{"id":247511,"date":"2025-02-26T22:51:15","date_gmt":"2025-02-26T22:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/26\/franketienne-father-of-haitian-letters-is-dead-at-88\/"},"modified":"2025-02-26T22:51:15","modified_gmt":"2025-02-26T22:51:15","slug":"franketienne-father-of-haitian-letters-is-dead-at-88","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/26\/franketienne-father-of-haitian-letters-is-dead-at-88\/","title":{"rendered":"Frank\u00e9tienne, Father of Haitian Letters, Is Dead at 88"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/02\/28\/multimedia\/25franketienne--02-kvlj-print1\/25franketienne--02-kvlj-facebookJumbo.jpg?ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"Frank\u00e9tienne, Father of Haitian Letters, Is Dead at 88\" title=\"Frank\u00e9tienne, Father of Haitian Letters, Is Dead at 88\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-0\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The Haitian artist and writer known as Frank\u00e9tienne, who published the first novel written entirely in Haitian Creole and who, as the nation\u2019s foremost literary lion, refracted its chaos and disorder through art, died on Thursday at his home in Port-au-Prince, the nation\u2019s capital. He was 88.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The Haitian Culture Ministry announced the death. The cause was not specified.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThrough his writings, he illuminated the world, carried the soul of Haiti and defied silence,\u201d Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aim\u00e9 said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Frank\u00e9tienne was a prolific novelist, poet and painter \u2014 often all three in a single work \u2014 whose art embraced and interpreted the chaos of the small, tumultuous country he came from.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cI am not afraid of chaos because chaos is the womb of light and life,\u201d he said in a 2011 <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2011\/04\/30\/world\/americas\/30haiti.html\" title=\"\">interview<\/a> with The New York Times at his rambling gallery and home, in a working-class district of Port-au-Prince. \u201cWhat I don\u2019t like is nonmanagement of chaos. The reason Haiti looks more chaotic is because of nonmanagement. \u2018\u2019<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-1\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">While not well known in the English-speaking world, Frank\u00e9tienne was a larger-than-life figure in Haiti and was celebrated in French and Creole-speaking literary and diaspora circles around the world. He garnered an Order of Arts and Letters award in France, and his lively, unpredictable appearances drew crowds.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">His output was varied and extensive, including some 50 written works in French and Haitian Creole and thousands of paintings and sketches, characterized by spirals of blacks, blues and reds, often with poems layered in.<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"imageblock-wrapper\">\n<figure class=\"img-sz-small css-1189og3 e1g7ppur0\" aria-label=\"media\" role=\"group\"><figcaption data-testid=\"photoviewer-children-caption\" class=\"css-13ytnnu ewdxa0s0\"><span class=\"css-jevhma e13ogyst0\">Frank\u00e9tienne\u2019s \u201cD\u00e9zafi,\u201d published in 1975, was the first novel written in Haitian Creole. A looping, experimental work, it is seen as an allegory for slavery and political oppression.<\/span><span class=\"css-14fe1uy e1z0qqy90\"><span class=\"css-1ly73wi e1tej78p0\">Credit&#8230;<\/span><span><span aria-hidden=\"false\">Uva Press<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\"> Writing the novel \u201cD\u00e9zafi\u201d \u2014 published in 1975 and translated as \u201cCockfight\u201d \u2014 in Haitian Creole was an important milestone for the language, derived from French colonizers and enslaved Africans, with a strong oral storytelling tradition. It is a looping, experimental work laced with poetry and elements of magical realism. The plot, involving Voodoo priests set upon by people they have put in a deathlike state, has come to be seen as an allegory of slavery and political oppression.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The novel was also a classic example of Spiralism, a Haitian literary movement, which he founded in the 1960s with the writers Ren\u00e9 Philoct\u00e8te and Jean-Claude Fignol\u00e9, characterized by the idea of self-perpetuating chaos and creativity.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-2\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">His play \u201cPelin Tet\u2019\u2019 also took a biting look at Jean-Claude Duvalier, the dictator known as Baby Doc who ruled Haiti in the 1970s and \u201980s, told through the lives of Haitian immigrants in New York recalling their time back home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Yet even during the tumultuous years of dictatorships and the 2010 earthquake that devastated the country, Frank\u00e9tienne stayed. He said he believed that his works were too baroque to attract interest from Haiti\u2019s succession of autocratic governments, and that disaster was merely a part of life.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Besides, he said, Haiti was his muse.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-3\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThrough the enigmatic, chaotic and mysterious massif of Haiti, the Divine Intelligence of universal energy has given me everything,\u201d Frank\u00e9tienne, speaking in his usual enigmatic style, told UNESCO in 2023 when the organization designated him an Artist for Peace.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Indeed, a conversation with Frank\u00e9tienne could take on flights of fancy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Kaiama L. Glover, an African American studies professor at Yale who has translated his works, recalled moderating a discussion with him in 2009 during which he leaped to his feet, ripped open his shirt to reveal prayer beads and began singing Voodoo prayers to make a point.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-4\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cHe was just bellowing and calling on the spirits to express an answer on what it means to write in French and Creole,\u201d Professor Glover said in an interview.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-5\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He and his studio became a magnet for aspiring writers and artists of all kind. He lived there with his wife, Marie-Andr\u00e9e \u00c9tienne, a son, Rudolphe, and a daughter, St\u00e9phane, all of whom survive him. His survivors also include a number of grandchildren.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The Haitian American writer Edwidge Danticat, who appeared with Frank\u00e9tienne at conferences in Haiti and Miami and whose parents brought her to see his plays when they were performed in Brooklyn, said his death leaves a big gap.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cBut as I\u2019m sure he would say, the spiral continues in the generation that, in part, he helped nurture and which continues in his wake,\u201d she said in an interview.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-6\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cHis novels and plays extended our vocabulary, expanding how we express love, passion, humor and rage,&#8221; she said. \u201cHis love for Haiti was so deep that sometimes he had to invent words to express it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Frank\u00e9tienne did get wider notice after the 2010 earthquake. Two months before it struck, he had written a play, \u201cThe Trap,\u201d depicting two men in a postapocalyptic landscape, and its themes and setting resonated with audiences far beyond Haiti. After it was first presented, at a UNESCO conference in Paris, demand for his written work and paintings soared, and his art was featured in exhibitions in New York.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-7\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Frank\u00e9tienne was born Jean-Pierre Basilic Dantor Franck \u00c9tienne d\u2019Argent on April 12, 1936, in Ravine-S\u00e8che, an impoverished rural village in northwest Haiti. He was born to a Black mother, Annette \u00c9tienne, who worked as a street vendor selling cigarettes, charcoal, candy and moonshine, while raising eight children, and a white father, Benjamin Lyles, an American businessman who abandoned the family.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cMy mother was an illiterate peasant and she had me when she was 16,\u201d Frank\u00e9tienne said in 2011. \u201cShe was taken in by an American, a very rich American. The American was 63.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-8\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He was raised in the Bel-Air neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, where his fair skin and blue eyes often drew stares. He was the oldest child, and his mother struggled to finance his schooling.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The school he attended was French, and he was teased because he didn\u2019t speak French. Angry, he set about mastering the language and developed an affinity for words and artistic expression.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He later combined two of his names as he embarked on an artistic and literary career. He began writing poetry in the early 1960s as a student at the \u00c9cole Nationale des Hautes \u00c9tudes Internationales in Paris and in 1968 published his first novel, \u201cM\u00fbr \u00e0 Crever\u201d (\u201cReady to Burst\u201d). <\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He started writing plays, he said, because in Haiti, where nearly half the population is illiterate, so few could read his novels.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He had a penchant for prophecies, including, years before the coronavirus pandemic, predicting that he would die in 2020. Friends and scholars then nervously watched the pandemic unfold, wondering if Frank\u00e9tienne had been on to something.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cHis prediction was five years too early,\u201d Professor Glover said, \u201cand so we got more time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-798hid etfikam0\">Steven Moity<!-- --> contributed reporting.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/02\/26\/world\/americas\/franketienne-dead.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Haitian artist and writer known as Frank\u00e9tienne, who published the first novel written entirely in Haitian Creole and who, as the nation\u2019s foremost literary lion, refracted its chaos and disorder through art, died on Thursday at his home in Port-au-Prince, the nation\u2019s capital. He was 88. The Haitian Culture Ministry announced the death. The [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":247512,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/02\/28\/multimedia\/25franketienne--02-kvlj-print1\/25franketienne--02-kvlj-facebookJumbo.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[18661,168170,169,163460,7177,191879,191877,191878,1418,4844,33496,169383],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247511"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247511"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247511\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":247513,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247511\/revisions\/247513"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/247512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}