Fennell Lecture 2022 - Professor Marlene Daut

This Fennell Lecture, by Professor Marlene L Daut, presents the little known history of heroism and strife, triumph and betrayal that characterizes the story of the first, last, and only king of Haiti, Henry Christophe I. Born to an enslaved mother on the island of Grenada, he first fought to overthrow the British in North America, before helping his fellow enslaved Africans in Saint-Domingue, as Haiti was then called, to gain their freedom from France. Yet in an incredible twist of fate, at one time, Christophe ended up fighting with Napoleon’s forces against the very enslaved men and women he had previously fought alongside. Later, reuniting with the famous armée indigène that liberated and declared Haiti independent in 1804, he offered to lead them and made himself their King. But it all came to a sudden and tragic end when after only 13 years of ruling, King Henry shot himself in the heart, some say with a silver bullet.  

This event will take place in person and online. Please register (free) at the Eventbrite links below.

Register - In person  Register - Online

Professor Marlene L Daut

Professor Marlene L Daut has a BA in English and French from Loyola Marymount University, and she earned a PhD in English from the University of Notre Dame in 2009. She is currently Professor of African Diaspora Studies in the Carter G. Woodson Institute and the Program in American Studies at the University of Virginia. Before joining the faculty of UVA, Daut was Associate professor of English and Cultural Studies at Claremont Graduate University. She has also been the recipient of fellowships from the National Humanities Center, the Ford Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).

She is the author of two books, 'Baron de Vastey and the Origins of Black Atlantic Humanism' (Palgrave, 2017) and 'Tropics of Haiti: Race and the Literary History of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World, 1789-1865' (Liverpool, 2015); and the forthcoming co-edited collection,'Haitian Revolution Fictions: An Anthology' (UVA Press, November 2021). Her articles have appeared in numerous scholarly journals such as, Studies in Romanticism, L'esprit createur, Small Axe, Nineteenth-Century Literature, Comparative Literature, South Atlantic Review, Research in African Literatures, and J19. She is also co-editor and co-creator of H-Net's scholarly network, H-Haiti and curates the websites, haitianrevolutionaryfictions.com and lagazetteroyale.com. 

You can find out more about her current and past projects by visiting her website.