A love of literature and a summer with relatives in Belgium—a country divided by language and culture—inspired me to travel to Santo Domingo in 1988 to learn Spanish and study the fraught dynamics of two countries speaking different languages but sharing an island. My time in the Dominican Republic and Haiti inspired a lifelong exploration of complex issues. Today I write about risk, drawing on psychology, culture, policy, and economics, as in Why the Cocks Fight. My third book, The Gray Rhino, calls for a fresh look at obvious, looming threats. The sequel, You Are What You Risk, explores risk perceptions and attitudes through a comparative, socio-cultural lens.
I wrote...
Why the Cocks Fight: Dominicans, Haitians, and the Struggle for Hispaniola
Like two roosters in a fighting arena, Haiti and the Dominican Republic are trapped by barriers of geography and poverty. One French-speaking and black, one Spanish-speaking and mulatto, the two countries co-inhabit the Caribbean island of Hispaniola. They share a national symbol in the rooster and a favorite sport in the cockfight. Just as the owners of gamecocks contrive battles between their birds as a way of playing out human conflicts, Haitian and Dominican leaders often stir up nationalist disputes and exaggerate cultural and racial differences in order to deflect other tensions. Why the Cocks Fight explores the relations of each nation with each other and with colonial powers including the United States; and how their shared history impacts contemporary dynamics.
It’s impossible to understand contemporary Haiti without recognizing the impact of the 2010 earthquake that devastated the country, taking an estimated 300,000 lives and destroying many of the iconic historical sites in the capital city, Port-au-Prince. Chancy’s powerful novel of tragedy and resilience depicts the lead-up to and aftermath of Haiti’s 2010 earthquake via the interlinked stories of ten characters from different walks of life. These stories drive home both how different the experience of Haiti can be depending on socioeconomic class and race; yet also how connected so many Haitian stories are to each other.
A NPR, Boston Globe, New York Public Library, Chicago Public Library, and Library Journal Best Book of the Year
“Stunning.” —Margaret Atwood
At the end of a long, sweltering day, an earthquake of 7.0 magnitude shakes the capital of Haiti, Port-au-Prince. Award-winning author Myriam J. A. Chancy masterfully charts the inner lives of the characters affected by the disaster—Richard, an expat and wealthy water-bottling executive with a secret daughter; the daughter, Anne, an architect who drafts affordable housing structures for a global NGO; a small-time drug trafficker, Leopold, who pines for…
The work of this rightfully acclaimed Haitian-American writer spans nonfiction and fiction, weaving historical memory in with present-day Haiti. This 2004 novel, told through related short stories, draws its title from the name of torturers under the regimes of the Duvaliers, father and son: François “Papa Doc” from 1957 to 1971 and Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” from 1971 until a popular uprising sent him into exile in 1986. Danticat draws on that period as well as contemporary issues like the ordeals of immigrants; the police killing of Haitian immigrant Patrick Dorismond in New York in 2000; the FRAPH government thugs who terrorized Haitians after the ouster of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide; the experiences of Haitian women; and the impact of trauma on families and relationships.
We meet him late in life: a quiet man, a good father and husband, a fixture in his Brooklyn neighborhood, a landlord and barber with a terrifying scar across his face. As the book unfolds, moving seamlessly between Haiti in the 1960s and New York City today, we enter the lives of those around him, and learn that he has also kept a vital, dangerous secret. Edwidge Danticat’s brilliant exploration of the “dew breaker”--or torturer--s an unforgettable story of love, remorse, and hope; of personal and political rebellions; and of the compromises we make to move beyond the most intimate…
The first time I went to Haiti, I stayed at the Hotel Oloffson, which appeared as the “Hotel Trianon” in this classic 1966 novel by a literary legend, later a movie starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. The Comedians depicts Haiti under the rule of the dictator "Papa Doc" Duvalier and his feared trenchmen, thetontons macoutes, named for the feared Uncle Strawsack of Haitian folklore (and the predecessors of FRAPH). Duvalier of course was long gone, but I briefly met the gossip columnist, Aubelin Jolicoeur, who inspired Greene’s character Petit Pierre. In the novel, the white Victorian “gingerbread” style hotel is owned by an Englishman, Brown, who is pulled into various political intrigues after a government minister commits suicide in the hotel pool.
Three men meet on a ship bound for Haiti, a world in the grip of the corrupt "Papa Doc" and the Tontons Macoute, his sinister secret police. Brown the hotelier, Smith the innocent American and Jones the confidence man are the "Comedians" of Graham Greene's title.
The Haitian writer narrates this 1955 novel about the 1937 massacre of Haitians in the Dominican Republic via a laborer, Hilarion, who is thrown into prison for petty theft and politically awakened by a fellow inmate (a stand-in for the author). After he is released, he meets his love, Claire-Heureuse. Political upheaval sends them across the Dominican border, where he cuts cane then joins in a strike. When the Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo orders an ethnic cleansing, Hilarion is mortally wounded as he tries to return to Haiti across the Massacre River along the northern border.
An English translation of "Compere General Soleil", published in France in 1955. This novel depicts the nightmarish journey of a labourer and his wife from the slums of Port-au-Prince to the cane fields of the Dominican Republic, and personifies the sun as friend and leader of the workers.
The celebrated Cuban author employs the Latin American trope of magical realism in this novel of the Haitian Revolution that created the world’s first Black republic on New Year’s Day 1801. Through the eyes of the slave Ti Noël, readers meet some of the most celebrated figures of Haitian history: the legendary one-armed houngan(Vodou priest) Mackandal, the independence leader Boukman, and the first emperor of the North, Henri-Christophe. As a freedman, Ti Noël becomes disillusioned with the brutality under the new regime, including the conditions endured by workers building the Citadel fortress.
I’m an old guy. I say this with a bit of cheek and a certain amount of incongruity. All the books on my list are old. That’s one area of continuity. Another, and I’ll probably stop at two, is that they all deal with ordinary people caught in extraordinary circumstances—those curveballs of life we flail at with an unfamiliar bat; the getting stuck on the Interstate behind a semi and some geezer in a golf cap hogging the passing lane in a Buick Le Sabre. No one makes it through this life unscathed. How we cope does more to define us than a thousand smiles when things are rosy. Thus endeth the lesson.
Nine Stories Told Completely in Dialogue is a unique collection of narratives, each unfolding entirely through conversations between its characters. The book opens with "God on a Budget," a tale of a man's surreal nighttime visitation that offers a blend of the mundane and the mystical. In "Doctor in the House," readers are plunged into the emotionally charged moment when an oncologist delivers a life-altering diagnosis to a patient. The collection then shifts to "Prisoner 8086," a story about the unlikely friendship that blossoms between a prison volunteer and a habitual offender, exploring themes of redemption and human connection.
The heart of the book continues with "The Reunion," a touching narrative about high school sweethearts reuniting, stirring up poignant memories and unspoken feelings. "The Therapy Session" adds a lighter touch, presenting a serio-comic exchange between a therapist and a challenging patient. In "The Fishing Trip," a father imparts crucial life lessons to his daughter during an eventful outing, leading to unexpected consequences. "Mortality" offers a deeply personal moment as a mother shares a cherished, secret story from her past with her son.
The collection then takes a romantic turn in "The Singles Cruise," where two individuals find connection amidst shared stories on a cruise for singles. Finally, "Jesus and Buddha in the Garden of Eden" provides a satirical, thought-provoking encounter in the afterlife between two spiritual figures. The book concludes with "The Breakup," a nuanced portrayal of a young couple's separation, told from both perspectives, encapsulating the complexities of relationships and the human experience.
Nine Stories Told Completely in Dialogue is a unique collection of narratives, each unfolding entirely through conversations between its characters. The book opens with "God on a Budget," a tale of a man's surreal nighttime visitation that offers a blend of the mundane and the mystical. In "Doctor in the House," readers are plunged into the emotionally charged moment when an oncologist delivers a life-altering diagnosis to a patient. The collection then shifts to "Prisoner 8086," a story about the unlikely friendship that blossoms between a prison volunteer and a habitual offender, exploring themes of redemption and human connection.
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