Performance Task 1

EMPLOY

(PRODUCT)

Direction: Write a book review based on the steps given to you.

Book Review: “El Filibusterismo” by Dr. Jose Rizal

The author of this novel, Dr. José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda widely known as
José Rizal, was a Filipino nationalist and polymath during the Spanish colonial period in the
Philippines. The first novel of Dr. Jose Rizal, “Noli Me Tangere” didn’t end and it was followed
by his second novel titled “El Filibusterismo” is also known to its english alternative titled “The
Reign of Greed”. This work was created during the Spanish era, when authorities were abusive
and corrupt, which is why Jose Rizal asks the reader to think for themselves.

The main character in this book “Simoun” who is the protagonist. He is Crisostomo Ibarra who
experienced misfortune in love, family and left the country with all of his family properties to
become wealthy and he want to get a revenge to those people who are reason why his beloved
country is dying. He went to Capitan Tiago and hired him as a houseboy in exchange of sending
him to school and he studied medicine. While he is a graduating student, he learns Simoun’s true
identity and befriended him. Which makes him the leader of the revolutionary faction in the time
he realized that no matter how hard to try, if there are something evil and powerful hindering
you, you can’t change a thing in a peaceful way.

At the beginning of El Filibusterismo Ibarra is supposed to be long dead, but he disguised as

Simoun, a jewelry merchant whom little is known about. The clever merchant clearly has big
ambitions and quite possibly the means to accomplish them though he plays his cards close to his
vest. One man who is Basilio learns his biggest secret early on, but Simoun trusts that his secret
is safe with him. Simoun is enraged by an oppressive system in which a few possess enormous
power and utilize it to oppress the majority. Few people can have access to Education, and the
friars and the nation's elite retain total control. Until the narrative reaches the climax, to the
promise of incredibly violent upheaval, only for the grand plans to implode. Rizal takes his
characters to the brink of a violent overthrow of the existing order and then draws back,
returning to the historical Philippine reality. There are a variety of reasons for why the plans are
not carried through as originally intended,.

The typography of this book is readable and beautiful, because of its organization on how the
story goes and it has so many translations. But on the other side, there’s no illustration that you
can see from the original book, you can only imagine the setting of the story, the atmosphere the
intense and the feelings of each character in this novel.

For me, I love the way how Jose Rizal wrote this novel, I love the idea and the message of this
but I am surprised and disappointed on how this novel ends. But I love how Jose Rizal conveys
his ideas in his novel El Filibusterismo. First is that the friars or the “prayle” in Tagalog in the
Philippines are con written, the people in the Philippines have their courage to fight against
Spanish to gain independence. I don’t know what I can criticize in this novel, but I simply want
to recommend this book to all students in order to remember why our heroes took up arms,
aimed at colonizers who wanted to cage our freedom, and laid down their lives in the hope that
the next generation will be fruitful enough to make other countries, nations accept and respect us
as they respect themselves.