The Memoirs of Toussaint and Isaac Louverture

Representing the Black Masculine Subject in Narratives of Mourning and Loss

Arthur F. Saint-Aubin

This book examines the memoir of Toussaint Louverture—a former slave, general in the French army, and leader of the Haitian Revolution—and the memoir of his son, Isaac.

The Revolution and its leaders have been studied and written about extensively. Until recently (2004), however, the memoir of Toussaint has received little attention—and only as a historical document. This is the first study that explores the 1802 work foremost as a literary text, a creative production that deploys the techniques of fiction and drama to make truth claims about the past; moreover, this is the first book-length study of Isaac Louverture’s memoir. The two texts are read as examples of how black men thought of themselves as “men” (citizens) and, therefore, how they expressed their masculinity, at that historical moment, as experiences of mourning and loss.

This study builds upon three areas of scholarship: the tradition of memoir writing; historicist readings of Toussaint’s memoir; and descriptions and theories of men and masculinity within the black Atlantic.

The study distinguishes itself in ways that will make it of interest to more than just historians: in addition to using the intersection of race and masculinity as an analytical tool, it speaks to the nature of literary creativity and it draws from studies examining the relationship between history, memory, and fiction. As a result, scholars and students in literary and cultural criticism, as well as those in gender and diasporic studies, will also find this study of interest and value.

University Press Copublishing Division / Lehigh University Press

Pages: 286 • Trim: 6½ x 9⅜

978-1-61146-195-4 • Hardback • July 2015 • $114.00 • (£88.00)

978-1-61146-196-1 • eBook • July 2015 • $108.00 • (£83.00)

Series: New Directions in Africana Studies

Subjects: Literary Criticism / Caribbean & Latin American, Biography & Autobiography / Personal Memoirs, Social Science / Gender Studies

The Memoirs of Toussaint and Isaac Louverture

Representing the Black Masculine Subject in Narratives of Mourning and Loss

Hardback

eBook

Summary

This book examines the memoir of Toussaint Louverture—a former slave, general in the French army, and leader of the Haitian Revolution—and the memoir of his son, Isaac.

The Revolution and its leaders have been studied and written about extensively. Until recently (2004), however, the memoir of Toussaint has received little attention—and only as a historical document. This is the first study that explores the 1802 work foremost as a literary text, a creative production that deploys the techniques of fiction and drama to make truth claims about the past; moreover, this is the first book-length study of Isaac Louverture’s memoir. The two texts are read as examples of how black men thought of themselves as “men” (citizens) and, therefore, how they expressed their masculinity, at that historical moment, as experiences of mourning and loss.

This study builds upon three areas of scholarship: the tradition of memoir writing; historicist readings of Toussaint’s memoir; and descriptions and theories of men and masculinity within the black Atlantic.

The study distinguishes itself in ways that will make it of interest to more than just historians: in addition to using the intersection of race and masculinity as an analytical tool, it speaks to the nature of literary creativity and it draws from studies examining the relationship between history, memory, and fiction. As a result, scholars and students in literary and cultural criticism, as well as those in gender and diasporic studies, will also find this study of interest and value.

Details

University Press Copublishing Division / Lehigh University Press

Pages: 286 • Trim: 6½ x 9⅜

978-1-61146-195-4 • Hardback • July 2015 • $114.00 • (£88.00)

978-1-61146-196-1 • eBook • July 2015 • $108.00 • (£83.00)

Series: New Directions in Africana Studies

Subjects: Literary Criticism / Caribbean & Latin American, Biography & Autobiography / Personal Memoirs, Social Science / Gender Studies

Author

Arthur F. Saint-Aubin is professor of French at Occidental College.

Table of Contents

Dedication
Acknowledgments
Preface
Father of a Nation/Father of Sons
A Father’s Son/A Son of the Nation
Authors of Memoirs
Manuscripts: The Production of Meaning and the Performance of Masculinity
Chronology
Chapter One: First Publications
Toussaint Louverture’s Memoir: A Profile in Racialized Anxiety
Prefacing and Appending Toussaint’s Memoir: Exposing the Black Male Body
and Diverting Blackness
Isaac Louverture’s Memoir: A Representation of Black Masculinity in the Name of the
Father
Reading and Writing the Father
Re-Reading and Re-Writing the Father
Validating Black Masculinity in the Notes
Chapter Two: The Louvertures and the Evolution of Memoir Writing in France: Personalizing the Historical/Historicizing the Personal
Personalizing the Historical: Revealing Truth in the First Person
Historicizing the Personal: Demonstrating Truth in the Third Person
A Louverturian “Family Romance”
Chapter Three: Remembered Injustices: A Memory of History/The Fiction of Memory
Father and Son: Between History and Memory
The Coloring of Memory: The Psychical and Social Construction of Remembering
Toussaint Mis-Remembers: Is There a Constitution in this Text?
Isaac Remembers Napoleon but Mis-Remembers His Brother
From Counter-History to Fictionalization
All of Saint-Domingue is a Stage: Toussaint Louverture, Dramaturge
From the Dramatic to the Lyrical: Isaac Louverture, Poet
Chapter Four: Toussaint’s Constitution: Power, Memoir Writing, and the Making of Black Manhood
From Constitution to Memoir: A Diagram of Masculine Justice
Power, Race, and Masculine Self-Actualization in the Memoirs of Toussaint and Isaac Louverture
Chapter Five: The Fact of Blackness/The Fiction of Masculinity: Toward Narratives of Mourning and Melancholia
Psychoanalysis: Race, Nation, and Masculine Identity
The Louvertures : Resisting Whiteness/Desiring Whiteness
The Fact of Blackness/The Fiction of Masculinity: The Body of the Father
Like Father, Like Son: Desiring Whiteness/Resisting Whiteness
Mourning Becomes the Black Male Subject
Toussaint’s Disconsolation/Isaac’s Loss
Postscript: The Louvertures, Haiti, and a Diasporic Tradition of Writing the Masculine Self
Appendix: “Le jour de la paix” (Isaac Louverture)
Works Cited
About the Author