 Amazing journalism
Amy Wilentz is the best kind of journalist: a great writer, but also a person who spent the time--often in courageous circumstances--to know her subjects deeply. Her portraits of the people she met and events she experienced in Haiti, along with her lively dissertations on Haiti's history, are vivid and poignant. Her images have embedded themselves in my mind and haunted my dreams.
 Great, but read with grain of salt.
This book is great reading and provides a lot of insight into Haiti. HOWEVER, Ms Wilentz is a biased journalist. One does not become an expert about something just by visiting and interviewing a few folks here and there.
I lived and worked in Haiti for 9 years in a couple of small southern towns. I have come to know the customs and the people. Not all are in agreement with Aristide, who was seen as a demon by many of the Haitians, and rightly so. He was no different than the other dictators who came before him. One example, he advocated "necklacing" of those who disagreed with him.
Wilentz also thinks voodoo is just great. She hasn't lived with the people who have been threatened, exploited, and killed by those who practice this religion. It is not benign, but evokes fear in those who dare to stand against it. Aristide is also a voodooist who used the dark magic to scare those against him.
So again, it is a great read, but it isn't the "gospel truth" on all things Haitian. It is her viewpoint on the things she has had contact with. It is not an unbiased work, nor extensive. It must be read with those things in mind.
It is a great read, well-written, but biased.
Topnotch reportage
Ms. Wilentz has created a fascinating account of life and politics in this turbulent country. Definitely worth reading even for those with no particular interest in Haiti.
Essential history for those interested in Haiti
In The Rainy Season, Wilentz leads the reader through the world of Haiti and its people, both those who are corrupt and those who struggle each day against corruption. I will visit Haiti for the 6th time this summer but I have not previously read anything in-depth about Haitian history. This book opened my eyes to essential information that every traveller to Haiti should be aware of, out of respect to the violent history of Haiti and the people who have survived through it. No one should attempt to "help" the Haitian people without first understanding the results of "help" already rendered in the past. Wilentz makes these (often tragic) results clear, and humbles all of us in the process.If you have gone to Haiti, or will go to Haiti, whether as a missionary, journalist, diplomat, or foreign aid worker, don't go ignorant. Read The Rainy Season (and more recent publications as well) first.
Haiti in the interim
If you are trying to figure out the muddle that is Haitian political history, this book can help. Covering Haiti from the fall of Baby Doc until early 1989, Willentz gives a close-up look at the parade of dictators and terrorists running the (in theory) post-Duvalier country. She also provides a personal connection to Aristide, then a radical priest continually in hiding from a government wishing to silence him. In addition to the internal political movements and terrorism, Willentz shows us the ties between Haiti's troubles and the United States. If you are not familiar with American policy in regard to Haiti, you will be in for a disappointing and infuriating surprise. We sucked! The book also covers the standards to be found in every book on Haiti: voodoo, illiteracy, slave revolution rememberings, hunger, poverty, exploitation, class and racial imbalances. Perhaps its greatest asset is the datedness of the text. Written after Duvalier and before Aristide, the view of both is fairly unbiased. If you want to learn more about Haiti's past, present and future, you should check this one out.
|
