Makandal, the Mandingue Slave, loses his arm in a sugar mill accident. He flees the sugar plantation of Monsieur Lenormand de Mézy, in the northern region of the colony where he was enslaved. Makandal escapes into the lush landscape of the region, learning to craft potions and poisons.
Makandal, now the Lord of Poison, mobilizes enslaved laborers across the Plaine du Nord and soon releases poison throughout the land, indiscriminately killing animals and humans.
Makandal returns to the region as "The Restored. The Transformed." Though M. Lenormand de Mézy attempts to burn the revel at the stake, Makandal instead channels his newfound powers and transforms into an insect, flying overhead and evading capture. Makandal is never seen again, becoming legendary throughout the land. The historical figure of François Makandal was in fact executed in Cap Haïtien for his seditious acts.
The Comédie du Cap, a theater in Cap-Français, fully opens to the public and M. Lenormand de Mézy is frequently in attendance. The future King Henri Cristophe (born Grenada, 1767–1820), originally brought to Saint-Domingue as a slave, works as a chef at the Auberge de la Couronne inn. Ti Noël has fathered twelve children, to whom he teaches the stories of Makandal with hopes that his friend will one day return.
National Constituent Assembly is formed in France on the eve of the French Revolution. In addition to their many legislative acts, the Assembly proclaims that all sons of manumitted slaves across the French empire be given rights as citizens. Word starts to spread throughout Saint Domingue that "something had happened in France."
The first stirrings of revolution occur with the Ogé Rebellion, an unsuccessful revolt led by affranchise against white colonial authorities in Saint-Domingue.
Bois Caïman Ceremony takes place, presided over by Dutty Boukman (simply named Bouckman, "the Jamaican," in the novel), who serves as the houngan (priest) and conducts a series of ritual activities dedicated to Ogoun, the Lwa (Diety) of War.
Conch shells are sounded across the land and the insurrection of Saint-Domingue's enslaved population marks an official start to revolutionary action.
The rebellion is stopped with people of color put to death across the region. M. Lenormand de Mézy flees to Cuba with Ti Noël and twelve other slaves in order to save their lives and save his assets.
Bouckman is killed by members of the French plantocracy. His severed head is displayed on a stake so the public will bear witness to his crimes.
France is declared a Republic, thus abolishing the monarchy and institutional enslavement.
French King Louis XVI is beheaded.
Enslavement is officially abolished across all French colonies.
The publication of Description topographique, physique, civile, politique et historique de la partie française de Saint-Dominigue by Médéric Louis Élie Moreau de Saint-Méry (1750–1819), a text that addresses the creolization of subjects of the territory of Saint-Domingue with concern for blood purity, genealogy, and culture. Saint-Méry's text develops a rigid hierarchy of black-white miscegenation through distinct castes and sub-categories.
Constitution drafted for Saint-Domingue at the behest of Toussaint L'Ouverture, signed July 1801. Catholicism is named the official religion. L'Ouverture is appointed rule for life. Freed slaves become indentured servants on the plantations where they were previously enslaved.
Pauline Bonaparte (1780–1825) boards ship with her husband General Charles Victor Emmanuel Leclerc (1772–1802) and takes a forty-five-day voyage across the Atlantic to Saint-Domingue.
Marshal Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau (1725–1807) leads expeditionary troops into Saint-Domingue on behalf of the French Crown. Rochambeau's brutal force inadvertently helps to unify and ultimately strengthen the disparate factions of soldiers rebelling against the French.
Napoleon reinstitutes enslavement to ensure Frensh sovereignty across the empire.
Yellow fever overtakes the Cap-Français, forcing Pauline Bonaparte to flee the region. Another insurrection becomes imminent.
Rochambeau surrenders to Jean-Jacques Dessalines, leading to the declaration of Haitian independence.
Haiti, under the leadership of Jean-Jacques Dessaline (1758–1806) officially declares independence from France and abolishes enslavement once again across the territory.
Jean Jacques Dessalines assassinated.
Ti Noël, now in Santiago de Cuba, buys his freedom and travels back to Saint-Domingue. Ti Noël reaches the former plantation of M. Lenormand de Mézy, where he was formerly enslaved. He discovers that the region has been transformed under the rule of Henri Christophe, and that black subjects now occupy all levels of social strata.
Palace at Sans Souci constructed.
Henri Christophe officially crowns himself King of Haiti, ruling over a kingdom in the northern half of the land, including Cap Haïtien and the Plaine-du-Nord.
Ti Noël finds himself wandering on the grounds of Sans Souci when he is captured and imprisoned by Henri Christophe's guards. Ti Noël is forced into manual labor, carrying bricks up the mountainside to construct the Citadel La Farriére.
Ti Noël escapes the Citadel and winds his way down the coast.
After a vision of the immured Corneille Breille, Duke of Anse and Christophe's former confessor, to whom he behaved poorly, King Henri Christophe suffers a paralytic stroke.
Henri Christophe commits suicide at the Palace of Sans Souci as the bastion comes under siege. The Palace is pillaged and burnt.
Feeling newly liberated after acquiring regal attire from the deceased Henri Christophe, Ti Noël settles again in the northern region of Haiti, near Cap Haïtien, enjoying a time of peace, freedom, and spirituality.
In an effort to slow economic decline, Haitian President Jean-Pierre Boyer institutes the Rural Code, a semi-feudal fermage system in which peasants are tied to agricultural labor. Frustrated with the aristocratic impositions of Boyer's administration, Ti Noël summons the transformative powers learned from his friend Makandal and transforms himself into animal form, thus removing himself from the turmoil of the country's political problems. Ti Noël settles on the form of a goose, believing their community to be welcoming and egalitarian. However, Ti Noël finds himself to be a perpetual outsider, ostracized from even this seemingly warm community, so he transforms back into a human, in which form he finally passes away.
Alejo Carpentier is born in Lausanne, Switzerland. His family moves to Cuba shortly after his birth.
Due to his subversive publications, Carpentier leaves Cuba and lives in self-imposed exile in Paris.
Accompanied by French theatrical director Louis Jouvet, Carpentier travels from Cuba to Haiti, visiting historical sites throughout Cap Haïtien. This trip will become the inspiration for The Kingdom of This World.
Carpentier completes The Kingdom of This World, including a prologue discussion of lo real maravilloso ("the marvelous real"), an influential approach to the unique and unbelievable reality and legacy of Latin America.
After a battle with cancer, Carpentier dies in Paris. His remains were sent across the Atlantic and interred at the Colon Cemetery in Havana, Cuba.