Plot Outline

Okay, I kind of changed the plot a little bit when I started writing. I cut the grandmother out altogether. I also cut the little brother out. So any parts you read with Grandmother or little brother I'm not going to write about. The point is that Célèste is all he has, he doesn't have any other family.

Setting: In the French colony known as Santo Domingue (later known as Haiti) in the summer of 1791. In the North-Eastern part of the country on a plantation (near Cap-Haïtien). Main character: Maurice Fortin a slave on a sugarcane plantation. 17 years old, strong and tall, light brown skin. His family includes his Grandmother, who is 60, and his 10 year-old little brother. He was born in Haiti and so was his mother who died from some unknown illness. His father is the slave-master. His Grandmother was taken from Africa. Another character is Célèste Savard who is also 17 and pregnant with his baby.

Exposition: Begins with him working in the fields and realizing it is around the time his mother died 6 years ago. He then hears a rumor form his fellow slaves that people are traveling into the forest nesr the plantation to hear Dutty Boukman, who was planning an extraordinary vodoun ceremony, where he would predict something unbelievable. That night when they are sleeping in the slave cabins Maurice tells his Grandmother he is going to the ceremony and she is vehemently against it, they argue. He talks about it with Célèste who at first disagrees with him going, but he convinces her.

Rising Action: He sets off for the forest in the middle of the night with a lot of other slaves. He doesn't realize his little brother follows him. We he does realize he sends him home after a big arguement. Then the ceremony takes place which is a big part of the rising action.

Climax: The vodoun ceremony creates a feeling of invincibility among the slaves and Maurice and the slaves he works with run back through the jungle to the plantation trying to revolt and kill the slave-master. Along the way he runs into a little girl, a friend of his brother's. He ignores her running right past, but he looks back and sees one of the overseers from the plantation run into the girl as well. The white man looks straight into her eyes and shoots her in the heart. Maurice is horrified and pukes into the bushes.

Falling Action: Trying to run away from what he has seen he searches for Célèste and his Grandmother. He finds Célèste with his little brother. They are trying to escape during the chaos, trying to run away and free themselves. He asks where his grandmother is, but Célèste says she has been beaten to death. The three of them flee the fighting to head for the nearest city, Cap Francais (the capital, later called Cap-Haïtien). the falling action takes place through their three day journey as they see the effects of the slave revolt.

Resolution: When the trio enters Cap Francais they see that the slave rebellions also happened there and they see runaway slaves trying to organize an army. They also find that the French government has displayed the head of Dutty Boukman. It is then that Maurice realizes what he was meant to do. He knows he has to fight in this war and he knows he is a soldier.

The flow of my plot conflict is more questions to answers or ignorance to knowledge than anything else. My story starts out peacefully, but ends in the beginning of a war. My character starts out not knowing what his place is or what he can do to help his people, but by the end he figures it out. The external conflict of this story is the beginning of the Haitian revolution and the slaves fighting to overthrow the French after many years of conflict between them. The internal conflict is one man's dilemma of protecting his family vs. fighting for his rights. During the climax he realizes that he has to fight for his people, something changes within him even if he doesn't realize it yet. By the end of the story he knows that the revolution is upon him and his life is going to be forever impacted by the external conflicts. As for his inward dilemma deciding between taking care of his family or fighting in the revolution he knows he has to do his best to do both.