Aimé Césaire's <em>Letter to Maurice Thorez</em>: The Practice of Decolonization

Abstract

Aime Cesaire's Letter to Maurice Thorez is sad a commentary on the contro- versial and uneasy relationship between the Marxist Internationalist Left and Third-world anticolonial activists. Written shortly after the Second Congress of Black Writers and Intellectuals, the Letter forcefully reintro- duces race and the colonial question at the heart of battles that were being waged mainly along ideological lines. Cesaire articulates the repudiation of Communist paternalism on the imperative, for colonized elites, to reclaim the historical initiative, therefore elevating the duty of responsibility as the ultimate test of decolonization. I contend, however, that this radical anticolonial stance ought to be nuanced by the pragmatism that character- ized Cesaire as the politician and chief advocate for departementaliza- tion. Cesaire's resignation from the French Communist Party, against the background of the Algerian war against French domination, could also be defined as both a powerful discourse on colonialism as well as a political, intellectual, and ideological declaration of independence. The Letter, both a mirror and a vanguard call to action, deserves it rightful place in the glorious archives of men and women who stood up against colonial dehu- manization, that is, who made this world more humane for both colonizers and colonized.