Brother, I'm Dying (Hardcover)

by Edwidge Danticat (Author)
Key Phrases: anti gang unit, chief dread, Tante Denise, Uncle Joseph, Bel Air (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. In a single day in 2004, Danticat (Breath, Eyes, Memory; The Farming of Bones) learns that she's pregnant and that her father, André, is dying—a stirring constellation of events that frames this Haitian immigrant family's story, rife with premature departures and painful silences. When Danticat was two, André left Haiti for the U.S., and her mother followed when Danticat was four. The author and her brother could not join their parents for eight years, during which André's brother Joseph raised them. When Danticat was nine, Joseph—a pastor and gifted orator—lost his voice to throat cancer, making their eventual separation that much harder, as he wouldn't be able to talk with the children on the phone. Both André and Joseph maintained a certain emotional distance through these transitions. Danticat writes of a Haitian adage,  'When you bathe other people's children, you should wash one side and leave the other side dirty.' I suppose this saying cautions those who care for other people's children not to give over their whole hearts. In the end, as Danticat prepares to lose her ailing father and give birth to her daughter, Joseph is threatened by a volatile sociopolitical clash and forced to flee Haiti. He's then detained by U.S. Customs and neglected for days. He unexpectedly dies a prisoner while loved ones await news of his release. Poignant and never sentimental, this elegant memoir recalls how a family adapted and reorganized itself over and over, enduring and succeeding to remain kindred in spite of living apart. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Bookmarks Magazine
Edwidge Danticat's father and uncle chose very different paths: the former struggled to make a new life for himself in America, while the latter remained in the homeland he paradoxically loved. In following their lives and their impact on future generations, Danticat's powerful family memoir explores how the private and the political, the past and the present, intersect. The most poignant section focuses on Joseph's tragic trip to the United States at age 81, but Danticat also tells a wider story about family and exile, the Haitian diaspora, the Duvalier regime, and post-9/11 immigration policy. Emotionally resonant and exceptionally clear-eyed, Brother, I'm Dying offers insight into a talented writer, her family history, and the injustices of the modern world.

Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; First Edition edition (September 4, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400041155
• ISBN-13: 978-1400041152
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #131,101 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #8 in	Books > Literature & Fiction > World Literature > Caribbean
  #9 in	Books > Literature & Fiction > United States > African American > Danticat, Edwidge
  #33 in	Books > Literature & Fiction > History & Criticism > United States > Women

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Of Love, migration and injustice, September 16, 2007

By	Josiane H. Barnes "Josiane Hudicourt Barnes" (Cambridge, MA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Edwidge tells the story of a modern Haitian family, her family, with great love and courage. In addition to Edwidge's family's personal events, the year 2004 was a year of great sadness and emotion for Haiti and Haitians. It was a year that was to be the celebration of the country's 200th. birthday. Haitians were full of anger at the political situation and sadness at their inability to celebrate one of the major reasons for Haitian pride, our great history. There were also terrible natural disasters, floods that killed more people than 9/11 did. It was a sad year and Edwidge was having her first baby.
While it is often said that Haitians in the US are not political refugees but economic refugees, this book shows us that family life is tied to political life. And in the face of the political and economic situation, some make the choice to emigrate at any cost as Edwidge's biological father did, and some make the choice of serving their community in Haiti as Edwidge's surrogate father and uncle did. Each man expresses love for the family in his own way either as a provider of financial support or a provider of every day love. Uncle Joseph stayed in Haiti as long as he could. When the day came that his own home was destroyed and his life was directly threatened, he decided to go to the US with no return date. That's how he encountered his death: a family man alone in a foreign hospital, shackled, voiceless, and abandoned, because he made the mistake of asking for political asylum.
For most Americans this story will be an introduction to a type of life common to many Haitians, a life of dedication to family and of cultural transitions. Edwidge's family is a hybrid of true Haitians and true Americans. As Americans they believed in respect for national institutions. But Joseph Dantica's death showed the ugly face of the Immigration Service as an institution; an institution whose clients are all voiceless, like uncle Joseph. In his life as a throat cancer survivor and in his death Edwidge becomes his voice. A beautiful voice.

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Simple Bowl of Rice, seasoned with salt: A Must Read Story of America Today, September 13, 2007

By	readers anonymous (USA) - See all my reviews

Edwidge Danticat once again writes gold with this unforgettable tale of America.

Edwidge Danticat is an acclaimed author with national bestseller and Oprah pick novels to her credit. This, however, is a biographical account of her own life as a Haitian immigrant dealing with, simulaneously, the slow death of her father, who came here an immigrant but died a US citizen, at the same time as her uncle, a minister who raised her for many years in Haiti, is on a path toward his own death at 81--shackled to a bed as an immigration detainee in post 9/11 America, after requesting asylum due to attempts on his own life in retaliation for UN-involved violence, his medication taken and discarded, despite the fact that he had been coming to the country for thirty years and arrived with proper documentation and a valid visa--a death hastened by his nexcusable treatment at the hands of the US government.

You will be outraged by this story, which is a testiment to both the best and worst of America, while you will learn to respect and admire the men and women who's tale it is. This is a story of love, of family, of America, and of transition. It is a lesson in justice, family, loyalty, trust, honor, pride, and betrayal. This book manages to tell an intensely human story within the context of the serious political and moral complications of American life today. It should be required reading by every American.

Simply put, it will feed your soul an entire feast with a simple bowl of rice.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Simple lives, exquisitely portrayed, September 17, 2007

By	Gayle Williams "GreenburghMamaDay" (Greenburgh, New York USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is one of Ms. Danticat's finest works. If you loved her work so far, you won't be disappointed with this book. As in her other books, her writing literally sings, sometimes mournful tunes, sometimes pretty ditties. Whatever the tone of the "music," it's wonderful. As is this book.