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27075: Hermantin(News)Young writers the focus of novelist's work (fwd)
Young writers the focus of novelist's work
Joanne Hyppolite: Haitian women and literature Hyppolite, shown with her infant
son Carl Green, is the author of two novels for young adults, Seth and Samona
and Ola Shakes It Up. Origin
-- Chauncey Mabe
January 1, 2006
"We help to connect Haiti's literary daughters with their heritage," says
young-adult author Joanne Hyppolite. Along with a few leading women authors,
Hyppolite is a member of Women Writers of Haitian Descent, a group founded in
2001 to encourage young Haitian-American writers.
WWOHD sponsors workshops, brings in authors for readings and conducts the
annual Butterfly Award, which alternates between the short story one year and
poetry the next.
Other members include Ketsi Theodore Pharel, Michele Jessica Fievre, Fabienne
Josaphat, Irmine Milord, Liliane Nerette and Maude Heurtelou.
"The interesting thing is that we're from all different age groups," says
Hyppolite, who moved to South Florida from Boston in 1992.
"I'm in my 30s, while Jessica and Fabienne are in their 20s and came to the
United States specifically to go to college. Liliane, who is in her 60s, was
fully raised in Haiti and is an expert on folklore. ... It's a diverse group,
some writing in English, some in French, some in Creole."
All of the group's authors are published, several with multiple books to their
credit. Hertelou's novel The Bonplezi Family: The Adventures of a Haitian
Family in North America was published by her husband's English-Creole company,
Deerfield Beach-based Educavision. Some of the members are self-published,
which, Hyppolite says, doesn't carry the stigma among the Haitian community
that it does in mainstream American literature.
"The situation in Haiti is that you have to self-publish because there is no
economy for commercial publishers," says Hyppolite, whose novels are published
by Random House. "The infrastructure doesn't exist for that. While some of us
are self-published, we are all established writers."
Distinguished novelist Edwidge Danticat, though not a member of the group, says
role models are especially important "when you have a very young immigrant
community." Haitian parents, Danticat says, still push children toward
professions "that offer a more secure route for a decent life in this country."
And for good reason, she says: "On some level being an artist is a luxury, but
it is also a necessity for the person doing it. And so it is a hard thing, a
hard choice for a young person to make as a new immigrant.
"But here there is the perfect environment for an explosion of the literary
arts. When I've visited schools, I've seen that excitement the children have
when they are presented with a role model like Joanne or myself. There's
something exciting about that."
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