click here - Autumn Hill Books

Beaudelaine Pierre
Preface
Comment écrire et quoi écrire: how to write, and what to write. In front
of you is a collection of texts from Haitian poets and writers describing
the earthquake of January 12th, 2010 the way they lived it.
The volume takes its french title from the piece by novelist Yannick
Lahens, in which she reflects on the role of the writer as a builder of
history.
The project took off in the immediate wake of the earthquake. On
the initiative of the International Writing Program at the University
of Iowa, a dozen writers and poets answered the call and took up the
challenge. In spite of everything, with deliberation and care, they
made the effort to put into words that which was overwhelming, that
which could barely be grasped. for how can the day of January 12th
be written? How, and why, should one attempt the painful task of
pulling out from the debris materials for a collective identity?
In this volume we have gathered some words. Nothing but words.
With the hope that in bringing them together we will give ourselves
and those who come after us a sense of who we are and of what will
unite us from now on. for how not to write? Shouldn’t the writer,
too, have her place in the rebuilding?
In adding to the now coined ‘literature of 1/12/2010,’ the contributors
to this collection assert and reestablish once again the sacred role
of literature in the construction of memory, out of which identity is
born. Because for all the pain that turns sobs into bleeding wounds
and for all the memories tearing up our guts, the pen will not rest,
nor will the words remain silent. The authors of this volume understand
that no matter what, it is essential that it should be we, the
daughters and sons of Haiti and the generations coming after us, who
must build ourselves up to rebuild our world, drawing on the sense
we make of our memories and of our past.
Pierre / Preface
contents
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