18143: Corbett: Louis Mars on Zombi (1945 essay)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

>From Bob Corbett:  Today I found another relatively unknown piece in my
library.  It is an article written by Louis Mars, MD, in 1945 and is and
reports on his own research work on the question of zombi in Haiti.

What I found so refreshing is that he singles out the book TELL MY HORSE
by Zora Neale Hurston for special criticism as being very unserious, and
noticeably non-academic or scientific.

I have long been simply astonished that any serious anthropologists can
find that book to be anything but HORRIBLE.  It's as bad as Seabrook's
book or any other person who writes such trivia.  However, she's
supposedly an anthropologist.  Were I an anthropologist I would certainly
want to be speaking out to disassociate her work with what serious
anthoropoligists do.

I speak STRICTLY about that one book -- the one that has the large section
on Haiti -- TELL MY HORSE.  I don't know the rest of her work, that book
so soured me on her as a writer or thinker I have no desire to spend my
time with more.

I have just added the 3 page Mars paper to my web page.  It's quite worth
reading.  See:

http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/haiti/voodoo/mars-zombi.htm

Bob Corbett