Overview

Believed to have emerged in the French Caribbean based on African spirit beliefs, the zombie represents not merely the walking dead, but also a walking embodiment of the region’s history and culture. In Haiti today, the zombie serves as an enduring memory of enslavement: it is defined as a reanimated body robbed of part of its soul, forced to work in sugarcane fields. In Martinique and Guadeloupe, the zombie takes the form of a shape-shifting evil spirit, and represents the dangers posed to the maroon or “freedom runner.” The Zombie in Contemporary French Caribbean Fiction is the first book-length study of the literary zombie in recent fiction from the region. It examines how this symbol of the enslaved (and of the evil spirits that threaten them) is used to represent and critique new socio-political situations in the Caribbean. It also offers a comprehensive and focused examination of the ways contemporary authors from Haiti and the French Antilles contribute to the global zombie imaginary, identifying four “avatars” of the zombie—the slave, the trauma victim, the horde, and the popular zombie—that appear frequently in fiction and anthropology, exploring how works by celebrated and popular authors reimagine these archetypes.

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9781802077995

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""Swanson sets the zombie back on its original path, thereby returning our attention to the Haitian figure (the original from which all others were spawned) and follows it into the 21st century in this vibrant and current study of a centuries’ old myth. This book is a great addition to the field of zombie studies and to scholarship on Caribbean literature."" Sarah Juliet Lauro, University of Tampa

Swanson sets the zombie back on its original path, thereby returning our attention to the Haitian figure (the original from which all others were spawned) and follows it into the 21st century in this vibrant and current study of a centuries' old myth. This book is a great addition to the field of zombie studies and to scholarship on Caribbean literature. Sarah Juliet Lauro, University of Tampa

Author Information

Lucy Swanson is Assistant Professor of French & Francophone Studies at the University of Arizona.

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