Memoirs of Toussaint and Isaac Louverture

Arthur F. Saint-Aubin is professor of French at Occidental College.

• DedicationAcknowledgmentsPrefaceFather of a Nation/Father of SonsA Father’s Son/A Son of the NationAuthors of Memoirs Manuscripts: The Production of Meaning and the Performance of MasculinityChronologyChapter One: First PublicationsToussaint Louverture’s Memoir: A Profile in Racialized AnxietyPrefacing and Appending Toussaint’s Memoir: Exposing the Black Male Bodyand Diverting BlacknessIsaac Louverture’s Memoir: A Representation of Black Masculinity in the Name of theFatherReading and Writing the FatherRe-Reading and Re-Writing the FatherValidating Black Masculinity in the NotesChapter Two: The Louvertures and the Evolution of Memoir Writing in France: Personalizing the Historical/Historicizing the PersonalPersonalizing the Historical: Revealing Truth in the First PersonHistoricizing the Personal: Demonstrating Truth in the Third PersonA Louverturian “Family Romance”Chapter Three: Remembered Injustices: A Memory of History/The Fiction of MemoryFather and Son: Between History and MemoryThe Coloring of Memory: The Psychical and Social Construction of RememberingToussaint Mis-Remembers: Is There a Constitution in this Text?Isaac Remembers Napoleon but Mis-Remembers His BrotherFrom Counter-History to FictionalizationAll of Saint-Domingue is a Stage: Toussaint Louverture, DramaturgeFrom the Dramatic to the Lyrical: Isaac Louverture, PoetChapter Four: Toussaint’s Constitution: Power, Memoir Writing, and the Making of Black ManhoodFrom Constitution to Memoir: A Diagram of Masculine JusticePower, Race, and Masculine Self-Actualization in the Memoirs of Toussaint and Isaac LouvertureChapter Five: The Fact of Blackness/The Fiction of Masculinity: Toward Narratives of Mourning and MelancholiaPsychoanalysis: Race, Nation, and Masculine IdentityThe Louvertures : Resisting Whiteness/Desiring WhitenessThe Fact of Blackness/The Fiction of Masculinity: The Body of the FatherLike Father, Like Son: Desiring Whiteness/Resisting WhitenessMourning Becomes the Black Male SubjectToussaint’s Disconsolation/Isaac’s LossPostscript: The Louvertures, Haiti, and a Diasporic Tradition of Writing the Masculine SelfAppendix: “Le jour de la paix” (Isaac Louverture)Works CitedAbout the Author