Irele, F. Abiola. "Aime Cesaire (1913-2008)." THE ROOT April 22, 2008.

The death last week of Aimé Césaire brings to a definitive close one of the most significant episodes of black literary and intellectual history, that represented by the Negritude movement. With Léon Damas from French Guiana and Léopold Sédar Senghor from Senegal, Cesaire formed a triumvirate who gave voice and form to Negritude as a concept and a movement. After the death of Senghor in 2001, Césaire was the last survivor of an early generation of French-speaking black writers who, in the years between the two World Wars, called into question the French colonial order and challenged the discourse of empire by which it was rationalized. It is safe to say that Cesaire's work represented the most vehement expression of this anti-colonial stance, and indeed the most powerful evocation of the black experience in its full historical scope and emotional range. Read the entire obituary here: http://www.theroot.com/id/45959.