Haitian Revolution Wall Of Fire Rising Summary

Haitian Revolutions Wall of Fire Rising

Edwidge Danticat was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti in 1969. Her parents separately moved to the United States in the next several years, and then Danticat followed them there at the age of 12. Danticat grew up speaking French and Creole and she spoke no English upon moving to the United States. However, after only two years, she began writing in English and now is an accomplished writer of English short stories and novels. Her work has been translated into several languages including Korean, Italian, German, Spanish and Swedish. Her first published writing in English became the inspiration for her first novel, Breath, Eyes, Memory. She has also published a collection of short stories, Krik? Krak! , and an additional novel The Farming of the Bones. Her own life experiences have provided background and inspiration for her writing. Danticat's short stories and novels focus on

recurring themes such as migration, sexuality, gender and history. In her short story A Wall of Fire Rising, Danticat so expertly paints the realities of the young family’s life, indeed a nearly every Haitian life: perpetual, unemployed, starvation, crushing poverty.
The Republic of Haiti is the second oldest independent nation in the Western Hemisphere. The people who occupied the island of Hispaniola at the beginning of the 16th century when Europeans first arrived in significant numbers rapidly succumbed to imported diseases, died in battle, or were killed off by slavery in the first 50 years of Spanish occupation. The Europeans then brought slaves from Africa. These slaves primarily worked the sugar cane plantations that made the French colony of Saint Domingue an economic success. This success, however, was based on unimaginable brutality and cruelty, and in 1789 the slaves began their 5-year struggle for freedom. On January 1, 1804, the ex-slaves of Saint Domingue renamed their country Haiti and proclaimed its independence. From 1915 until 1934 the United States occupied Haiti and suppressed peasant movements, revamped the army, and concentrated sociopolitical power in Portau-Prince. Until 1946 the Haitian administrations were pale reflections of U.S. political interests in the Caribbean. Then from 1946 to 1950 President Dumarsais Estimé ushered in a progressive era that saw an interest in African heritage, cooperation with other Caribbean nations, the development of peasant economic cooperation, the introduction of progressive income tax, expanded education and economic opportunities for the poor, and the rise of a middle class. In 1957 President François Duvalier emerged as the proclaimed heir to Estimé. The Duvalier regime was marked by brutal oppression against opponents and isolation from the international community. Many professionals fled into exile, and the economy descended into a serious slump. With the 1971 transition from Duvalier to his 19-year-old son Jean-Claude, the United States guided Haiti to a new economic program that featured private investments from the United States featuring no custom taxes, a very low minimum wage, the suppression of labor unions, and the right of U.S. companies to repatriate their profits. For most of the population living conditions continued to decline. In February 1986 Jean-Claude Duvalier fled to France, and an era ended. After several provisional governments the popular priest Jean-Bertrand Aristide was elected president and installed in office in February 1991—5 years to the day after the end of the Duvalier dynasty. Despite the widespread popularity of Aristide and the heightened expectations of the masses, the military ousted Aristide after only 7 months. No government or state except the Vatican recognized the de facto military regime. This brutal and illegal 3-year occupation of Haiti by its own army saw a rapid downward spiral in the economic and health conditions of Haitians. Under U.S. sponsorship Aristide was returned to power in. October 1994. Since Aristide could not succeed himself, his protege René Préval was elected and took office in February 1996. Four years later Aristide was again elected president and took office in February 2001.
After defeating the colonial government of the French slave owners the newly independent nation faced the threat of a French army returning to re-enslave them.

To counter this perceived threat, the new government at first confiscated private land and imposed forced labor in an attempt to develop an export agriculture leading to the importation of war material. Such a plan proved impractical, and eventually the confiscated plantations were distributed to the ex-slaves and the Haitian elite retreated to the provincial cities. The result was the fragmentation of land holdings, peasantization, and the alienation of the masses from the government and the ruling elites. Currently an estimated 80% of the rural population owns its own land, though the plots are fragmented and small, and about 65% of the labor force is in agriculture. Despite the importance of agriculture and the peasantization of Haiti, the government traditionally expends little effort or money on agricultural research or on integrating the rural population into the politics of the

country.
Haiti's primary export products have traditionally been coffee, sugar, rice, and cocoa, though the political uncertainties of recent decades have meant a low rate of export. Haiti has some light manufacturing along with a few cotton mills. Before the so-called de facto regime, when offshore industries were in operation, Haiti was a major source of garments, toys, baseballs, and electronic goods for the United States. Many people engage in the manufacture of tools and small items. Market women from the rural areas bargain their produce in open-air markets, and most of this produce moves by foot as these women often carry heavy loads. All sorts of merchandise may be found in the city markets, including black-market items. Much of the trading is done in kind. The annual per capita monetary income is estimated at only US$480.
A Wall of Fire Rising is a haunting tale of a fathers shame, a mothers love, and child’s innocent belief, all centered around the impossibly hopeful subject of a classroom play about a hero of Haitian Revolution and a hot air balloon. Yet in the character of Lili, the mother, there is hope and a parent's eternal desire to achieve a better life for her son through education. Even the name of the child represents the father's hope that the life of his child will better than his, that there is always generational improvement. Lili is proud of her husband; "a man is judged by his deeds," she tells him. "The boy never goes to bed hungry". (Wall of Fire Rising, pg. 237). But Guy is unconvinced. He is frustrated with his inability to give his family security and ashamed of the menial work he does. While Guy loves his family, they only serve to remind him of him of his own failure. In fact, he sees a cycle of despair and remembers his own father as a low-income struggling man all his life. "I remember him as a man I would never want to be," he tells Lili. In the hot air balloon owned by the rich son of the sugar refinery, Guy sees freedom. "Can't you see yourself up there? Up in the clouds somewhere like some kind of bird?" he asks Lili. (pg. 234) For him, the drudgery of life is suspended momentarily by the miracle of flight and escape. What Guy decides to do next will leave Lili and Little Guy forever changed. Yet, with the constant enslavement of poverty and no hope of relief (and to the encouraging shouts below of "Go beautiful, go!")(pg. 239), Guy chooses, perhaps for the first time in his life, a kind of freedom. Danticat's thoroughly engrossing stories represent the lives of many of UUSC's partners in Haiti. Through them, we can begin to understand the difficulties they face — and moreover, the heroic lives they lead, forever hopeful of achieving freedom.