Libete: A Haiti Anthology [Hardcover]

Libète is a wide-ranging and compelling anthology of writing on Haiti. As the title suggests, the Haitian people's struggle for freedom from oppression is the focus, but the editors manage to weave a lot more than history and politics into the work. The selections are interesting and concise, and well organized into chapters with equally concise introductions. Libète is invaluable as an introduction to Haiti, but also will fill in knowledge gaps for most Haiti veterans, and is a handy reference on the bookshelf.

The book's breadth is striking: 187 selections, mostly excerpts, are grouped into ten chapters, including history, politics, rural and urban life, refugees, culture and literature. The selections are well chosen, and represent much of the best that has been written about Haiti. Selections date from the end of the 15th century to the end of the 20th; their authors hail from Haiti, Europe, North America and the Caribbean. The selections include primary and secondary non-fiction, as well as novels, poetry and photographs. The writers were (and are) participants, chroniclers, anthropologists, scholars and artists.

Libète's brevity is equally impressive: all that is crammed into 352 pages. Each selection can be read in a few spare minutes, each chapter in an hour or two (I first read it over a month of breakfasts). The price of this breadth and brevity is depth: although the editing is skillful, no skill can distill a book adequately into a page or two, especially a great one, nor adequately treat a complex subject in two-dozen pages. In this sense, Libète is not an end in itself, but a starting point. The reader should keep this limitation in mind, and use the book as inspiration and guide to further reading.

Each chapter begins with a short introduction by the editors, which places the selections in context and fills in some of the gaps between them. Libète ends with a comprehensive index and citations for all included material. It does not, unfortunately, contain a bibliography discussing the useful material that did not make the final cut.

Although the various authors represent a diversity of perspectives, Libète is assembled consciously from an activist point of view. The principal editor is the coordinator of the London-based Haiti Support Group, and a long-time supporter of Haiti's democratic transition. The book reflects an activist's adoption of Haiti's poor majority as the starting point for analysis, as well as an emphasis on the adverse impacts of a host of "isms" - colonialism, imperialism, racism and capitalism - on Haitians' struggle for freedom, especially freedom from poverty.

About half of Libète chronicles the series of oppressions that have kept Haiti's majority vulnerable to exploitation. They include outsiders, from Columbus' explorers to the French slave-holders, the occupying U.S. Marines, and the current enforcers of neo-liberal economic policy. They also include home-grown oppression - brutal political and military potentates, and the economic elites they served. The book shows how the poor in Haiti were kept in their place with force, including slavery, war and civilian massacres, but also with law, politics, diplomacy, land tenure, social structures, the economy and the education system.

Libète does not, however, treat Haiti and Haitians as mere objects of these large forces. Its other half chronicles the courage, creativity, resourcefulness and persistence of Haitians as they wage their perpetual uphill battle for freedom. This resistance uses brute force when it has to, but also art, literature, song, politics, social organization, work and even botany where it can. Although it often seems to be losing the war, Libète points out the many areas where the struggle has carved out space for freedom to express, to create, to vote and to live. The book highlights Haitians' agency by featuring Haitian voices, in works of fiction, newspaper articles, interviews and essays, many of them for the first time in English.

Libète does not speak directly to some of the current debates raging about Haiti, but that may be one of its strengths. By focusing on the issues that are important over the long-term, it provides an example of looking past the petty internecine battles that have plagued Haitians' struggle for freedom, to the more vital long-term work to be done. The long view also extends the book's shelf life: by not depending on today's events, the selections, and the editors' analyses ensure their relevance for a long time to come (sadly, until "Libète" is achieved).

Libète is an excellent introduction to Haiti, possibly the best in English. A student, visitor or solidarity activist who had read nothing else on Haiti would have a pretty good idea of what was going on in a variety of fields. It is equally useful for veterans: it points out the gaps that we all have in our knowledge, and shows where we can go to fill these gaps. It is also a good reference for the specialist's shelf, for quick access to subjects outside one's expertise.