Poetry of Revolution: Romanticism and National Projects

(Sean Pound) #1

is interesting to note the way in which Emile Nau, in this same essay, addresses the topic that


other editors and contributors have debated, that of imitation. Lamenting that “l’imitation de la


manière et du faire des poètes européens est plus ingrate et plus stérile ici qu’ailleurs...” his


earlier comments about mythology in Haitian poetry frame the topic much differently than one


might anticipate.^89 Citing Racine as an example, Nau claims with exasperation the inutility and


the inappropriateness of classical poetry and mythological allusions in Haiti of his day. Not only


is Nau in this way speaking against imitation of French classicism (as opposed to French


Romanticism), but more covertly, he is criticizing poetry which pleases or praises a current king,


president, or other Haitian leader. The rejection of writers like Racine is then a political one as


well as a generational one, as Haitian intellectuals in the 1830s are looking for features to


distinguish themselves from the poets born in colonial Saint-Domingue. In this way, the debate


is a bataille des anciens et modernes reproduced in Haiti. Several interspersed comments in


L’Union qualify these writers as belonging squarely in the seventeenth century with no relevance


for nineteenth-century Haiti, and Old Testament Biblical references do not carry the same


association with this previous generation of Haitian writers. As one of L’Union’s anonymous


contributor notes “D’ailleurs, pouvons-nous être indifférents au mouvement littéraire de l’Europe


[...] surtout à la littérature française...” Calling Romantic poetry “l’école poétique moderne,”


(my emphasis) he insists that “il est nécessaire que l’on fasse connaissance avec les


romantiques.”^90 It can be said that the choice for Romanticism was also then a choice to be


modern, a way to modernize and to revolutionize literature in Haiti, cultivating a personal and


national expression which would also be recognized and have relevance outside of Haiti.


(^89) L’Union le 16 novembre 1837.
(^90) L’Union le 27 juillet 1837.

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