Edwidge Danticat in conversation with Paul Holdengräber

Online conversation

Event co-presented in collaboration with the Onassis Foundation in Los Angeles (OLA) “Art Center for Dialogue”

Edwidge Danticat is an author who has been deeply scarred by the experience of the Haitian diaspora. Her work analyses the relationship between the particular and the universal, or, in other words, how, as they interact with one another, families and communities mirror issues of great import: from gender constructions to cultural identity, from the immigrant experience to the violence of hegemony and imperialism. In the words of Anderson Tepper in Vanity Fair: “Danticat's voice has woven its way into our consciousness, with unforgettable tales of families and lovers - from Haiti to Miami, Brooklyn and beyond - often struggling with grief, loss, and missed connections”.

Edwidge Danticat (Port-au-Prince, 1969) is the author of several novels and collections short stories, including “Breath, Eyes, Memory” (Emecé/Bronce, 1998), “Krik? Krak!”, which reached the finals of the National Book Award in the United States, “Create Dangerously”, a collection of essays, and “The Farming of Bones” (Norma, 1999). She is also the editor of anthologies of Haitian writers in the American diaspora. She has written seven books for children, travel stories, and, in 2007, her book of memoirs, “Brother, I’m Dying” was a finalist for the National Book Award and went on to win the 2008 National Book Critics Circle Award. Her latest book, “Everything Inside”  (2019) is a collection of short stories. Paul Holdengräber (Houston, 1960) was the founder and director of the New York Public Library’s ‘Live’ programme. Over the course of the last decade, he has curated more than six hundred cultural programmes and conversed with such prominent celebrities as Patti Smith, Zadie Smith, Jay-Z, Wes Anderson and Margaret Atwood. Among the awards he has received for his work in the promotion of culture are that of Knight of Arts and Letters of the French Republic and the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art. He is currently the director of the Onassis Foundation in Los Angeles. In March 2020, Holdengräber created the series of daily podcasts, ‘The Quarantine Tapes’.