Brother I'm Dying

When Edwidge Danticat was a young child, her parents emigrated to the United States. For eight years, she and her brother, Bob, lived with her aunt and uncle, Joseph and Denise in Haiti. In her moving memoir, Brother I’m Dying, Danticat chronicles her family’s history.

During their years apart, she communicates with her family through sparse letters and brief phone calls.

After moving to the United States, Dantitcat remains close with her uncle, visiting him many times. Her family refers to her uncle as their second father. When Joseph arrives for a visit, her father says:

“Do you see your children,” my father blurted out as though he’d been waiting a long time to say it. “Do you see how much they’ve grown.”

In later years both her uncle and father are in poor health. After UN troops use the roof of her uncle’s church as a base to fire their weapons, he finds himself in serious danger. Even though he had no control over what the troops did and they fired from many people’s roof, gangs threaten Joseph and his church and home are looted. A neighbor smuggles him out of the neighborhood in a disguise and he eventually flies to the United States. (He had a trip planned). When he arrives, Joseph requests temporary asylum.

It’s then, unfortunately, things take a turn for the worse. Joseph – an 81 year old with health problems, is placed in detention. He dies shortly after – in the prison ward of a hospital, unable to see his family. When he becomes sick during an asylum hearing, a medic even claims that he’s faking it. Just five months later, Danticat’s father also dies after fighting pulmonary fibrosis.

I’m woefully ignorant of Haiti’s history. It’s one of political unrest, oppression and violence. When he was a small boy, Joseph was ordered to not go too far home because his family was worried American troops would make him work in gangs rebuilding bridges and roads. His brother urged him many times to leave arguing that there was too much violence in his neighborhood. Joseph did not want to leave his church and neighbor’s.

This is a gripping, elegant, heart breaking memoir with a tragic ending. Danticat loses both her uncle and father in close succession. Shortly after her uncle dies she gives birth to her daughter, Mira, who she named after her father.

The family can’t bury Joseph in Haiti because gangs threaten to burn his corpse. He’s buried in New York.

“He shouldn’t be here” my father said … “If our country were ever given a chance and allowed to be a country like any other, none of us would live or die here.”

******

“And I’m my imaging, whenever they lose track of one another one of the other calls out in a voice that echoes throughout the hills, “Kote w ye fre m?” “Brother where are you?”

And the other one quickly answers, “Mwen la. Right here, brother. I’m right here.”

Additional reading

A Haitian family, linked by love, must learn to live on separate shores, http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0911/p13s02-bogn.html

NBCC Award Finalists in Autobiography: Edwidge Danticat's "Brother, I'm Dying," http://bookcriticscircle.blogspot.com/2008/01/nbcc-award-finalists-in-autobiography.html

Edwidge Danticat, Dealing with Birth and Death, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=14721447

Even More Junot Diaz

Fresh Air is currently running older episodes. It recently aired an interview with Junot Diaz, who wrote The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.

Regular Dear Reader readers may recall I really enjoyed this book. In this Fresh Air interview, they describe Oscar as the “ghetto nerd at the end of the world.”

Diaz speaks about his book, his upbringing and the Dominican Republic. He even does a reading from his novel.

One thing I thought was interesting was his discussion about the different languages in The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. There were parts I didn't understand whether it was Spanish or SciFi references I didn't get. Diaz notes that he wanted there to be one language chain that the reader doesn't get. "I wanted everyone to know what it felt like to be an immigrant," he said.

I’m currently reading Brother I’m Dying – a memoir by Edwidge Danticat. It’s interesting to read about the other side of the island – Haiti, which similarly to the Dominican has a history of unrest.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90111248&ft=1&f=1032

Best Books of 2007

Bookmarks magazine has compiled multiple best books of 2007 lists and created a handy score card. Now those of you at home keeping track of these things, can learn that The Yiddish Policeman's Union and The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao tied for the most mentions - 11 each.

For those of you unfamiliar with Bookmarks, it compiles book reviews, summarizes reviewers comments and gives them an overall score. There's also feature articles and news. I think it's geared towards librarians and those purchasing large numbers of books. Geeks like me find it a great source for reading ideas.

Some highlights --Tree of Smoke also was on 11 lists. Away by Amy Bloom was on eight lists. (This is on my to read list.) On the non-fiction side, Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, got eight nods. Brother I'm Dying - another one I have my eye on -- received six mentions.

Happy reading!

Morsels

Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States is a staple in most college’s introductory US history courses. In it, Zinn presents an alternative version of the United States focusing on our history from the view of the oppressed and overshadowed. For Zinn, history doesn’t belong to the victors.

Zinn is a Professor Emeritus in the Political Science Department at Boston University. He now has a graphic book coming out – A People’s History of American Empire. Apparently a documentary of A People’s History of the United States is also in the making.

A People's History of American Empire.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/gallery/040108_zinncartoons/

Howard Zinn tells history, in comic form
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080404/ap_en_ot/book_review_people_s_history;_ylt=AnaaEl.i.DrzokDRz7ZnIrJREhkF

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/hh050408.html

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New York Times Book Review has a funny essay this week mocking the questions included in the backs of books these days – There Will Be a Quiz.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/06/books/review/Queenan-t.html?_r=1&ref=review&oref=slogin

Often the questions drift away from the book itself, as in one I read vis-à-vis “Pride and Prejudice”: “Have you ever seen a movie version in which the woman playing Jane was, as Austen imagined her, truly more beautiful than the woman playing Elizabeth? Who doesn’t love Elizabeth Bennett?!!”

He even takes a crack at writing his own odd ball questions.

If it took Odysseus 10 years to make a short trip across a microscopic body of water, why does everyone in “The Odyssey” keep insisting he’s so smart?

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The Boston Globe released its picks for best books of 2007. I don’t want to sound critical, but it seems odd to release this in April.

http://www.boston.com/ae/books/gallery/2007_best_of/

Their picks include On Chesil Beach - Ian McEwan, Cheating at Canasta – William Trevor, and Brother, I'm Dying - Edwidge Danticat. I have to add Danticat’s memoir to my must read list.

I only read one book in the Globe’s list. For additional reading suggestions, I would recommend The Dew Breaker by Danticat or The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor.