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Black History Highlight: Haitian Poet Jean-Fernand Brierre was born in Jérémie, Brierre worked as a politician and diplomat. He is recognized “as one of the most brilliant Haitian writers.” Poet, dramatist, and Haiti’s ambassador to Argentina. He emerged in the 1930s as a poet and militant in the backlash against the American Occupation (1915-34).

Throughout the 1950′s and 60′s, Brierre produced numerous patriotic verse dramas, including, Pétion and Bolívar, The Roots, Farewell to the Marseillaise and Discoveries. Even though Brierre had a distinguished career in public service, for several years he would be in and out of prison for his outspoken resistance against oppression. He was forced into exile, for the first time, in Jamaica after the Duvalier regime imprisoned him in 1961, and then again in 1964, when he moved to Senegal — where he lived the remainder of his life.