Religiosity Versus Ecocriticism in Masters of the Dew, by Jacques Roumain

Abstract

Voodoo, a religion that originated in West Africa, mixed with Catholicism in Haiti, permeates the narrative Masters of the Dew (1978), by Jacques Roumain. The Immanuel who gives rise to Emanuel or Manuel, and in Hebrew means “God is with us,” (Figueiredo, 2022) is the protagonist of the story and comes as a “Messiah” to make black people aware that not everything depends on religiosity. He respects the creeds exalted by his people, but warns of the responsibility of each person with the same nature whose entities they are part of. A Character, who is a victim of the diaspora, as he spent 15 years in Cuba, he returns to his country, carrying the experiences he acquired and promoting a breath of hope and continuity for his people. The character’s new worldview facilitates the unfolding of the narrative, causing a clash between the assumptions of a pagan religion, intertwined with the assumptions of Christianity, and having the environment as the trigger for conflict in the plot. This work aims to demonstrate in the narrative the clash between the assumptions of religiosity and the concept of ecocriticism.