Philippe Thoby-Marcelin

Philippe Thoby-Marcelin (1904–1975), was a Haitian poet, novelist, journalist, folklorist and politician.

Philippe Thoby-Marcelin was born December 11, 1904, in Port-au-Prince.

He and his younger brother, Pierre Marcelin (1908-?), worked together on the writing of several novels about rural Haiti, highlighting the themes of peasant life and Haitian folklore.

Philippe went to high school in Port-au-Prince and finished his education in Paris where he studied law.

Like most Haitian intellectuals, he was opposed to the American occupation of Haiti, which had been established in 1915.

While there, he became acquainted with Valéry Larbaud, who arranged to have some of his poems published in La revue européenne, a monthly literary journal that was published from 1923 to 1931.

Back in Haiti, he began his career as general secretary at the Ministry of Public Works.

In 1927, together with Jacques Roumain, Carl Brouard, Émile Roumer and Normil Sylvain (1900-1929), he helped create La Revue Indigène, a literary journal in which they published their poems.

They idea was to honor the indigenous Haitian literary and artistic material, and return the culture to its pre-occupational state.

His first novel Canapé-Vert, was published in 1944.

In 1946, he participated in the founding of the short-lived Popular Socialist Party (PSP), together with Anthony Lespès.

That same year he published his second novel, La Bête de Musseau, translated as The Beast of the Haitian Hills.

In 1948, when the PSP was declared illegal by President Dumarsais Estimé, he moved to the United States, where he worked as a translator for the Pan-American Union.

His third novel, Le Crayon de Dieu, appeared in 1952.

His last novel, Tous les Hommes sont Fous was published in 1972 and translated into English by his wife, Eva.

He died at his home in Cazenovia, near Syracuse, New York, in 1975.