From Peacemaker to Insurgent

Divergences in The Fictional Construction of The Taíno Leader Anacaona in Critical and Uncritical Historical Novels – The Colonization Process in Latin America

Abstract

The indigenous Anacaona represents a symbol of resilience and female leadership of the Taíno people. For resisting the forces of colonization that were eroding her ethnicity, she was executed, condemned to hanging for insurgence and rebellion, by the Spanish colonizers who arrived in the America continent with Christopher Columbus, in 1492. However, records about this historical figure and her people are scarce in the European hegemonic traditional historiography. It is within the literary universe that her figure finds space to be redefined in response to the historical erasure to which she was subjected. In this article, we present our comparative analysis of the fictional construction of this character in the uncritical historical novel Flor de Oro (Anacaona, Reina de Jaragua) (1860), by Francisco José Orellana, and the critical historical novel Anacaona: la última princesa del Caribe (2017) by Jordi Díez Rojas. To this end, we rely on scholars such as Celia Fernández Prieto (2003) and Fleck (2017) for theoretical support regarding the different modalities of the historical novel. Regarding the decolonial studies, we draw on Mignolo (2017). Additionally, we reference authors such as Martínez Miguélez (1994) and Federici (2017) concerning the role of women in society. Through our analysis, we demonstrate examples of the ideologizations constructed around the image of this indigenous woman over the centuries. We also emphasize the importance of bringing to light characters obscured by traditional historiography, granting them space in contemporary literature and, consequently, in the collective imaginary of Latin American society, which remains deeply rooted in coloniality-driven thought.