'' by
Washington Irving In the years since Anacaona's death, writers and artists have since used her memory to advance various positions.
Alfred, Lord Tennyson wrote the poem "Anacona" while attending
Trinity College, Cambridge, first reciting it in 1830, though it was not formally published until 1897, two years after his death. Independent scholar Marion Sherwood describes "Anacaona" as an "escapist fantasy" that portrays Anacaona as an "
Other" living in an Edenic, natural paradise. According to Sherwood, Tennyson's "Anacaona" reflects Tennyson's ambivalence or hostility towards the
Spanish Empire while romanticizing Anacaona as a "
noble savage". Between 1879 and 1882,
Manuel de Jesús Galván published
Enriquillo, which features Anacaona as a character. In the novel, Higuenamota marries Hernando de Guevara and takes the name Doña Ana. She is the grandmother of the novel's protagonist, Enriquillo. In 1880, Dominican writer
Salomé Ureña wrote the poem "Anacaona", which featured Anacaona as the protagonist. Literary scholar
Maria Cristina Fumagalli argues that this poem subtly promotes Hispanic identity over a broader pan-Hispaniolan or multi-ethnic perspective, projecting modern national borders onto a historical landscape. In the late 20th century, Anacaona became a popular figure in Caribbean music. The Salsa song "Anacaona", originally performed by
Tite Curet Alonso and popularized in the United States by
Cheo Feliciano in 1971, was among the earliest examples of this trend. The song tells the story of Anacaona using lyrical fragments interspersed with a based on the "Areíto de Anacaona", an that was allegedly played by warriors to pay her homage. Writer Olivia Tracy argues that this song helped to foster an embrace of Indigenous identity within the
Chicano Movement. Other tributes to Anacaona in song include "Anakaona" by Ansy and Yole Dérose, released in 1983; and "Anacaona" by
Irka Mateo, released in 2009. Haitian neurologist, poet, novelist and playwright
Jean Métellus published a play titled
Anacaona in 1986. The play depicts Anacaona as a strong Taíno leader who uses her voice to establish peace via her marriage to Caonabó. The play concludes with Anacaona's death, as her "right hand", Yaquimex, prepares to flee into the mountains of Jaragua to incite a rebellion amongst African slaves. Fumagalli argues that
Anacaona serves as a reappropriation and celebration of Hispaniola's Indigenous history and its
creolizing influences. She further argues that the play is a critique of the regimes of
François and
Jean-Claude Duvalier, critiquing their
Afrocentrism by emphasizing interethnic and interracial collaborations. Meanwhile, Tracy argues that through
Anacaona, Métellus is reinterpreting history to suggest a direct connection between Anacaona's resistance and that of enslaved Africans, encouraging contemporary Haitians to adopt a defiant stance against ongoing oppression and deceit. In 2005, Haitian-American author
Edwidge Danticat published the
young adult novel
Anacaona: Golden Flower, Haiti, 1490, which tells the story of Anacona's life in the form of a fictional diary. Pierre notes this as the most notable work of literature about Anacaona. In the novel, Anacaona is depicted as a skilled poet, cultural figure, and active participant in resistance, engaging in physical combat against the Spanish. Tracy, in analyzing the novel's themes, discusses how Danticat's novel portrays Anacaona as a complex leader, embodying both the preservation of culture through poetry and storytelling as well as active, physical resistance against oppression. Meanwhile, Fumagalli argues that Danticat's novel implicitly and problematically prioritizes a "Haitian narrative" by anachronistically superimposing modern Haitian national boundaries onto the historical geography of Anacaona's rule, thereby overlooking her broader significance to the entire island of Hispaniola and its transnational creole culture. ==See also==