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• 04 / 19 / 2008

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The government of Martinique announced today that it was preparing State funerals for Cesaire, who died on Thursday at age of 94, in a hospital of that capital.

Great among the greatest poets that boost the Caribbean to the world stage, Cesaire was co-writer of the concept that explained black peoples contribution, with customs and traditions, to the regional culture, together with Senegalese Leopold Sedar Senghor and Guyanese Leon Gontran Damas.

The authorities of Fort de France, where he worked until shortly before dying, announced that after a family funeral, his coffin will be carried on shoulders around the city, and that the funerals could last three days.

The anti-colonial advocacy of Cesaire began to have an impact after publication of his essay "Speech about Colonialism," written in 1951.

His struggle against colonialism and racism had great impact on the Caribbean, Europe, and the United States, where the movements for civil rights were fueled by his theories.

Poetry marked by vigor and conviction, together with a polished command of the language, place him beside other epitomes of the Caribbean literature, as his Cuban friend Nicolas Guillen and Haitian Jacques Roumain.