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education at a military college, and received his

own commission as second lieutenant in 1935.

Although Da

glarca received a military educa-

tion and was an army officer from 1935 to 1950, he

showed an aptitude for writing at an early age,

publishing his first poems while he was still in

middle school. His first complete book of poetry

was published in 1935, but he had been publish-

ing poetry in various literary magazines since

1933. He first gained public attention in 1933 for

his poem Slowing Life, but it was his book Child of

God (1940) that actually provided the basis of the

questions about the universe and God that the

bulk of his poetry would attempt to answer. The

book’s major theme is humanity’s amazement at

the universe, expressed through the psychological

viewpoint of a child who constantly asks questions

and searches for answers, while at the same time

both admiring and fearing the world itself. God

and the nature of God are recurring themes in

much of Da

glarca’s work.

glarca’s military career also provided useful

ideas on which he would ultimately focus his po-

etry. Toward the end of his time as an officer,

glarca began to use his writing in an attempt to

answer diverse questions on the relationship of hu-

manity to nature in poems such as The Stone Age

(1945) and Mother Earth. Other areas of interest

included humanity’s relationship to one’s own his-

tory (in The War of Independence [1951], The Con-

quest of Istanbul [1953], and The Epic of Gallipoli

[1963]) and people’s struggles with other people

(in The Agony of the West [1951], Song of Algeria

[1961] and Our Vietnam War [1966]). Da

glarca’s

poetry is highly patriotic and firmly entrenched in

the ideals of Turkish nationalism.

glarca is one of the Turkey’s most prolific

and most frequently translated poets. Throughout

his career, Da

glarca successfully has tried virtually

every form of poetry, including lyric, epic, and in-

spirational verse; he has also written satire and so-

cial criticism. His early poems, in particular, were

focused on inspiration and are exemplified by vi-

sions of a soul at peace, ready to embrace God. Be-

cause Da

glarca watched and lived during a time of

conflict, love of God and of the universe were ulti-

mately replaced in his works by a deeper concern

for the tragedy of humanity as a whole and a love

for all of mankind. His epic poems fall under this

category, celebrating the heroic spirit of his nation.

glarca’s Epic of the Three Martyrs (1949) exem-

plifies and glorifies the Turkish people’s struggles.

glarca’s style, particularly in his inspirational

works, is influenced by a form of Turkish folk po-

etry known as divan, which has its basis in mysti-

cism and elements of both Islam and Sufism. Folk

poets concentrated primarily on native forms and

vernacular in much the same manner as the oral

literary tradition of the early minstrels. In con-

junction with this, early in the 20th century, a na-

tionalist movement sought to create a “Turkish”

literature free of borrowed words. This combina-

tion of military precision, nationalist sentiment,

and mystical allusion is a driving force behind

glarca’s popularity.

After resigning from the military in 1950,

glarca began to concentrate solely on literature

and its impact on Turkish culture. Particularly

since the Turkish Revolution of 1960, he became

increasingly disillusioned by humankind and the

failure of intellectuals to contribute adequately to

social change. Starting with the publication of

Mother Earth (1950), his works focus on civic re-

sponsibility. Along with a friend, he opened a

bookstore in Istanbul that he managed until 1970.

On the storefront window glass, he displayed a va-

riety of poems dedicated to current events and so-

cial change. Printed in large letters, these poems

attracted much attention. When one of his poems

of social protest, Horoz (1965), prompted legal ac-

tion against him, Da

glarca responded to his perse-

cutors in yet another poem, Savci’ya (1965), which

is translated as To the Public Prosecutor, thus prov-

ing that the literary form can be as viable a weapon

as military force.

Another Work by Fazil Hüsnü Da

glarca

Seçme Siirler. Selected Poems. Translated by Talât

Sait Halman. Pittsburgh, Pa.: University of Pitts-

burgh Press, 1969.

108 Da

glarca, Fazil Hüsnü

dalit literature

The term dalit literally means “oppressed” and is

used to refer to the “untouchable,” casteless sects of

India. Dalit literature, therefore, is not only about

but also written by the educated of this social group.

Unlike literature that is defined by its affiliation to a

particular style or structure, such as

MODERNISM or

DADA

, dalit fiction and its literary movement is

based on the common ground of social oppression.

This movement puts all importance on the lived ex-

perience of the writer. Only those who have under-

gone the trials of being socially ostracized can be

said to write dalit literature of any political or moral

relevance. Predictably, such a framework allowed

newfound opportunities among women to voice

their rebellion against gender oppression.

Dalit writers belong to a historical, social, and

political background that spreads throughout

India from Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, and

Andhra Pradesh to Punjab. It could be said that

dalit literature achieved a firm foundation in the

mid-20th century, but its framework was estab-

lished in the early 19th century. Today, dalit writers

have their own literary foundations and publish

numerous journals. They also have a number of

political organizations. The most prominent of

these is the Dalit Panthers (begun in the 1970s),

which has borrowed much of its ideology from

America’s Black Panthers.

The form or style of dalit literature covers a

wide range of literary genres. In content, however,

there are similarities between authors and their

works. The overall message is about community

not individuality, revolt not passivity, progress not

backwardness. The shared political position of

these authors is against the hegemony of upper-

and middle-class Hindu beliefs and for the power

of the human being against oppressive social rules.

Because of this, cultural concepts such as religion

and identity are called into question. The language

of these texts is very faithful to local, spoken di-

alects, and high-flown language is not seen to have

adequate political power.

Many national leaders have based their reform

on the social cause of the lower castes. For the

dalits, the most famous of these leaders was Dr.

Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (1891–1956). The

emancipation of the dalits was due in large part to

Ambedkar’s foundation of educational institutions

in the 1960s. These schools were havens where

dalit professors and educated, middle-class, dalit

students could come together intellectually. Some

famous dalit writers are Mulk Raj

ANAND and

Namdeo DHASAL.

Dalit literature has, since its inception, been

translated into several Indian and European lan-

guages without compromising on the quality of re-

bellion that first characterized it. Such literature

defies the idea that practice and theory remain sep-

arate. The strength of the term dalit, originally

used to ostracize a section of Indian society, en-

abled a successful literary movement that has over-

thrown social prejudice and won worldwide

acclaim.

Works about Dalit Literature

Anand, Mulk Raj. Anthology of Dalit Literature. Co-

lumbia, Mo.: South Asia Books, 1992.

Moon, Vasant. Growing up Untouchable in India: A

Dalit Autobiography. Translated by Gail Omvedt.

New Delhi: Vistaar, 2002.

D’Annunzio, Gabriele (1863–1938) poet,

novelist, dramatist

Renowned as a writer and a military hero who

strongly supported fascism, Gabriele D’Annunzio

was born in Pescara, a town in central Italy. The

son of a wealthy landowner, he received his educa-

tion in Prato at Liceo Cicognini, one of the best

schools in Italy during that period.

D’Annunzio published his first collection of

poems while he was still in his teens. Primo Vere

(First Spring, 1879) was inspired by the works of

the aristocratic, elitist, classical scholar Giosue Car-

ducci, who sought a humanistic approach to liter-

ary studies.

In 1881, D’Annunzio enrolled at the University

of Rome. Life in the capital city exposed him to a

variety of cultural, artistic, and literary stimula-

D’Annunzio, Gabriele 109

tion. He contributed articles to several newspapers

and became a member of several literary groups.

He also married Maria Hardouin di Galese. The

daughter of a duke, she expected a specific stan-

dard of living, and D’Annunzio produced large

quantities of hack writing to maintain her. The

works he produced during this time, however, also

included some notable pieces strongly influenced

by Guy de MAUPASSANT and the French DECADENCE

movement. In particular, the short stories Canto

novo (1882), Terra Vergine (1882), and L’Inter-

mezzo di rime (1883) express a sensual awareness

of life.

D’Annunzio’s first novel, The Child of Pleasure

(1889), was a parody of decadence. He followed

this highly successful work with The Victim (1891),

a novel about sexual depravity. The same year as

this work came out, his marriage ended. He moved

to Naples and began a series of affairs, the most

influential of which was his long-term liaison with

the actress Eleonora Duse. He was so deeply in-

spired by her that he began to produce dramatic

works specifically for her, including La Gioconda

(1899) and Francesca da Rimini (1901).

Beginning in 1897, D’Annunzio served a three-

year term in parliament, but he was not reelected

at the end of his term. Having just purchased an

expensive villa in anticipation of maintaining his

position, he was able to live off of his savings for

only a short period before being forced to flee to

France to avoid his debts. He returned to writing

during this period, staying away from his native

Italy until the start of World War I.

Ever the nationalist, D’Annunzio was

prompted by the war to return to Italy. He also

began his military career. He wrote powerful

speeches and articles, urging his fellow country-

men to support the Allied cause. He began a se-

ries of correspondences with Mussolini that

provided the leader with much insight into poten-

tial military tactics. At one point, however, during

1919, D’Annunzio began to lose faith in Italy and

its lack of determination. He took his troops and

occupied the town of Fiume, ruling as its dictator

for 18 months and professing a desire to declare

war against Italy. Ultimately, however, he was

forced to retreat.

After losing one eye in a flying accident, D’An-

nunzio retired to once again work on his writing.

He was given the title of Prince of Monte Nevoso

in 1924 and was elected president of the Italian

Royal Academy in 1937. On March 1, 1938, he suf-

fered a stroke and died the same day. Mussolini, in

honor of his contributions to the cause, ordered

that he be given a state funeral.

A Work about Gabriele D’Annunzio

Woodhouse, John. Gabriele D’Annunzio, Defiant

Archangel. New York: Oxford University Press,

2001.

Darío, Rubén (Félix Rubén García

Sarmiento)

(1867– 1916) poet, short-story

writer

Rubén Darío was born in Metapa, Nicaragua (now

called Ciudad Darío). While still an infant, his par-

ents divorced, and he was adopted by his godfather,

Colonel Félix Ramírez. Though he showed writing

talent and ability as a teenager, he was denied a

scholarship to study in Europe because his youth-

ful writing was too liberal in its religious views. In-

stead, after he finished school, he traveled to El

Salvador, where he met the poet Francisco Gavidia.

Gavidia introduced Darío to French literature.

Darío was particularly interested in Victor

HUGO

and briefly imitated his style. Unable to go to

France, he absorbed French culture through its

novels and poems. This immersion, first in Hugo

and then in the writers of the French symbolist

movement (see SYMBOLISM), particularly the poet

VERLAINE, was a key factor in Darío’s development

and led to his founding of the movement of Latin

American MODERNISM.

Before Darío, Latin American literature was

completely dominated by antiquated modes of

writing inherited from Europe. In addition, the

subject matter was almost exclusively limited to

descriptions of local life and scenery. By introduc-

ing modernist ideas such as making art for art’s

110 Darío, Rubén

sake and developing a unique poetic voice, Darío

succeeded in creating a literature of international

scope.

In 1888, while living in Chile, Darío published

Blue, a book of short stories and poems that inves-

tigate again and again the role of an artist in an in-

dustrial society where all value is based on

monetary worth. In the poem “Queen Mab’s Veil,”

Darío uses strong metaphors and symbolic im-

agery to depict how the artist’s inner life can be

filled with beauty, even when his or her outer real-

ity is cold and unfeeling. The title of the poem al-

ludes to a speech from Shakespeare’s play Romeo

and Juliet in which Mercutio speaks about the

magical quality of dreams.

In Songs of Life and Hope (1905), a book of

poems, Darío reached another stage in his poetic

development. While his earlier books freely use

nostalgic images that traditionally represented

beauty in poetry, for example, the nightingale,

Songs of Life and Hope reshapes those images

and questions what they mean in a Latin

American social and political context. His long

poem To Roosevelt, written to United States

president Theodore Roosevelt, is a meditation on

the United States. In it Darío both admires the

United States as a model of modern democracy

and worries about the possible threat of U.S.

imperialism.

In the final years of his life, the poet would write

increasingly about politics, his fear of death, and

the uncertainty of the fate of humanity. These are

the themes that occupy his haunting and beautiful

poem “Fatalities,” the final poem in Songs of Life

and Hope.

Darío was the central figure in Latin American

MODERNISM and was a forerunner of the cosmopol-

itan tendencies of such later Latin American au-

thors as Jorge Luis BORGES, Julio CORTÁZAR, and

Octavio PAZ. He introduced idiomatic language,

original metaphors, and formal innovations to the

Latin American literary scene. Finally, his body of

work stands as a testament to a highly learned and

expressive mind, struggling with the great themes

of history, spirituality, and art.

Another Work by Darío

Selected Poems. Translated by Lysander Kemp. Austin:

University of Texas Press, 1965.

A Work about Darío

Ellis, Keith. Critical Approaches to Rubén Darío.

Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1974.

Darwish, Mahmud (Mahmoud)

(1942– ) poet

Foremost Palestinian poet Darwish emerged as

one of the “Resistance Poets,” Palestinians who, in

the aftermath of the 1967 Israeli occupation, wrote

poetry of struggle. The poem “Identity Card”

(1964), an impassioned cry from an Arab quarry-

man who is determined to keep his dignity despite

Israeli occupation, typifies Darwish’s early voice. In

the 1970s, Darwish’s poetry became the definitive

expression of the pain of Palestinian exile. He has

evolved beyond being keeper of Palestine’s spiri-

tual flame, and editor Munir Akash calls him the

“poet of human grief.” Darwish’s broad vision em-

braces the literary heritage not only of Arabs but

also of Jews and the many other peoples who in-

habit the land of his birth. His creative scope en-

compasses ancient Near Eastern, Native American,

and European mythology. A giant in his signifi-

cance for modern Arabic literature, Darwish re-

mains such a literary icon for Palestinians that

when he writes personal poetry, such as the vol-

ume of love poems, Bed of a Stranger (1999), some

Arab critics respond as if he were turning his back

on the plight of his people.

Darwish was born in Barweh, a Palestinian town

that was attacked by Israel in its 1948 campaign.

Darwish grew up, in Salma K. Jayyusi’s words,“as a

refugee in his own country.” He became active in the

Israeli Communist Party and, in 1964, published his

first book of poetry, Leaves of Olive. In 1971, he re-

settled in Beirut, where he lived until 1982, when

Palestinians were driven out of Lebanon. His mem-

oir, Memory for Forgetfulness, is about being trapped

in the 1982 Israeli siege of Beirut. In 1996, Darwish

was allowed to return to the land of his birth.

Darwish, Mahmud 111

Darwish’s awards include the Lenin Prize

(1983) and France’s Knighthood of Arts and Belles

Lettres (1997). He served on the Palestinian Na-

tional Council, founded the prestigious literary

magazine al-Karmel, has written 30 books, and is

translated into 35 languages. In 1999, Israeli au-

thorities finally permitted five Darwish poems to

be included in schoolbooks.

Other Works by Mahmud Darwish

Adam of Two Edens. Edited by Munir Akash and

Daniel Moore. Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse Univer-

sity Press, 2000.

Psalms. Translated by Ben Bennani. Boulder, Colo.:

Passeggiata Press, 1995.

Victims of a Map: A Bilingual Anthology of Arabic Po-

etry by Samih al-Qasim, Adonis, and Mahmud

Darwish. Translated by Abdullah al-Udhari. Lon-

don: Al-Saqi Books, 1984.

Davies, Robertson (1913–1995) novelist,

playwright, essayist

Robertson William Davies was born in

Thamesville, Ontario, Canada, to a newspaper

owner. He attended Oxford, receiving a degree in

literature in l938. From a young age, he was drawn

to the theater, playing small roles outside London;

in 1940, he acted at the Old Vic Repertory Com-

pany in London and married Brenda Matthews,

who was the stage manager for the company. He

returned to Canada with his wife soon after to

work as a journalist. He was the editor of the Pe-

terborough Examiner for l5 years and its publisher

from l955 to 1965.

Davies’s love of theater was evident from the

many plays he wrote, and he said that he consid-

ered his plays comedies rather than tragedies that

criticized Canada’s provincial attitudes. He won

the l948 Dominion Drama Festival Award for best

Canadian play for Eros at Breakfast, which made

use of allegory (using symbols rather than direct

representation) and was more theatrical than real-

istic. In a similar style, King Phoenix is a fantasy

based on the mythical King Cole, while General

Confession is a historical comedy of ideas with the

main characters serving as Jungian (derived from

Carl Jung) archetypes of self, persona, shadow, and

anima. These three plays, with their elaborate cos-

tumes and settings and magic transformations, re-

veal Davies’s inclination for spectacle and

extravagance.

Although Davies wrote plays, essays, and criti-

cism, it is for his many novels that he is best known

and admired. His first trilogy, the Salterton tril-

ogy—Tempest-Tost (l951), Leaven of Malice (l954),

and A Mixture of Frailties (1958)—is an ongoing

social comedy set in a small Ontario university

town. The novel that begins the Deptford trilogy,

Fifth Business (1970), is considered by most critics

to be his finest work with its blend of myths,

magic, freaks, evil, and theatrical elements. A

snowball with a stone concealed in it opens the

novel, which then proceeds through the life of a

magician whose life is linked through that stone to

that of the protagonist, Boy Staunton. The other

Deptford novels are The Manticore (1972) and

World of Wonders (1975).

Davies’s work often plays with traditional

themes and tropes from the Western literary

canon. He often works with classical themes set in

a modern context, making frequent allusions to

works like Milton’s Paradise Lost. The influence of

Shakespeare and Milton is immediately evident.

(In fact, Davies’s B.Lit. thesis at Oxford was on

Shakespearean Theatre.) Davies’s work also reflects

his interest in Freudian and subsequently Jungian

psychology, especially The Manticore.

During the course of his career, Davies won a

number of major awards for his work, including

the Lorne Pierce Medal, the Stephen Leacock

Medal for Humour, and the Governor General’s

Award for The Manticore. Davies was the first

Canadian to become an Honorary Member of the

American Academy and Institute of Arts and Let-

ters. He was a Companion of the Order of

Canada.

Reviewer S. A. Rowland writes in Contemporary

Novelists that Davies “delights in paradox and is

himself an example: Among the most innovative of

112 Davies, Robertson

contemporary novelists, he stresses our deep roots

in old cultures and ‘magical’ beliefs.”

Other Works by Robertson Davies

The Cunning Man: A Novel. New York: Viking, 1995.

The Lyre of Orpheus. New York: Viking Penguin, l988.

The Mirror of Nature. Toronto: University of Toronto

Press, 1983.

The Rebel Angels. New York: Viking Press, 1982.

The Well-tempered Critic: One Man’s View of Theatre

and Letters in Canada. Toronto: McClelland and

Stewart, 1981.

Works about Robertson Davies

Grant, Judith Skelton. Robertson Davies: Man of

Myth. New York: Viking, l994.

Peterman, Michael. Robertson Davies. Boston:

Twayne, 1986.

decadence

Decadence is a literary and artistic movement that

began in Europe during the final decades of the

19th century. Although France produced the most

notable of all decadent authors, Joris-Karl HUYS-

MANS, whose À Rebours (Against Nature, 1884)

epitomizes the movement, decadence was not con-

fined to France. It spread to Belgium with writers

such as Rodenbach, to Germany, with the early

works of Thomas

MANN and the writings of Stefan

GEORGE, and Austria, with Hugo von HOF-

MANNSTHAL. It was also evidenced in Britain and

Ireland in the works of Oscar Wilde, particularly

his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). Huys-

mans’s influence on Wilde seems apparent in that

Wilde refers to A Rebours, calling it the The Yellow

Book that corrupts Dorian Gray. Other notable

members of the French decadent movement in-

clude Charles BAUDELAIRE and Stéphane MALLARMÉ

and Arthur RIMBAUD.

Characteristic of the decadence movement as a

whole, and symptomatic of the obsessions of FIN-

DE-SIÈCLE Europe, elements such as decapitation,

vampirism, and images of women as evil predators

and temptresses were common throughout deca-

dence texts. The themes in these writings are,

therefore, inherently diverse and include tales of

the supernatural and occult, science fiction, ro-

mance, and “faits divers” or “slice of life” sensa-

tional crimes.

Seeking to speak out against scientific progress

and democracy, decadent authors created their

own paradise, often drug induced, and reveled in

the poetics of necrophilia. Self-centered and ego-

maniacal almost to the point of self-annihilation,

they tended to be members of the aristocracy who

were antidemocratic in politics, misanthropic, and

misogynistic (hating or fearful of women). They

were often members of the occult, and their

lifestyles tended to be as flamboyant as their writ-

ings were insolent. Many members of the decadent

movement ultimately died from their excesses.

A Work about Decadence

McGuinness, Patrick, ed. Symbolism, Decadence and

the Fin de Siècle: French and European Perspectives.

Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2000.

De Kok, Ingrid (1951– ) poet

Ingrid De Kok was raised in South Africa, whose

geography influenced her later work. She says,

“Growing up in a hard, flat, dry place, a demand-

ing physical environment has probably influenced

the way I see a great number of things as well as the

way I respond to landscape. I’m interested in ge-

ography and space insofar as it relates to the notion

of home” (Rich). This image of home appears in

much of her poetry. Her work has appeared in

many anthologies and numerous journals in South

Africa, England, the United States, and Canada.

De Kok’s poetry blends the languages of

Afrikaans and English to create images of the

South African landscape. In a move that she calls

unconscious, she weaves into her poetry the po-

litical subjects of loss and apartheid alongside the

very personal lives of the people; for example, in

her poem, “Mending,” from her collection Famil-

iar Ground (1988), the narrator says,“The woman

plies her ancient art, / Her needle sutures as it

De Kok, Ingrid 113

darts, / scoring, scripting, scarring, stitching, / the

invisible mending of the heart.” By blending

the traditional sewing metaphor with images

of scarring and scoring, De Kok shows not

only a garment or body being mended but also a

nation.

Her notion of the community in her poetry is

influenced by authors such as Seamus HEANEY and

Jeremy CRONIN, while her interest in form is more

influenced by traditional English and American

writers such as Emily Dickinson, John Donne, and

Robert Frost. De Kok’s work has been described

as having “fearlessness, guts to transgress, an

unfailing ear for the alternation of consonants on

the tongue, a turn of thinking and the ability to

capture in the most delicate and individual terms a

devastating phenomenon.”

A Work about Ingrid De Kok

Krog, Antjie.“Defenceless in the Face of De Kok’s Po-

etry.” Electronic Mail and Guardian. Johannesburg,

South Africa. January 19, 1998.

Dépestre, René (1926– ) poet, novelist,

essayist, journalist, professor, editor

René Dépestre was born and educated in Jacmel,

Haiti, before attending the Lycée Pétion in Port-

au-Prince. There he worked with the revolutionary

magazine La Ruche. At 19, Dépestre published his

first revolutionary volume of verse, Étincelles

(Sparks, 1945). He became a leading voice for

young Haitian radicals by, for example, criticizing

the Haitian government’s exploitative acts in La

Ruche. After a Haitian student revolution sparked

by La Ruche’s prohibition in 1946, Dépestre was

exiled to France. He published Traduit du grand

large (Translated from the High Sea, 1952), a vol-

ume of poetry, before returning to Haiti in 1958.

Dissatisfied with Haitian dictator François Duva-

lier, Dépestre moved to Cuba in 1959 and worked

as an editor and professor. After Cuba expelled him

in 1978, Dépestre returned to France. He worked

for UNESCO during the 1980s and became a

French citizen in 1991.

Although Dépestre has lived much of his

adult life outside Haiti, he is one of Haiti’s most

celebrated contemporary poets. His poetry

voices Haitian and Caribbean values and ex-

plores the relationships between and among

identity and ethnicity, slavery, and exploitation.

His articles and essays grapple with similar is-

sues, as seen in Bonjour et adieu à la négritude

(Hello and Goodbye to Negritude, 1980), a collec-

tion of essays that marks Dépestre’s ideological

shift from embracing authentic identity to em-

bracing more-open concepts of cultural and

personal identities.

Alléluia pour une femme-jardin (Hallelujah for

a Garden-Woman, 1973) marks an erotic shift

|in Dépestre’s writing. There, for example,

Dépestre employs erotic and allegorical represen-

tations of women. In Éros dans un train chinois

(Eros in a Chinese Train, 1993), Dépestre develops

a new, imaginative, erotic aesthetic called erotic-

magical realism that would ideally re-create Haiti.

Dépestre’s work not only focuses on revolution,

but his innovative aesthetics also redefine how to

write about revolution.

Other Works by René Dépestre

The Festival of the Greasy Pole. Translated by Carrol F.

Coates. Charlottesville: University Press of Vir-

ginia, 1990.

A Rainbow for the Christian West. Translated by

Jack Hirschman. Fairfax, Calif.: Red Hill Press,

1972.

Vegetations of Splendor. Translated by Jack Hirschman.

Chicago: Vanguard, 1981.

Works about René Dépestre

Dayan, Joan. “France Reads Haiti: An Interview with

René Dépestre.” Yale French Studies 83 (1994):

136–53.

Ferdinand, Joseph. “The New Political Statement

in Haitian Fiction.” In Voices from Under: Black

Narrative in Latin American and the Caribbean.

Edited by William Luis. Westport, Conn.: Green-

wood Press, 1984.

114 Dépestre, René

Desai, Anita (Mazumdar, Anita)

(1937– ) novelist

Anita Desai was born in Mussoorie, a tiny hill sta-

tion on the outskirts of Delhi, India, to a German

mother and an Indian father. Though her novels

are in English, Desai is fluent in several languages.

It has been noted that she spoke German at home,

Hindi with friends, and English at school. In addi-

tion to being a professor of writing at Massachu-

setts Institute of Technology (MIT), Desai is also

involved in education in India and is a member of

the Advisory Board of English in New Delhi. She

is currently a Fellow of the Royal Society of Litera-

ture in London.

Desai’s novels are preoccupied with the theme

of alienation. Her novel In Custody (1985) is set

during the fraught political tensions between India

and Pakistan during the Partition War and traces

the daily lives of middle-class women at home.

What unfolds is a female narrative of political

struggle that occurs outside of and simultaneous

to the one fought in the public space dominated by

men. One of the main characters, Nur, is a budding

poet whose talent is silenced and hidden by her

husband. Her story is one example of the novel’s

concern with the effects historical events have on

family relations and how women are denied public

recognition.

Although Desai’s earlier novels are based on the

question of women’s roles in Indian and Pakistani

societies, Desai’s later novel, Baumgartner’s Bom-

bay (1988), goes beyond the problem of gender. It

is the story of a businessman’s search across conti-

nents to escape Western anti-Semitism, only to

discover traces of it even in India. This novel is

more global in perspective in its exploration of the

aftereffects of World War II in an Indian context.

Desai has also written numerous children’s

books, of which The Village by the Sea (1982) won

the Guardian Prize for Children’s Fiction in 1983.

Her first novel, Fire on the Mountain, (1977) won

the Indian National Academy of Letters Award. In

1988, she was awarded the Padma Shri by the pres-

ident of India for her outstanding contribution to

Indian literature.

Other Works by Anita Desai

Clear Light of Day. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000.

Journey to Ithaca. New York: Knopf, 1995.

Works about Anita Desai

Bande, Usha. The Novels of Anita Desai. Prestige

Books, 1992.

Buruma, Ian, ed. India: A Mosaic. New York: New

York Review of Books, 2000.

Desbordes-Valmore, Marceline

(1786–1859) poet

Marceline Desbordes-Valmore was born in

Douai, France, to a lower-middle-class family

whose lives had been ruined by the French Revo-

lution. She left with her mother for the Antilles

in 1801 only to find the conditions there horrible.

Faced with riots and an epidemic of yellow fever,

her mother died only a few days after their arrival.

Desbordes-Valmore returned to Douai in 1802 to

embark on a career as a professional singer and

actress.

Desbordes-Valmore’s life was fraught with

tragedy. In 1809, she fell in love with a writer who

left her shortly after she gave birth to their child.

The child lived only five years. In 1817, she married

the actor Prosper Valmore, with whom she had

three children, Hippolyte, Ondine, and Inês. The

family lived a precarious existence, fleeing the dan-

gers of revolution throughout Europe. Her daugh-

ter Inês died in 1846; Ondine’s daughter died in

1852, followed by Ondine herself in 1853; and in

1858 Desbordes-Valmore lost her best friend, the

musician Pauline Duchambge.

Desbordes-Valmore’s poetry was the one reli-

able source of satisfaction in her life. In it, her

griefs found memorable expression and perhaps

catharsis. In “Les Séparés (“Apart”), for example,

the poet addresses an absent lover with a constant

refrain: “Do not write!”:

Do not write. Let us learn to die, as best we

may.

Desbordes-Valmore, Marceline 115

Did I love you? Ask God. Ask yourself. Do

you know?

To hear that you love me, when you are far

away,

Is like hearing from heaven and never to go.

Do not write!

Between 1819 and 1843, she published several

collections of poetry and received recognition

from critics such as Charles Augustin Sainte-

Beuve (1804–69) and Victor

HUGO as one of the

leading poets of her time. She also wrote a num-

ber of works for children. Her poetry is charac-

terized by sincerity, spontaneity, grace, and

melancholy.

Another Work by Marceline Desbordes-

Valmore

Simpson, Louis, ed. and trans. Selections in Modern

Poets of France: A Bilingual Anthology. Ashland,

Ore.: Story Line Press, 1997.

Works about Marceline Desbordes-Valmore

Boutine, Aimee. Maternal Echoes: the Poetry of

Marceline Desbordes-Valmore and Alphonse de

Lamartine. Newark: University of Delaware Press,

2001.

Johnson, Barbara. The Feminist Difference: Literature,

Psychoanalysis, Race, and Gender. Cambridge,

Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000.

Sainte-Beuve, Charles Augustin. Memoirs of Madame

Desbordes-Valmore, with a selection from her

poems. Translated by Harriet W. Preston. New

York: AMS Press, 1980.

Devi, Mahasweta (1926– ) novelist,

short-story writer, dramatist, journalist

Mahasweta Devi was born into a literary family in

Dacca, Bangladesh (previously known as East

Bengal). As a young child, she migrated to West

Bengal (India) with her parents. The local politics

of West Bengal and the Bengali language are

to this day the source and inspiration for Devi’s

literature. Her early involvement with the local

political theater group “Ganantaya” formed her

ambition to spread social and political awareness

through her writing. Since then, she has used

her prodigious talent to champion the cause of

suppressed Indian tribal societies. Most of her

work is written in Bengali and has been translated

into several Indian languages and into English.

In a 1998 interview, she said that her goal is to

“fight for the tribals, downtrodden, underprivi-

leged, and write creatively if and when I find the

time.”

Devi’s feminist tone comments on the tradi-

tional view of women in Indian society. Female

characters in her works are borrowed from an

older literary tradition but are transformed to re-

veal a profound political self-awareness. In the

short story “Dopadi,” Devi evokes the central fe-

male character from the classical epic Mahab-

harata, Draupadi, to tell a story of a fugitive tribal

woman, also of the same name, who outwits the

local police. Another short story, “Breast-Giver”

(1993), is a symbolic comparison between a

woman’s physical illness and the social illnesses ex-

tant in postindependent India.

Mahasweta Devi gave up her position as a pro-

fessor in English literature at a Calcutta university

in 1984. This decision allowed her to begin a new

life devoted to social work and writing. In 1997,

she was a recipient of the Magsaysay Award (Asia’s

equivalent to the Nobel Prize) for a lifetime spent

in creating literature that extends beyond the liter-

ary and intellectual to the social.

Another Work by Mahasweta Devi

Imaginary Maps: Three Stories by Mahasweta Devi.

Translated by Gayatri Spivak. New York: Rout-

ledge, 1994.

Works about Mahasweta Devi

“Mahasweta Devi.” Available online at http://

www.emory.edu/ENGLISH/Bahri/Devi.html.

Spivak, Gayatri. In Other Worlds: Essays in Cultural

Politics. New York: Routledge, 1987.

116 Devi, Mahasweta

Dhammachoti, Ussiri (Atsiri Thamma-

choat)

(1947– ) novelist

Ussiri Dhammachoti was born in the Hua Hin dis-

trict, Prachuap Khiri Khan, Thailand. His father

was a fisherman who owned several fishing

trawlers. Dhammachoti received his primary and

secondary education at Sathukan School. When he

failed to pass the entrance exams for Chula-

longkorn University, he applied to work for the

National Statistical Office and was assigned to

draw maps for the national population census. In

1970, he reapplied and was admitted to Chula-

longkorn University. He graduated with a bache-

lor’s degree in communications arts in 1974 and

started a magazine, which lasted less than a year.

He worked for various newspapers, including the

Siam Rath, for many years before finally quitting

his post as publisher in 1998. He is now a freelance

writer and writes only in Thai.

Dhammachoti’s writings are deeply influenced

by his life experiences. His mother’s death greatly

affected Dhammachoti, whose initial interest in lit-

erature was motivated by his mother’s love for old

Thai literature and poetry. His travels to the north-

ern provinces of Thailand during the years he

worked for the National Statistical Office opened

the opportunity for him to collect ideas that

formed the basis of his works. Dhammachoti’s

works deal with a variety of themes, such as the

impact of the modern world on traditional soci-

eties located in the hilly outskirts of Thailand.

These themes are often represented in his TV

plays, such as Khun Det and Mae Nak Phra

Khanong. His fascination with the local folklore

and cultural and religious practices can be ob-

served in his short stories. Dhammachoti also pos-

sesses a nostalgic empathy for the people who live

in the remote regions of the country. His goal to

better their lives is intermixed with his desire to

preserve some aspects of their way of life. He sees

richness in the traditional history of many of the

tribes, like the Miao and Hmong, that should be

preserved.

Dhammachoti’s stories, such as “Samnuk

Khong Pho Thao” (“The Old Man’s Conscience,”

1972), reflect his compassion for and understand-

ing of not only the poor and downtrodden in Thai

society but also the various ethnic groups that live

at the borders of the Thai nation. His characters

consist of a variety of personality types, ranging

from the elite group to the marginalized peoples

who lived in the northern region of Thailand.

Their differences in background, philosophy, and

status, however, do not hinder their attempts to

gain a mutual understanding of each other’s cul-

tures and tradition.

When Dhammachoti was still an undergradu-

ate, he won the Phlubphla Mali Literary Award

from the Literary Circle of Chulalongkorn Univer-

sity for his short story “Samnuk Khong Pho Thao”

in 1972. His collection of short stories Kuntong . . .

Chao Cha Khlab Ma Mua Fa Sang (Kuntong . . . You

Will Return at Dawn) was published in 1978 and

won the Southeast Asian Writer Award in 1981. On

November 3, 2000, Dhammachoti was awarded the

honor of National Artist in Literature.

Another Work by Ussiri Dhammachoti

Of Time and Tide: A Thai Novel. Bangkok: Thai Mod-

ern Classic Series, 1985.

Dhasal, Namdeo (Namdev) (1947– )

poet, novelist

Namdeo Dhasal was born in a small village outside

Pune, India. He is a DALIT, which means “casteless”

or “untouchable,” and grew up very poor. Dhasal

had almost no formal education but educated

himself on the literature of other dalit writers who

also wrote about the conditions of the oppressed.

Because of this focus, at no time can the voice of

the poet be distinguished from that of the political

rebel. Dhasal’s poetry directly addresses the

sources of human unhappiness such as poverty,

prostitution, and underworld politics of Bombay.

His famed knowledge of the city caught the atten-

tion of Trinidadian author V. S. NAIPAUL, who used

Dhasal as his guide to Bombay and made him an

important figure in his book India: A Million Mu-

tinies Now (1990).

Dhasal, Namdeo 117