Author: Charles Forsdick, Christian Hogsbjerg
publisher name: Duke University Press
ISBN: 9780822362012
The definitive modern biography of the great slave leader, military genius, and revolutionary hero Toussaint Louverture. The Haitian Revolution began in the French Caribbean colony of Saint-Domingue with a slave revolt in August 1791 and culminated a dozen years later in the proclamation of the world's first independent black state. After the abolition of slavery in 1793, Toussaint Louverture, himself a former slave, became the leader of the colony's black population, the commander of its republican army, and eventually its governor. During the course of his extraordinary life, he confronted some of the dominant forces of his age - slavery, settler colonialism, imperialism, and racial hierarchy. Treacherously seized by Napoleon's invading army in 1802, this charismatic figure ended his days, in Wordsworth's phrase, 'the most unhappy man of men', imprisoned in a fortress in France. Black Spartacus draws on a wealth of archival material to follow every step of Louverture's singular journey, from his triumphs against French, Spanish, and British troops to his skillful regional diplomacy, his Machiavellian dealings with successive French colonial administrators, and his bold promulgation of an autonomous Constitution. Sudhir Hazareesingh shows that Louverture developed his unique vision and leadership through a hybrid heritage of fraternal slave organizations, Caribbean mysticism, and African political traditions.
