La Llorona
[6] La Malinche is considered both the mother of the modern Mexican people and a symbol of national treachery for her role in aiding the Spanish.
[8] Author Ben Radford's investigation into the legend of La Llorona, published in Mysterious New Mexico, found common elements of the story in the German folktale "Die Wei e Frau" dating from 1486.
[10] The Florentine Codex is an important text that originated in late Mexico in 1519 [citation needed] , a quote from which is, "The sixth omen was that many times a woman would be heard going along weeping and shouting.
[4] The poem makes no reference to infanticide, rather La Llorona is identified as the ghost of a woman named Rosalia who was murdered by her husband.
In a typical version of the legend, a beautiful woman named María marries a rich ranchero / conquistador[13] to whom she bears two children.
One day, María sees her husband with another woman and in a fit of blind rage, she drowns their children in a river, which she immediately regrets.
[16] Recurring themes in variations on the La Llorona myth include a white, wet dress, nocturnal wailing, and an association with water.
In Mexican culture La Llorona represents a vengeful lover who goes from a resentful wife to a monstrous mother who drowns her children after discovering her husband's infidelity.
Chicana writers and artists redefined La Llorona based on embodied experience and the social and political pressures they faced.
La Llorona was rewritten as a strong woman who had been forced to accommodate to the colonizers ruling and had been punished for challenging traditional female roles.
The tale of La Llorona warns kids about disobedience and the importance of avoiding bodies of water and locations at night, similar in other versions around the world.
[30] Also told to them is that her cries are heard as she walks around the street or near bodies of water to scare children from wandering around, resembling the stories of El Cucuy.
The tale begins with a woman named Elvira who experiences a devastating life which slowly led to her transformation into the spectral figure La Llorona.
[35] The Greek legend of Jason and Medea also features the motif of a woman who murders her children as an act of revenge against her husband, who has left her.
[38] In a pivotal scene in the 2001 film Mulholland Drive, Rebekah Del Rio plays La Llorona de Los Angeles, a mysterious singer who performs Llorando, a Spanish language version of Crying by Roy Orbison.
[49] In July 2019, James Wan, Gary Dauberman and Emilie Gladstone produced a film titled The Curse of La Llorona for Warner Bros. Pictures.
The film was directed by Michael Chaves and stars Linda Cardellini, Raymond Cruz, Patricia Velasquez and Marisol Ramirez as La Llorona.
[51] The Legend of La Llorona was a film released in January 2022 and stars Danny Trejo, Autumn Reeser, and Antonio Cupo.
[52] Mexican playwright Josefina López wrote Unconquered Spirits,[53] which uses the myth of La Llorona as a plot device.
[56]The novel Paola Santiago and the River of Tears, the first part of a young adult trilogy by Tehlor Kay Mejia, is based on the legend of La Llorona.
[57] Rodolfo Anaya's novel Bless Me, Ultima references La Llorona, describing her as a spirit of the river without mentioning her origins.
[61] North American singer-songwriter Lhasa de Sela's debut album La Llorona (1997) explored the dark mysteries of Latin folklore.
[64] Manic Hispanic, a rock band from Los Angeles, California, have a song titled "She Turned Into Llorona" on their 2003 album Mijo Goes To Jr.
La Llorona is an antagonist in the TV series Supernatural, portrayed by Sarah Shahi in the pilot episode and by Shanae Tomasevich in "Moriah" and season 15.
Contrary to the usual depictions, this version of La Llorona is good and simply lonely and claims to have had twenty kids who had all grown up and left her; implying that she suffers from Empty nest syndrome.
