definitely there's integration. You know, I think, but I don't see, I think we have a diaspora that goes back further than people know, yet that connection to Haiti throughout the generations has been made. And then with these artists that you mentioned, Leila McCalla, she's a wonderful artist born of Haitian parents, yet her music reflects. At artists like Millie Salavaux, you know, you mentioned Bastia”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Because there's often so much happening in Haiti, let's say, that tie, you know, what we would call that lambit, you know, the umbilical cord is really married to Haiti. And even over several generations like the Haitians, who I know, I don't want to speak for everybody, remained very connected to Haiti and want their children to know Haiti and want that connection through language, through food, through music. So the diaspora, no diaspora is fully stable. There's, of course, there's integration, there's assimilation, that happens with every immigrant community over the generations, certainly for sure. But there's a certain tie to Haiti that the diaspora has that there's so many diaspora organizations that neighborhood organizations where people support schools in the neighborhoods where they come from, where they support organizations.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Important to us as readers. I'm a writer, but I'm also a reader. I appreciate art. I'm on the council of the Sancho Dar in Haiti, an esteemed institution that goes back several decades now. So there is still that culture. And it's really a powerful statement, I think, to Haitians and Haitian culture because there's so many obstacles all the time in the way of artists in Haiti. They still are thriving and are very, really wonderful, expressing what's happening very powerfully through their work.”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, I think that would be incorrect to say because there is still such a, there is a great vibrant culture inside Haiti and there are wonderful writers inside Haiti as well. There's wonderful visual artists, musicians. And so I think if you think of it like any other diaspora, there is sort of we're going to be like if you're in North America or if you're there's some mechanisms that make that our work more visible. My work is in English so naturally people have more access to it like more easily but there's a really strong and vibrant culture inside Haiti as well that people like us we feel fed by that we feel is still important”
2020-11-04 · Conversations with Tyler · Edwidge Danticat on Haitian Art and Literature · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source