Chapter 15 - “Arrêtez le monde! Je veux rêver”

Summary

Radio Haïti-Inter, Haiti’s most prominent independent radio station and the first station to regularly broadcast news, reportage, and interviews in Haitian Creole, is best known for its investigative journalism, political analysis, and pro-democracy activism under its famous director, Jean Léopold Dominique. But Radio Haiti was also a place where artists of all kinds, especially literary writers, presented, discussed, and declaimed their work to a wide public over the airwaves. In fact, there is no clear line between Radio Haiti’s political content and its literary content. Many of Radio Haiti’s journalists, including Dominique himself and his daughter, novelist Jan J. Dominique, were also literary writers. A literary sensibility suffused much of their content; discussing art or literature allowed them to talk about the country’s social and political situation in a hostile realm; and much of the literary work contains implicit or explicit political meaning. Creating a platform that allowed a wider audience to experience literary works through programs like Radio Haiti’s “Entre Nous” was a political, revolutionary act.