Edwidge Danticat

Edwidge Danticat is a Haitian-American novelist, short story writer, and memoirist born in 1969 in Port-au-Prince. She emigrated to the United States at age twelve to join her parents in Brooklyn, and her work is deeply shaped by the experience of Haitian diaspora, the history of Haiti, and the intersection of memory, loss, and longing. Danticat is the author of numerous celebrated works, including Breath, Eyes, Memory (1994), Krik? Krak! (1995, finalist for the National Book Award), The Farming of Bones (1998, American Book Award), The Dew Breaker (2004), and Brother I'm Dying (2007, National Book Critics Circle Award). Her fiction and memoir consistently engage with the violence, beauty, and resilience of Haitian experience. She received the Neustadt Prize in 2018. She is also the editor of The Butterfly's Way: Voices from the Haitian Diaspora (2001) and The Beacon Best of 2000. Her work as a writer and cultural advocate has been enormously important for the visibility of Haitian and Caribbean literature in the United States and internationally. Danticat is one of the most important Caribbean-American writers of her generation and a powerful voice for Haitian culture and identity.