On the Commerce of Intimacy: Dany Laferriere on How to Make Love to a Negro...and Heading South

Abstract

There is palpable tension distinguished by respect and humor in the following conversation which engages with the author/producer bound to and by the mechanics of an art form and its signifying intentions. One reading of this relationship, and suggested in the conversation, is Laferrière’s insistence that his stories are fiction, however much they resonate the actuality of historical activity and gesture something more than the imagination of the writer. Restating what is a complex of ideas and personal investments is to recall the author/producer’s privilege and right to not bear the weight of history.