Quote by Dionne Brand: “I write to enter the past, to remake it.”

This reveals a profound motivation for writing: not just to record history, but to actively engage with and transform it. It implies an artistic and intellectual desire to challenge existing narratives and construct new understandings.

The mid-1990s was a fertile period for writers actively engaged in decolonizing history and reimagining narratives, especially for the Black diaspora. Brand articulates a powerful artistic mission: to not just record, but to actively confront and reconstruct historical understandings.

Trinidadian-Canadian poet, novelist, and essayist who was Poet Laureate of Toronto from 2009 to 2012. Her 2001 work A Map to the Door of No Return explores the ongoing legacy of slavery and the Atlantic crossing in shaping diasporic Black identity.