"1937"

When reading through Edwidge Danticat’s stories of “Children of the Sea” and “1937” I start to feel the raw emotions behind her writing. Her writing paints pictures of what the Haitian people might have and or did go through many decades ago. Though the stories are mostly fiction, you almost cannot help but feel for the Haitian people.           

After reading “1937” I knew that I would have to do some further research on the significance of the

year 1937. On October 2^nd to October 4^th of 1937, “70 years ago” 15,000 to 20,000 Haitian immigrant workers were massacred in the Dominican Republic. They were slaughtered by the Dominican Army as well as “big landowners,” they also murder infants and women as well. Many would try to flee but could not, because they were stopped at the border. After reading about this terrible and awful time, you cannot help but feel for the Haitians, they did not deserve what was given to them. The Dominicans were ordered by dictator Raphael Leonidas Trujillo to murder the Haitians, so that it would “cleanse” the border. This occurred at the Massacre River, which was a river between the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

When reading the story “1937”, I could not help but feel for this young girl, who witnessed her mother be beaten then tossed in prison for the rest of her life for a crime that she did not commit. The mother was arrested and beaten because they believe that she murdered a young boy, but when really she was helping to take care of him because the baby’s mother was too tired. Her mother was not only one thrown in prison, there were many other women that day as well. The police believed that these women were witches, or some how supernatural beings. As days went on this young girl would continue to visit her mother, and watched, as her mother would slowly die. The way that Danticat writes this story it is as if you are there, you’re that young girl. For someone like me who does not like to read that much, Danticat’s writing is suspenseful and real, I just want to keep on reading her stories. I feel that the this story was written for a reason, Danticat wanted to put into words what the Haitian people went through 70 years ago, and for myself I can really being to feel for these people.

For the most part I think I understood the story, and got a real sense of the story and what Danticat was trying to tell, but there is one lingering question, the Madonna, what is the significance of this item. I take it to be a magical or spiritual piece that was of great importance to the Haitian people.