Biography of Jonel Juste

Jonel Juste, journalist, poet, short story writer and editor, was born in Port-au-Prince on October 2, 1980. He is the author of the poetry collections Carrefour de Nuit, Solèy, Solèy, Mémoire de Quarantaine and Astres et Désastres. As a journalist, he has collaborated with various national and international press outlets such as HPN, Le Matin, Le National, Le Nouvelliste etc. A writer at Artburst Miami, some of his works appear today in The Miami Herald, The Miami Times, The Miami New Times, Sun Sentinel, etc.

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Jonel Juste began his literary career as a librarian and art instructor at the Atelier de Création Marcel Gilbert at the Justin Lhérisson Library in Carrefour, Haiti. Upon graduating from the Lycée Louis Joseph Janvier in Carrefour in 1999, Juste enrolled in the Facultés des Sciences Humaines of the State University of Haiti.

In 2000, Jonel Juste won the Dictée des Amériques contest in Port-au-Prince and went on to represent Haiti in Canada. His poem "Drapeau Atypique" won the poetry contest held by the École Normale Supérieure de Port-au-Prince in 2003.

Jonel Juste began his career in journalism in 2003. He collaborated with various Haitian newspapers, magazines, and online agencies. In 2005, he was savagely attacked while reporting for Le Nouvelliste in the dangerous area of Bel-Air. After leaving the daily paper, he worked at Haiti Press Network (2007-2011) as editor-in-chief.

In 2009, Jonel Juste’s poems appeared in the anthology Cahiers de la Ral,M Haiti published by the Chasseur Abstrait in France. It was a gigantic work that brought together three generations of Haitian poets.

In October 2011, he moved to Florida. There he wrote in 2012 "Carrefour de Nuit" which was published by Editions Edilivre in France. The collection contains both poems, and short stories. He has also published a collection of poems in Creole titled "Solèy, Solèy" (2019), a collection of poems in English entitled "I loved you before I knew your name" (2019), two collections of short stories (Trois fois passé là and The Watch) and an essay on Haitian hip hop (Haitian Hip Hop: From Top to Bottom). He participated with the text "Qui s'est permis" in the collective collection "So Spoke the Earth/Ainsi Parla la Terre" under the direction of author Jessica Fièvre.

In the United States, Jonel Juste has worked with various newspapers such as Le Floridien and The Miami Times. He currently collaborates with Artburst Miami. Some of his works appear today in The Miami Herald, The Miami Times, The Miami New Times, Sun Sentinel, etc.

Some of Jonel Juste's poems are available on the website poeme.co and on Facebook. He hosts a podcast called "Carrefour Poésie" in which he reads the poems of Haitian and foreign authors. Jonel Juste also promotes Haitian authors on Instagram through the platform Haiti Littéraire.

In 2021, he published Mémoire de Quarantaine, a series of multi-genre texts (poems, stories, short stories) written in French and Creole during the spring of 2020 when the world came to a standstill because of the coronavirus.

In 2022, the author published Astres et Désastres, a bilingual collection of poems, some of which reflect his attachment to Haiti, his native land, and others of his experience as an immigrant in the United States.