"The king Lear"

More tales from Shakespeare
by Charles and Mary Lamb
822.33 S527LC 1961 c.1

Charles and Mary Lamb were brothers whom rewrote the best sellers of Shakespeare with their own words. This book contains 20 tales, I´m not going to resume all of them because it will be a little confused. I think is difficult to choose one of them; however, I have my favorite it´s called “The King Lear”.

The story talked about a King who had to give his throne, he had three daughters but only one of them was a really good girl. First of all, He had to share the kingdom among his heiresses, so he thought: “The sweetest princess will have a big part of my empire”. These girls had to eulogize in the most exaggerate way.

Nonetheless, he didn´t realize that they will be able to do everything for reaching their ambitions. The first one said the most beautiful things that the king had never heard, the second one made her best too. They got two of three part of the kingdom, the last one sister called “Cordelia”. She knew about the avarice of her sisters, she really loved his father and she didn’t exaggerate her love for him. Consequently, at the moment of the interview with the King she didn’t eulogize like her sisters, that situation made King angry. He was terrible furious and decided to expulse away to Cordelia. He will live with his others daughters.

The king was blind but along the time, he realized that the words from his daughters were only lies. He gave the throne to her ambitious girls but they were indifferent and cruel with his father. An old servant of the King held him and took him away from the kingdom. When Cordelia knew about this situation talked with his husband, that was King of France and he gave her some troops. Cordelia met with her father, the king was ashamed he had been a stupid.

Finally, the avarice of Cordelia’s sister killed them. This provoke that a Count took the kingdom and sent to arrest to Cordelia. The King Lear was insane, he died. The book doesn’t explain why he died. That’s really a family tragedy.

END.

Maybe, we are not so patriotic because we know that we lived in a country full of lies. Supposedly, we have an identity but that is only the influence of other cultures. We don´t have anything own, and that is terrible. We never think in ancestral people but in these celebrations everybody loves Mapuche and Rapa Nui culture. We are Chileans only when our Chilean teams play soccer.
I don’t know anything about native people, I´d like to learn. I think we should have bilingual education, in my school I didn’t learn anything about ancestral people. I remember I made a presentation about Onas but that wasn’t enough.
I really I can´t identify with a culture that I don’t know. I hate some people when they said “I´m brave because I have mapuche blood”. They said that and they don’t know anything about them; besides, they don’t know the problems that affect in their lives.
If we think that Chileans are lazy, I could say that is my principal characteristic. I like diversity, I think Chileans are different among them we are heterogeneous. Also, we love double meaning and these kinds of jokes.
I´m not proud to be Chilean. I am not saying that I hate to be Chilean but I really we have to improve a lot like country. The problem is not the people, is our government. Well, we have a bit of responsibility if we are more interesting in important things we could change our reality. We have to support native people.
The so called Chilean culture is an invention, it doesn’t exist but that happens in other countries too. The nationalism was an invention of the high level before of Chile´s independence. They needed create a new state in order, and the patriotism was the perfect way for reach some goals like win territories and minerals in the war of the pacific. I´d like to live in a world without frontiers and lies.

The yes men

I think in Chile we need an organization like “The yes men”. First of all, I agree with the decision of closing supermarkets and some malls during our “national holiday”. The last semester, I had to work in holy week. I don’t believe in God but in that moment I though in all the employees of Jumbo.

If chamber of commerce dislike the decision, they should work by us in the national holiday. The hoaxes of “The yes men” are very funnies, I believe that is a good way to show the opposition against the police, industries and government.

About the videos, I think is totally justified the actions of “The yes men”. Those industries and Organizations have sold the life and dignity of the people. A hoax is nothing compare with the damage that these corporation provokes us. We need a team like “the yes men” that represent us though we should move for make justice.

Call for the dead

Call for the dead

by John le Carré

823 L456c c.1

The book was titled “Call for the dead” because it was the only evidence that existed about the death of a foreign office civil servant. The main character (Smiley) realized that Fennan (employee of the government) didn’t commit suicide because this man had solicited a wake-up call two hours after that he died. Obviously, this evidence was very important and that provoked a lot of mysterious in the life of this officer (Smiley). These mysterious are about spies, conspiracies and infidelity.

Smiley had to discover if Fennan was a German spy. But when the last one died, Smiley started investigating the case by himself, this irritated to his boss. Afterwards, a man tried to kill to Smiley, a secret conspiracy wanted to kill him. When Smiley found the man who tried to kill him, this man had died. In that period, an old friend of war (Fried) visited the Smiley’s house. He was working for Germany but Smiley didn’t know that. During this time, Fried had been having sex with Smiley´s wife. Finally, Smiley discovered that Fennan’s wife and Fried worked for East Germany. Smiley fought with his friend, and he had to kill him.

In my opinion is a complicated story, most of characters are suspects. By the way, the author makes his point. He talks about the German spies; in addition to, he creates an enigmatic story. About romantic relations, the author shows us a man totally open-minded about infidelity, his woman is terrible horny and unfaithful; nonetheless, he loves her. This situation strikes my attention, he got used to of that and he doesn’t anything. The main lesson of this story is: you have to be unfaithful!!! Really, for me is difficult to understand the moral of the story; however, if you fight looking for the true and don’t give up, you can win all the battles and, of course, don´t be unfaithful.