TELL US YOUR STORY…YOUR RELATION WITH BOOKS*
Angelucci Manigat, Jr.: Surviving borders, bondage and bigotry
(As published in Connecticut Post on Friday, August 25, 2017)
On my way out to a friend’s house with my 11-year old daughter, she asked me if she could bring a book along with her.
Instead of a simple “yes” or “no” answer, I replied that she should never consider herself welcome anywhere that a book is not.
My response to her meant to convey my gratitude to every author who connected me to the promises of universal citizenry.
It was late in my adolescence and quite by accident that I developed the habit of reading. Until I was 16 years old, I read only my school books and a copy of the New Testament that a Catholic priest distributed to my third grade class.
My birth country, Haiti, did not have one single public library.
As I remember growing up there, the few private libraries that were open to the public were under tight surveillance by the political police before a popular revolt toppled the Duvalier regime.
I can recall when returning from a visit to the legendary African-American dancer, scholar and social activist Catherine Durham’s mansion in the south of Port-au-Prince, I came across piles of independent magazines in a dumpster adjacent to a police station.
Eureka! That discovery would prove to be a life-changing event for me. Every weekend I would go to that dumpster and each trip felt like I struck a gold mine.
I would return home with my hands full of publications with stories challenging the status quo. It was a brief period of political détente between the government and the opposition.
In exchange for more economic aid from the Jimmy Carter’s administration, Duvalier slightly relaxed his rules about freedom of expression.
I read as much as I could and started looking beyond the dumpster for additional reading materials. I went to the remaining three bookstores in the capital reading titles and forewords.