The House of the Spirits

Use this activity to engage all types of learners, while requiring that they refer to and incorporate details from the text over the course of the activity.

“An Exercise in Perspective”

In this activity, students identify and flesh out the background and story of a minor character in the book before penning a series of journal entries for that character.

The House of the Spirits spans generations, telling the interconnected stories of multiple characters over the course of half a decade; narrated by two different characters, it offers different perspectives and emphasizes the interconnectedness of life. However, the focus remains largely on the Treuba family and the del Valle women, and there are threads or stories that the story leaves incomplete.

• With this in mind, choose a character whose incomplete story intrigues you. Flesh out their background or project into their future, using your imagination and building on the details available in the text and other related sources.
• To help you imagine the life of your chosen character, play a game of “Hot Seat” with your class. Each of you occupies the “Hot Seat” in turn, and the rest of the group poses questions about anything ranging from your favorite food to your most secret desires. Your job is to answer as your chosen character, the questions serving as prompts as to the kind of details you can use to flesh out your story.
• Armed with these details, pen a series of 2-3 journal entries corresponding to important events outlined in the book. Where were you in the years that Esteban was establishing Tres Marías as a model hacienda? How did the earthquake impact your life? Who did you vote for in the elections that saw the President emerge victorious? Did you welcome the military coup, or are you still on the run from the new regime?

Teaching Suggestion: In selecting their characters, students can cast a broad net; they may even choose an unnamed figure (for instance, an anonymous peasant at Tres Marías). Where textual details are thin, students may look at other sources to help them create their character’s background, such as historical information about the conditions of peasants living in Latin American haciendas, or about the sociopolitical context surrounding the emergence of guerrillas in Chile. While the game of “Hot Seat” is in play, you may need to remind the group to ask questions of varying depths and complexities: Preferences, dislikes, and physical appearance are fair game, but so are desires, motivations, ambitions, and personal beliefs. Students ought to incorporate this range of details when they finally write out their journal entries. This activity corresponds strongly to the theme of Storytelling and the Power of Narrative but may also draw in elements of Politics and Ideology as Content and Context and/or Patterns, Cycles, and the Interconnectedness of Life.

Differentiation Suggestion: For those who may need additional support, students may work in pairs or small groups to flesh out the details and form a broad outline of a single character. You can also explore different media options: Visual learners may choose to present the journal entries graphically (for instance, through a series of comic strips), while auditory or kinesthetic learners might find filming their entries vlog-style helpful.