CERVANTES MEETS SHAKESPEARE by Ramón Ybarra Rubio (Ed. Burlington Books)

In this book, an American girl moves to the UK and starts learning about Cervantes and Shakespeare to find out that they will be her guides to adapting herself to her new life by appearances through which they will give her interesting and useful tips making use of their own experiences in life.

Throughout the book we will also learn about how it is sometimes difficult to adapt to new circumstances and also about how important writers made their living in the 16th century, besides learning about the historical background of the time and puritanism in England.

You can get the audio to listen to this book as you read it at the Burlington Books website.

MULTICULTURALISM

We are dealing with multiculturalism as well as immigration in class these days. As we all know, immigration has been a powerful force to help raise countries such as the United States of America or  Germany, here in Europe. Spain has also been a receiver of immigrants, in addition to being a source of  immigrants to many other countries in South America and , more recently, to Germany or other European countries as well.

As we have also seen in class, American immigrants arrived to this island called Ellis Island at which you can have a curious look here. I have chosen this part of the film Hitch because it is really hilarious; Will Smith (Hitch) and Eva Mendes (Sara Melas) are having a look at the original document in which the landers on Ellis Island had to register to get into the USA. If you haven't watched the film, I recommend it to you, I think you can have a great time.

I have used several connectors of additon and example, if you spot them, send me a comment please!!

THE IRON LADY

Margaret Thatcher was born in 1925, from a worker's family. She started quite soon in politics and was the first and only female candidate in 1952's general elections. She first became a Member of Parliament (MP) in 1959 and continued to be so for most of her life.

Her first really important job in UK' s political sphere was Education Secretary from 1970 to 1974 when she became the leader of the opposition from 1975 to 1979, and then, she became the first female Prime Minister (PM) of the UK.

She had to deal with many problems such as inflation and unemployment and also with the problem of Europe (belonging to the European Community or not); and due to the harsh treatment she gave to these and other issues, she won the nickname of  Iron Lady.


She continued for a long time to be an active politician and someone important in British society, nowadays she is again in the news thanks to the film première about her in which the American actress Meryl Streep plays her role.

If  you go and watch the film, don't forget to tell me about it!!

A SENSE OF DANGER by Tracy Simmonds (Ed. Burlington Books)

( Burlington Books)

This reader by Tracy Simmonds is an interesting story about a pair of Australian teenage twins that have to move to Spain because of their father's job. They don't know how to speak Spanish and they haven't got any friends in Spain. 

When they get to Spain, there is a mistery related to their father's job that they have to solve. Jonathan has special mental powers and always feels a sense of danger. Jody falls in love with a handsome Spaniard. Mistery and love at the Fallas in Valencia, I hope you like it.

You can download the complete reading aloud of the pages of this book at the Burlington Books' Student's Zone.

You can also tells us what you think about the book. LEAVE YOUR COMMENTS!!

THE WANTED "Glad You Came"

For me, literature is important, I studied it for five years at university and love reading literature. We sometimes have a strange image of what literature is, as something boring or obscure. But the truth is that literature is a form of  art, and therefore, should make us feel better.

WHY HAVE I CHOSEN THIS SONG?
I think literature surrounds us, while I was listening to this song, I thought, "I like the rhythm, I feel like dancing", but when I listened to the lyrics it struck me that they have a strong and powerful literary device called anadiplosis.

WHAT IS ANADIPLOSIS?
According to the Britannica Encyclopedia, it is a device in which the last word or phrase of one clause, sentence or line is repeated at the beginning of the next. We can find it in several poems but also in the chorus of this song :

Turn the lights out nowNow I'll take you by the handHand you another drinkDrink it if you canCan you spend a little time,Time is slipping away,Away from us so stay,Stay with me I can make,Make you glad you came.
If you want to learn more about this British group, you can find more information at their official website.