Edwidge Danticat
Edwidge Danticat
Edwidge Danticatis a Haitian–American novelist and short story writer...
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth19 January 1969
building country interests permanent serve states structure united
Most of them, they serve the interests of the United States but are not building any kind of permanent structure for the country they are affecting.
country fact limited rich shocking struggle unless
In fact that is the struggle that most Americans - As rich as this country is, most Americans are very limited in their interaction with the world, unless the world comes to us in a very shocking way.
country example haiti
This was a "bad" example for U.S. slaves. Haiti was subjected to an embargo from the United States, which, along with many other countries, refused to recognize this new republic.
country political news
That's whatever news topic, whatever political process any country is going through - whenever they are in the news, that's when they exist. If you don't see them they don't exist.
country frustration people
There is a frustration too, that at moments when there's not a coup, when there are not people in the streets, that the country disappears from people's consciousness.
country thinking cnn
People think that there is a country there that these people are only around when they are on CNN. I don't think that's limited to Haiti.
country children destiny
The justification - the idea that we have a right to invade another country and determine another people's destiny - is frightening. And I fear really for the future of that occupation. What happens now, and twenty years from now, and forty years from now, given our case? People in the United States may feel like when we don't see it on CNN twenty-four hours a day, it sort of disappears. But it doesn't disappear for the people who have to live under occupation - and their children and their children's children.
castro glue held revolution states time together united
You have also at the same time Castro and the revolution being the glue that held the United States together with a lot of these dictators.
aware columbia haiti happens influence people places policies united
Also, people are not often aware of the way the United States' policies influence what happens in places like Haiti or El Salvador or Nicaragua. Or in Columbia right now.
daily future thrown
I think daily that the country's future is being thrown to the wind.
affects bad brings connected happened joining larger people questions realizing recently scary spain
On some level, now, we are joining the larger world and realizing that we are connected with people in these very scary ways, sometimes. What happened recently in Spain affects us here and brings questions up. It is too bad that people have to be shaken up in that way.
amazing dreams growing knew people poor raise voice
I wanted to raise the voice of a lot of the people that I knew growing up, and this was, for the most part, poor people who had extraordinary dreams but also very amazing obstacles.
florida groups citizenship
I see the sharp inequality between how Haitian and Cuban refugees are treated in Florida. Both groups come here because their lives are equally desperate. But on arrival, the Haitians are incarcerated, and some are immediately repatriated, whereas Cubans get to stay and are eligible for citizenship.
giving greatest-gifts
The greatest gift anyone can give to a writer is time.