La Rue Cases Nègres

I decided a while back that I ought to read more about Guadeloupe and, in general, the Caribbean. I’ve read the history and culture bits found in the various French tourist guidebooks we have at the house. These passages are obviously very short and brief, but often offer a surprisingly insightful and honest interpretation of life here. But, these books can only offer so much. Much more useful and engaging is literature. I ambitiously began with La Case à Chine, by Raphaël Confiant, a Martinican with some Chinese ancestry. Therein lay the interest for me. But, I quickly discovered that Confiant writes with a French that requires intensive reading, or at least not the kind I could manage sitting on my terrace, or before going to bed. So, I abandoned Case à Chine, regrettably.

M. recommended something with much more classical style of narration: La Rue Cases Nègres by Joseph Zobel (1). The book is semi-autobiographical, and recounts the early life of a young boy named Joseph Hassam in Martinique. José - as he is called - lives with his grandmother, Ma’Tine, on a sugar cane plantation in the early 1900’s, during a time when Blacks were free, but kept extremely poor working on the sugar cane plantations of Whites (called békés). The title of the book - black shack alley - comes from the row of ‘houses’ where all the black laborers live. The early part of the book is mostly a description of José’s world, as well as a narration of his adventures, as seen from the point of view of a child.

In this following passage, José has discovered he can fish for little shrimps in a nearby creek while Ma’Tine works in the fields:

It was marvelous. The breathless attention which I watched my line, the acute emotion that started in my heart by the smallest movement of the buoy ... Even more wonderful, the world of the shrimps as I imagined: hills, paths and trails, fields, shacks. All of it in fresh water. Here lived translucent shrimps, the papa-shrimps, the mamas, the children, who spoke in the language of water. When I got a large shrimp, it was maybe a papa-shrimp, or a mama-shrimp returning from work. And I thought about the grief of the children, who cried inconsolably, and whose tears maybe swelled the river. When it was a little shrimp, I imagined the desolation of the its parents ... and I regretted even more those that got away, whom I feared would advise the others to stay away from the appetizing earth worm hiding my suspended hook (2).

But underneath lies the history of the miserable existence of Blacks during this time period. Ma’Tine struggles to send José to school, which she sees as the only escape from the sugar cane fields for both her grandson, and for Blacks in general. Below, José has just asked Ma’Tine why he does not go to work in the fields like the other children of Rue Cases Nègres:

Miserable boy! cried my grandmother; you would have me put you into the small bands, you too! ... Well! I should, send you to gather para (3), or spread guano, for good, like the others have done! That's what you need to know the misery and to teach you how to behave...Hum! How can it end if fathers stick their sons there in it, in the same misery (4).

The second half of the story tells of José's struggles in school, and his new life in Fort-de-France.

Its a wonderful story, and the characters are incredibly memorable. José is precocious and the reader is quickly charmed by his intelligence and sincerity. Ma' Tine is an impressive force and the reader, like José, treats her with equal parts affection and fear.

The book was adapted to film in 1983 by Euzhan Palcy. The film follows the overall plot of the book, but diverges in the details. Asked during an interview, whether or not he liked the film, Zobel answered, “I’m not sorry about the adaptation that Miss Palcy made, it’s another thing than my book, it doesn’t matter how the two were received by the public...” (5). I believe the film captures the essence of Zobel’s book. The principal actors, Garry Cadenat as José, and Darling Légitimus as Ma’ Tine are marvelous.

I was not able to find a clip of the film online, except the one below, which is not actually a clip, but a video essay by an American- or Canadian-born Taiwanese. He uses the clip to explore his own relationship with his grandparents. The clip is rather interesting on its own. The clip shows M. Médouze, an elderly laborer whom José has befriended, and who is his mentor.



(1)
Zobel, Joseph. La Rue Cases-Nègres. Paris: Présence Africaine, 1974.




(2) “C'était merveilleux. L'attention haletante avec laquelle je surveillais la ligne, l'émotion aiguë lancée au coeur par le plus insensible mouvement du flotteur...Plus merveilleux encore, le monde des crevettes tel que j'imaginais: des mornes, des sentiers et des traces, des champs, des cases. Le tout en eau claire. Là vivaient les crevettes translucides, les papas-crevettes, les mamans, les enfants, qui parlaient en langage d'eau. Quand j'en avais pris une grosse, c'était peut-être un papa, ou une maman qui revenait du travail. Et je songeais au chagrin de leurs enfants qui pleureraient inconsolablement, et dont les larmes feraient peut-être grossir la rivière. Quand c'était une petite, je me représentais la désolation de ses parents ... et je regrettais d'autant plus celles que je manquais, que je redoutais qu'elles n'aillent conseiller aux autres de se méfier de mon hameçon suspendu sous l'apparence d'un appétissant ver de terre.”- p84 Éditions Présence Africaine, 1974.

(3) I am not sure what para is, and so cannot translate it. It is maybe creole. If I find out, I will edit this.

(4) "Petit misérable! s'écria ma grand-mère; tu voudrais que je te fiche dans les petites-bandes, toi aussi! ... Eh bé! j'aurais dû, pour de bon, t'envoyer ramasser du para, ou mettre du guano, comme ont fait les autres! C'est ce quíl faudrait pour connaitre la misère et apprendre à te comporter...Hein! comment cela pourrait-il finir si les pères y foutent leurs fils là-dedans, dans la même malheur?" - p79 Editions Présence Africaine, 1974.

(5) "Je ne regrette pas l'adaptation qu'en a fait mademoiselle Palcy, c'est autre chose que mon livre, peu m'importe la manière dont les deux ont été reçus par le public..." Interview with Simone DUMAS