Mrs. Bettencourt’s World Literature class is currently studying South America. As a student of Mrs. Bettencourt, South America has been the most entertaining and beautiful part of the world we have examined. The initial exponent of South American literature that stood out to me was the complex imagery and its candid accounts of real-life struggles.

  Bettencourt’s World Literature classes have read the warped romantic poetry of Pablo Neruda, a Chilean poet who was famous for his sonnets. Pablo Neruda’s poetry is different because he depicts love in a twisted fashion, he does not depict love in the typical, sappy point-of-view. Neruda’s warped sense of romance and passion makes for a great reading experience. He describes love as a “lunatic city with crowds of people blanching their porches”.

  Mrs. Bettencourt sealed the Neruda study by assigning her students to make a small collage of pictures that represents what love means to them. Her students were not allowed to use cliché symbols like baby cupid or pink hearts; instead she wanted her students to use unusual symbols just as Neruda did in his descriptive poetry.

  Mrs. Bettencourt has also revealed new literary styles to her students through South American literature and one of those styles is magic realism which many South American poets are well- known for. Magic realism was demonstrated through the writings of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, another famous Hispanic author. In the short story, “The Most Handsomest Drowned Man”, the story told of children who discovered the dead drowned body of a good looking gentleman. When the elders saw the body they literally fell in love with the grace and beauty of the man and they were astounded by his great size. Marquez’s description in the story that the elders had for the corpse of the drowned man was very disturbing yet beautiful.

  Bettencourt’s class has also read the work of Jorge Luis Borges, a Hispanic writer interested in philosophical issues that were very evident in his poem “Borges and Myself”. The poem by Borges describes how an individual can have multiple, dynamic personalities, which is something anyone can relate to. The poem describes Borges stepping out of himself and judging his own life and accomplishments. Mrs. Bettencourt’s travel around the world still continues!