Mount Pelée on the Caribbean island of Martinique erupted in May 1902, completely destroying the city of Saint-Pierre and killing approximately 30,000 people in minutes through pyroclastic flows. Only two survivors were confirmed in the city itself. This disaster led to the scientific recognition of pyroclastic flows as a distinct volcanic hazard and transformed volcanology as a discipline.

The destruction of Saint-Pierre inspired numerous literary works in French and Caribbean literature, including poems by Aimé Césaire and other Négritude poets who explored themes of colonial vulnerability and Caribbean identity. The catastrophe appears in travel writing and fiction by authors like Lafcadio Hearn, who had lived in Martinique, and influenced Caribbean poetic responses to natural disaster as metaphor for colonial exploitation and cultural survival.