Haiti Noir

Simidor rubs his eyes, turns to the other side of the bed and switches on the light for the last time. Is it day or night? The alarm clock says 4:53 p.m.

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

MADISON SMARTT BELL is the author of twelve novels and two story collections. In 2002, his novel Doctor Sleep was adapted as a film, Close Your Eyes. Bell’s eighth novel, All Souls’ Rising, the first volume in his Haitian Revolution trilogy, was a finalist for the 1995 National Book Award. Toussaint Louverture: A Biography appeared in 2007. Since 1984 he has taught at Goucher College, along with his wife, the poet Elizabeth Spires. He lives in Baltimore.

MARIE LILY CERAT is an educator and writer, and cofounder of the group Haitian Women for Haitian Refugees. Cerat has published a West African folktale in 1997; a commentary for NPR as part of the 2001 Conference on Racism in South Africa; and two essays in the Ten Speed Press book Vodou: Visions and Voices of Haiti. She is a contributor to Haiti Liberté and at work on a novel, In the Light of Shooting Stars.

LOUIS-PHILIPPE DALEMBERT is a novelist, short story writer, poet, and essayist born in Port-au-Prince. His books have been awarded the Villa Médicis and Casa de las Américas prizes, and he has been honored with grants from DAAD in Germany and UNESCO-Aschberg in Israel. Since his departure from Haiti in 1986, Dalembert has lived in many cities, including Paris, Rome, Port-au-Prince again, Jerusalem, and Florence. He now lives in Berlin.

EDWIDGE DANTICAT was was born in Haiti and moved to the United States when she was twelve. She is the author of two novels, two collections of stories, three books for children and young adults, and three nonfiction titles. In 2009, she received a MacArthur Fellowship. Her most recent books are Eight Days and Create Dangerously.

RODNEY SAINT-ÉLOI was born in Cavaillon, Haiti. He is a poet and memoirist, as well as the founder of Memoire d’encrier, a Montreal-based publishing house. His poetry collections include Graffiti pour l’aurore (Graffiti for the Dawn), Pierre anonymes (Anonymous Stones), and J’ai un arbre dans ma pirogue (I Have a Tree in My Canoe). His memoir on the January 12, 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Goudougoudou, was published in France in the fall of 2010.

M.J. FIEVRE’S short stories and poems have appeared in P’an Ku, The Mom Egg, Healthy Stories, Writer’s Digest, Caribbean Writer, Pocket Smut, and 365 Days of Flash Fiction. She is a regular contributor to the online publication the Nervous Breakdown and a contributing editor for Vis.A.Vis magazine. She is the founding editor of Sliver of Stone magazine.

MARK KURLANSKY has written twenty books of fiction, nonfiction, and children’s books, and has translated a novel by Emile Zola. Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World, Salt: A World History, and Nonviolence: The History of a Dangerous Idea are among his best-known books. As a newspaper reporter, he covered Haiti and the Caribbean for eight years, and he continues to write on Caribbean themes.

YANICK LAHENS is the author of three short story collections, including Tante Réisa et les dieux, La petite corruption, and La folie était venue avec la pluie; and two award-winning novels, Dans la maison du père and La couleur de l’aube, which has been translated into Italian and German. Her next book, Failles, about the earthquake in Haiti, will be published in France in 2011. She lives and works in Haiti.

JOSAPHAT-ROBERT LARGE was born in Haiti in 1942 and moved to the United States in 1963 during the Duvalier dictatorship. He then studied English at Columbia University. A poet and novelist, he writes in French, Creole, and English. He is the author of five novels and four collections of poems. His novel Les terres entourées de larmes (Paris, 2002), was awarded the Grand Literary Prize of the French Caribbean in 2003.