Latin American literature explores the different facets of reality and how the bounds of reality can be expanded or contracted to enhance ideas, themes, and culture. We can explore this within a culture by exploring the works of Latin American authors including, Octavio Paz, Jorge Luis Borges, Pablo Neruda, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, and Isabel Allende. Realism in literature is defined as the accurate representation of reality, whereas magical realism uses magical properties to enhance the natural state. Octavio Paz embraces the reality of city life as he blatantly describes the various parts that make up a city. He works in realism to maintain the redundancy of city life and expresses that time is often lost in mundane life. The other authors, Jorge Luis Borges, Pablo Neruda, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, and Isabel Allende, all use magical realism to highlight aspects of culture. Borges explores the concepts of time where Neruda uses magical imagery. In all, we can use both hyperrealism to express something very important, or we can use magical realism as a metaphor to express the same ideas.
With Your Students:
- Have each student identify a theme, idea, or value that is important to them or their culture.
- Each student will create two short stories, sentences, poems, or pictures. One using hyperrealism to express the idea and one using magical realism.
- Discuss the different effects each has, use the following questions as a guide:
Is one more powerful in getting the idea across?
Which one is more relevant to the audience?
Does one better represent the culture’s value?
Which do you prefer? How does this relate to the above readings?
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