23985: (pub) Slavin: Bell's pen makes literary triumph of Haiti's history (Orlando Sentinel 122604) (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: JPS390@aol.com

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/features/lifestyle/orl-livbell_bkrv122604dec26,1,1636329.story?coll=orl-living-headlines

BOOK REVIEW

Bell's pen makes literary triumph of Haiti's history
By Molly Knight
The (Baltimore) Sun

December 26, 2004

With the first two volumes of his ambitious Haitian trilogy, Madison Smartt Bell invited readers on a demanding literary journey: more than 1,000 pages of dense history, tangled plots and a colossal cast of characters.

Now, with the publication of The Stone That the Builder Refused -- the trilogy's third volume -- Bell asks readers to embark on the final and most formidable stretch: a 768-page account of the last two years in the life of Toussaint L'Ouverture, hero of Haiti's slave rebellion.

It might sound daunting, but for readers who stick with the trilogy, there is substantial reward.

With his completion of All Souls' Rising (1996), Master of the Crossroads (2000) and now The Stone, Bell has proved himself a master of historical fiction -- a disciplined, confident writer with the imagination and scholastic ability to transcend time and place.

He is also a writer undaunted by stories of the grandest scale, seamlessly carrying readers from the decks of warships to smoldering battlefields and glittering ballrooms.

For these reasons, readers approaching Bell for the first time will find The Stone an intimidating starting point. The book picks up with the final, bloody battles of the Haitian Revolution under the leadership of Toussaint, an ex-slave-turned-general.

Fortunately, a short prologue provides some background.

The revolution in Haiti (then called St. Domingue) began in 1791, when African slaves in the former French colony rebelled against their white masters. Two years into the struggle, Toussaint emerged as its leader, stabilizing the country and allowing white plantation owners to return. By 1801, Toussaint had drafted a new constitution proclaiming himself "governor-for-life" and calling for an end to slavery. The move sparked the ire of Napoleon Bonaparte, who immediately dispatched an armada of French troops to seize control of the colony and capture Toussaint.

The Toussaint of The Stone is a much more fatalistic protagonist than the warrior of Bell's first two volumes. The book opens on the general watching French warships approach through a spyglass. Shaken, he proclaims: "Get ready to die -- all of France has come against me."

While Toussaint fast becomes a familiar figure, new readers will face a dizzying cast of returning characters. Among them are the virtuous physician Antoine Hebert and his sister, Elise; aristocratic Isabelle; the murderous plantation owners Claudine and Michel Arnaud; and Riau, a runaway slave-turned-narrator.

The dozens more include the right-hand men to Toussaint and Gen. Charles LeClerc, Napoleon's brother-in-law and leader of the French forces.

If Bell can be faulted, it's that in a story so sweeping, he offers few of those subtle signposts that even the sharpest readers require. Assuming that his audience has some prior knowledge of Haiti's history, he moves at breakneck pace through a story so tangled it would benefit from the occasional deceleration or brief summary.

Even so, there is no question that this trilogy will make an indelible mark on literary history -- one worthy of occupying the same shelf as Tolstoy's War and Peace -- for blending fiction and an imposing and complex history.

Molly Knight is a reporter for The (Baltimore) Sun, a Tribune Publishing newspaper.

Copyright © 2004, Orlando Sentinel

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J.P. Slavin
New York
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