FRANCOISE SEMIRAMOTH CANNIBALIZES CARAVAGGIO

Maryse Condé

“Martiniquan poetry shall be cannibal or nothing,” Suzanne Césaire, the wife of our great poet from Martinique, Aimé Césaire, loudly proclaimed. She might have said in a slightly different mode “Antillean painting shall be cannibal or nothing”. Suzanne Césaire invested all her talent in fighting the marginalization imposed by men. Nevertheless, she was sharply criticized by René Etiemble, at the time teaching in Martinique, who blamed her for defending the notions of freedom and brotherhood between metropolitan France and her colonies instead of looking after her brood of children… Read more