Customer Reviews

Song of Haiti

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Song of Haiti is an absolutely awesome book! As a nurse who has done mission work in Haiti, I found this book authentic, a true inspiration, as well as a compelling, indepth view of the lives of many dedicated and compassionate people. Barry Paris' work describes the country and the people in beautiful and fullfilling language. Oftentimes, I felt as if I were in Haiti again experiencing the amazing, hard-working and loving people of the country. I've never before read a biography with such griping prose. I looked forward to my time to read because I became more and more interested in the life of every person described - be it Dr. Mellon and Gwen or Albert Schweitzer, or the nurses and doctors and friends with whom they shared their lives. I believe this is the way that biographical work should be written. Song of Haiti is thorough in that it covers the entirety of Dr. Mellon's life, touching on his downfalls as well as his high acheivements. I found that the realism with which the story is told is excellent and believable. The many everyday encounters and adventures are interesting and mesmerizing - it makes a person want to travel and experience the third world for all of the beauty and intensity it offers. I recommend this book to everyone, regardless of your interest in medicine, mission work, or biography. It is amazing.

The life of William Larimer Mellon is an example of the life Americans should dream for themselves and those they love dearly. For one who majored in biology and gave it up for 18 years in auditing the paralells to Mellon's change of career and motivations struck me deeply. On witnessing the WTC disaster personally (a few hundred yards away) man should strive for something in life and go for it. Barry Paris well written account of a life inspired by Dr. Schweitzer is highly recommended to all readers committed to God and American morals and values. If readers have a noble vision the price of this book is totally insiginificant to the highest rewards you will gather from reading it.

Truly an engaging read that reminds us that we can choose to turn our lives around at any time. Larimer Mellon did just that at age 37, first going to medical school, then founding a hospital in Deschapelles, Haiti, that is running to this very day. The author does well to follow their project and show how their lives were intertwined by others similarly interested in Albert Schweitzer's ethos. This idea of "Reverence for Life" has led to the existence, in the middle of poorest rural Haiti, of a thriving band of expatriates, native Haitians, short-term volunteers, and visitors of various sorts dedicated to humanistic ideals. Hospital Albert Schweitzer lives on, and you can be a part of it if you choose.

The book has two distinct sections. The first 100 pages is a report on the Mellon family lifestyle, and how a rich maverick Mellon got to Haiti. The rest of the book details Dr. and Mrs. Mellon's founding of a hospital and civil engineering projects in central Haiti.
An important finding is that the Mellon's hospital was founded on the humanitarian premise, "Reverence for life." Taken from Dr. Sweitzer's work in Africa, life refers not only to human life, but also plant and animal. This little detail is critical to understanding the book. Many missions to Haiti are Christian, while Dr. Mellon's hospital is distinctly humanistic primarily as presented in the book.
As all books on Haiti fairly present, doing anything in Haiti is hard, and without American financial support, very little work done lasts. The hospital Dr. Mellon founded did well as long as he provided two of the four million dollars needed to run it. His civil engineering projects, in which he was much more interested than medicine (he actually only practiced medicine 3 years), all crumbled when turned over to the Haitians. Many other cottage industries met the same fate.
The book thus captures the Haitian dilemna, how to serve in Haiti and lift up the Haitians to be self sufficient. If Dr. Mellon's millions couldn't do it, how can any of us with less money at our disposal. Never the less, we go to Haiti because we cannot not go, nor can we not go back after going once.
An excellent book about how a real rich guy did his best to follow his heart, not his accountant's advice, and another book about how a strong wife really does the grunt work while her husband plays with big boy's toys.

The Song of Haiti is a tribute to the dream of Larimar Mellon, a man born to privilege and personal indulgence, who as full fledged adult on his own ranch in Arizona took into his heart a great desire to give all he had to the poor.
It tells how he rebuilt his life to give service by becoming a medical doctor and following the example of Albert Schweitzer, he found a people he could love without judgment in the Arbonite River Valley of Haiti.
The book shows what it took to build the facility and with what dedication he led his life with these people. He succeeded despite the many opportunities to fail by sharing his dream with his wife and his family. While he and Gwen are now gone to their reward, they are still there through their hospital, now staffed by locals and the family.
I loved the story, but I also loved the explanation of the people of that valley. It is easier to understand the fierce independence of the human spirit that exists in these people despite unbelievable hardships and repression by cruel overlords. In fact I guess the message is that the human spirit favors independence and self determination whether born to riches or in oppressing poverty.
It isn't money that makes the difference in us, not that life is easy without it, it is progress and self determination to choose wisdom and goodness.
I know three young men who are from DesChapelles. I see in their lives the fruit of Dr. Mellon's self appointed mission. While he can't take credit for their character, he probably can their career choice and their belief they can choose wisely. We should all be so good. What is precious is difficult to find if we fail to look where Dr. Mellon did. It is there in most all of us, but too few of us expend the effort to mine the depths of our souls for the precious gems that are there to find.
My book was in great shape. It is easy to read. There is no reason for us to sink in despair at the present state of our world. There is is every reason to work to improve it where we see it is needed.

Having just finished reading Song of Haiti, I can say that Larry and Gwen Mellon were great Americans whose work should be better known and widely honored...on American streets, on our stamps, on our money. We should all be proud to stand on a hilltop and scream, "at least one over-privileged American did the right thing!"

It's interesting to contrast Larry Mellon with George W. Bush, who was born with a similar set of privileges. Both men were products of wealthy northeastern families; both men were drawn to the rugged simplicity of the western cowboy lifestyle as a sort of antidote to the culture of the northeastern establishment.

But the similarities end there. After fulfilling his cowboy phase, Mellon turned the page, studied tropical medicine, and spent over thirty years improving the lives of the people of Haiti. In addition to building a great hospital, he used his ranching knowledge to build wells and irrigation systems throughout the Artibonite Valley. Bush by contrast more or less grew up a cowboy, then applied a certain brand of cowboy thinking to national and international politics.

It's shocking that Mellon's contributions are not better known. Let's hope that every time someone is crazy enough to want to name an airport or freeway after George W. Bush, it gets named instead after Larimer Mellon, the real national hero.