Bridging the Middle Passage: The Textual (R)evolution of Césaire’s Cahier d’un retour au pays natal

Abstract

Aimé Césaire’s Cahier d’un retour au pays natal had an American life before it had an international or an African life. In fact, the poem was published in book form for the first time in America, first in Spanish translation in Havana in 1942, and then in English and French in New York in 1947. An important addition to the poem also appeared in Tropiques in the April, 1942 issue, later appearing in Haïti journal, on May 25, 1944. The evidence also suggests that issue no. 20 of the Paris journal Volontés, where the poem appeared for the first time, was also making the rounds in the Caribbean and the United States-much more so than in France, where it was originally published in 1939.