This week’s reading is almost a contrast to last week’s reading, because instead of looking at the optimistic future of Latin America (LA), it looks at a variety of different examples of the reality. The readings varied from rebel manifestations and also poetry.

Rubén Darío’s poem titled “To Roosevelt” is a different kind of source that we have normally looked at during the the term, but it is particularly interesting. The description before the poem talks about how Darío is considered a modernist Latin American writer. This is prevalent in his poem, because of the style. The style of the poem is reflective of a modernist style because of the break from traditional form.

Darío conveys his disagreement with the United States, because of the clear distinction between the US and LA. This is shown through the pronouns of ‘you’ and ‘us’ in roder to describe the two different countries.

The beginning of the poem sets the scene of the controversy between the US, because of its promotion of liberality, but in practice the country is still entrenched in its conservative foundations of Puritanism. There is also a constant extended metaphor of the US being violent and oppressing to others. In the first line, Darío refers to the US as ‘Hunter’, and then refers to them as the ‘future invaders of our naive America/ with this Indian blood, an America’. This reference seems to be comparing the US to the European monarchy in terms of its abuse of power. Darío highlights the idea that the US appears to be progressive, it is just a facade of the old traditional ways of the European monarchy.