L’universalisation de la catastrophe haïtienne dans "Tout bouge autour de moi" de Dany Laferrière

"Tout bouge autour de moi" by the Haitian-Quebecois writer Dany Laferrière is a hybrid work which escapes all classification. It is a personal reflection triggered by the catastrophic earthquake that destroyed the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince and other cities in January 2010. The purpose of this essay is to correlate two aspects that define this work: the narration of the disaster (the need of bearing witness as a survivor, the chronological account of events) and the meditation which enables the writer to transcend the Haitian tragedy and make it universal. The analysis of some extracts from Tout bouge autour de moi will show how this process is made possible through two kinds of references: cultural (Haitian and non-Haitian painters and writers such as Paul Morand, Stefan Zweig, Amos Oz) and extraterritorial (the ties between Haiti and other geographical places, such as Brazil and Quebec).