Biographies on just a few of the many women writers whose work explores important topics relating to the Caribbean:
Rosario Ferre
Rosario Ferre was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico, in 1938. She is the daughter of Lorenza Ramires de Arrellano, a member of the landowning elite, and Luis A. Ferre, who was a pro-statehood governor of the Commonwealth. Ferre, herself, is a supporter of independence for the island. Ferre has three grown children, and is in her second marriage. She currently resides in San Juan.
Ferre holds a Doctor of Philosophy in Latin American Literature from the University of Maryland, College Park. During her career as a professor of Latin American Literature, she has taught at the University of California, Berkeley, Rutgers University; Harvard University; Johns Hopkins University; and the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras.
Some of her most recognized works include Sweet Diamond Dust, The House on the Lagoon, and The Youngest Doll. Recently, she has published another novel, titled Eccentric Neighborhoods.
Simone Schwarz-Bart
Simone Schwarz-Bart was born in Charent-Maritime in 1938 and went to Guadeloupe at the age of three. She studied at the University of Paris. In France, she met and married a Jewish writer, Andre Schwarz-Bart. The two published a joint novel, Un plat de porc aux banes vertes. Schwarz-Bart currently lives in Goyave, a small community in Guadeloupe. Some of Schwarz-BartŐs most recognized novels include The Bridge of Beyond and Between Two Worlds.
Maryse Conde
Maryse Conde was born in Pointe-a-Pitre in 1937. She was the eldest in a family of eight children. Her parents are Guadeloupean. At 16, Conde left Guadeloupe to study in France. In 1959, she married Mamadou Conde, an actor from Africa. She lived and the Ivory Coast and taught for a year in Bingerville. She has also lived in Ghana. In the 1970Ős, she left Africa to live in France. In 1982, she married Richard Philcox, the English translator of many of her novels. She also taught in the Los Angeles, California for a year. In 1986, she returned to Guadeloupe for a time. She is currently teaching at Columbia University, New York. Some of Conde's works include Tree of Life, I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem, and Crossing the Mangrove.
Edwidge Danticat
Edwidge Daticat was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, in1969. Her parents immigrated to Haiti when she was very young. Subsequently, she was raised by an aunt, who influenced her to enjoy the Haitian practice of story telling. At 12, Danticat moved to Brooklyn to join her absent parents. In Brooklyn, Danticat lived in a largely Haitian-American neighborhood.
Danticat received a BA in French Literature at Bernard College. She received her Master of Fine Arts degree at Brown University. As her masterŐs thesis, Danticat wrote her novel Breath, Eyes, Memory, which is now available through Soho Press. Her other works include Krick? Krack!, which was nominated for a National Book Award, and a recent novel, Farming the Bones.