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Afro-Creole Poetry in French from Louisiana’s Radical Civil War–Era Newspapers: A Bilingual Edition

Translated and introduced by Clint Bruce, with a foreword by Angel Adams ParhamThe Historic New Orleans Collection 2020 • hardcover 

As the United States descended into civil war, the influential community of French-speaking free people of color in New Orleans struck back against racial hostility by founding newspapers: L’Union: mémorial politique, littéraire et progressiste appeared in 1862, succeeded by La Tribune de la Nouvelle-Orléans in 1864. Collected here for the first time, the poetry printed in these papers unveils hidden verse conversations among a network of activist authors.

The original French poems appear alongside Clint Bruce’s sensitive English translations. A comprehensive introduction, biographies of the poets, and extensive annotations immerse readers in Civil War–era Louisiana. New evidence of a poetic hoax debuts in the volume, along with long-lost, recently discovered issues of La Tribune that report on the 1866 Mechanics’ Institute massacre.

Awards and Honors

• Winner of the 2021 Lois Roth Award, recognizing outstanding efforts in translation by the 
• Winner of a 2021 Vindie Award by the 
• Longlist selection for the National Translation Award in Poetry, 
• Honorable Mention: Leadership in History Awards,  
• Honorable Mention: 

“[A]dds significantly to the corpus of French-language poetry published in 19th-century Louisiana. . . . Bruce’s translations, annotated and placed alongside the original verse, are masterful. . . . His extensive historical and contextual introduction and the biographies of the poets are invaluable resources. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty; general readers.”
—A. J. Guillaume Jr., 

“Bruce’s archival excavations [demonstrate] a remarkable achievement for several fields of historical, cultural, and literary studies. [The volume] is to be praised for bringing to full light courageous voices who channeled and amplified the energy needed in the present for changing the future.”
—Caterina Bernardini, 

“[A] stellar edition and translation. . . . significantly enhances our knowledge of Black writing and print culture in the nineteenth-century US.”
—Nicholas T. Rinehart,