Poetic Tributes to Toussaint Louverture from William Wordsworth (1803) to John Agard (2006)

Abstract

This survey of poetic tributes to Toussaint Louverture shows considerable differences in how the Haitian hero is commemorated in different cultural contexts. William Wordsworth celebrates him as a freedom fighter spearheading a transnational struggle against social inequities. American abolitionist John Greenleaf Whittier views Louverture as a “martyr” who exposes White supremacy. In Champions of Freedom (1910), Henrietta Cordelia Ray hails Louverture as a “patriot” inspiring a pan-African community. Ntozake Shange’s choreopoem For colored girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enuf [sic] (1975) casts “Toussaint” as an imaginary friend helping the speaker find her first teenage love. In Toussaint L’Ouverture Acknowledges Wordsworth’s Sonnet “To Toussaint L’Ouverture” (2006), John Agard cleverly comments on Western mythologizations of the Haitian hero. Collectively, these tributes not only reveal contrasting popular historiographies of Louverture, but also showcase different ways in which Black heroes are conceptualized from the Romantic period to the early twenty-first century.

Keywords

• toussaint louverture
• william wordsworth
• john greenleaf whittier
• henrietta cordelia ray
• ntozake shange
• john agard