NATIONAL ARTISTS
FOR
LITERATURE
Philippineliterature is a rich group of literary works
that has developed along with the country’s history.
Long before the arrival of Western influences, early
Filipinos already have stories to tell to younger
generations.
ThePhilippines has a rich collection of fables,
legends, and myths from different regions. The
babaylan, the early healers, used chants to please the
supernatural beings or spirits to bestow good health
and fortune in the home and the fields.
When the Spaniards came in the 16th century, they
introduced Christianity to the islands and used literature to
colonize the country. During the time of the Americans,
English was introduced and Filipinos have grown adept in
the usage of the language. Today, contemporary writers are
expanding the horizon of reality and imagination in their
works to reflect the Filipino spirit.
Philippine literature is diverse, although some of the
famous literary works focus on the country’s postcolonial
heritage, politics, and modern traditions. Filipinos must
recognize and give importance to the people behind the
development of Philippine literature.
AMADO V. HERNANDEZ
National Artist for Literature (1973)
(September 13, 1903 – May 24, 1970)
Amado V. Hernandez, poet, playwright, and novelist, is among
the Filipino writers who practiced “committed art”. He is well
known for his disapproval of social injustices in the country. In
his view, the function of the writer is to act as the conscience
of society and to affirm the greatness of the human spirit in
the face of inequity and oppression. He was later imprisoned
for his participation in the communist movement. His
novel Mga Ibong Mandaragit, first written by Hernandez
while in prison, is the first Filipino socio-political novel that
exposes the ills of the society as evident in the agrarian
problems of the 50s.
Other notable works include the following: Bayang Malaya,
Isang Dipang Langit, Luha ng Buwaya, Tudla at Tudling:
Katipunan ng mga Nalathalang Tula 1921-1970, Langaw sa
Isang Basong Gatas at Iba Pang Kwento, and Magkabilang
Mukha ng Isang Bagol at Iba Pang Akda.
He was married to another national artist Filipino Actress
Atang de la Rama.
JOSE GARCIA VILLA
National Artist for Literature (1973)
(August 5, 1908 – February 7, 1997)
Jose Garcia Villa is considered as one of the finest contemporary
poets regardless of race or language. Villa, who lived in Singalong,
Manila, introduced the reversed consonance rime scheme, including
the comma poems that made full use of the punctuation mark in an
innovative, poetic way. If you will study Villa’s work, you will notice
his use of comma in every word. Villa described this style as similar
to Seurat’s architectonic and measured pointillism. Pointillism is a
painting technique in which the artist uses small, distinct dots of pure
color to create an image. The first of his poems “Have Come, Am
Here” received critical recognition when it appeared in New York in
1942 that, soon enough, honors and fellowships were heaped on him:
Guggenheim, Bollingen, the American Academy of Arts and Letters
Awards.
He used Doveglion (Dove, Eagle, Lion) as penname, the very
characters he attributed to himself, and the same ones explored
by e.e. cummings in the poem he wrote for Villa (Doveglion,
Adventures in Value). Villa is also known for the tartness of his
tongue. Villa’s works have been collected into the following
books: Footnote to Youth,Many Voices, Poems by
Doveglion, Poems 55, Poems in Praise of Love: The Best
Love Poems of Jose Garcia Villa as Chosen By
Himself, Selected Stories,The Portable Villa, The Essential
Villa, Mir-i-nisa, Storymasters 3: Selected Stories from
Footnote to Youth, 55 Poems: Selected and Translated into
Tagalog by Hilario S. Francia.
NICK JOAQUIN
National Artist for Literature (1976)
(May 4, 1917 – April 29, 2004)
Nick Joaquin, is regarded by many as the most distinguished
Filipino writer in English writing so variedly and so well about
so many aspects of the Filipino. His first short story dealt with
the vaudeville of Manila, “The Sorrows of Vaudeville”,
published in 1937 by the Sunday Tribune Magazine. He worked
as a journalist for most of his life, pioneering literary journalism.
Literary journalism is the reportage of actual events that employs
literary techniques.
(Vaudeville is a light often comic theatrical piece frequently combining
pantomime, dialogue, dancing, and songs)
. Among his voluminous works are The Woman Who Had
Two Navels, A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino, Manila, My
Manila: A History for the Young, The Ballad of the Five
Battles, Rizal in Saga, Almanac for Manileños, Cave and
Shadows, An Elegy in Three Scenes, and A Life for the
Student Fans.
CARLOS P. ROMULO
National Artist for Literature (1982)
(January 14, 1899 – December 15, 1985)
Carlos P. Romulo was an envoy, statesman, soldier,
correspondent, writer, and the founder of the Boy Scouts of the
Philippines. It is common knowledge that he was the first
Asian president of the United Nations General Assembly, then
Philippine Ambassador to Washington, D.C., and later minister
of foreign affairs. Essentially though, Romulo was very much
into writing: he was a reporter at 16, a newspaper editor by the
age of 20, and a publisher at 32. He was the only Asian to win
America’s coveted Pulitzer Prize in Journalism for a series of
articles predicting the outbreak of World War II.
Romulo, in all, wrote and published 18 books, a range of
literary works which included The United (novel), I Walked
with Heroes (autobiography), I Saw the Fall of the
Philippines, Mother America, I See the Philippines
Rise (war-time memoirs). His other books include his memoirs
of his many years’ affiliations with United Nations
(UN), Forty Years: A Third World Soldier at the UN,
and The Philippine Presidents, his oral history of his
experiences serving all the Philippine presidents.
FRANCISCO ARCELLANA
National Artist for Literature (1990)
(September 6, 1916 – August 1, 2002)
Francisco Arcellana, writer, poet, essayist, critic, journalist and
teacher, is one of the greatest Filipino poets in his generation and
is the most important progenitors of the modern Filipino short
story in English. He pioneered the development of the short story
as a lyrical prose-poetic form. He studied in Tondo Intermediate
School. However, it was the Manila West High School (which
was later named the Florentino Torres High School) that he took
up his writing seriously and became a staff member of The
Torres Torch, the school organ.
While still a student at Florentino Torres High School, he wrote
his first story, “The Man Who Would Be Poe”. Arcellana’s
exceptional works in fiction include “Death in a Factory,” “A
Clown Remembers”, and Divided by Two”. Some of his poems
include “The Other Woman”, “To Touch You”, and “I Touched
Her”, which are among others are now part of the secondary -
and tertiary-level syllabi in the country.
ESSENTIAL LEARNING
Philippine literature is a rich storehouse of narratives and texts
that date back from the precolonial times to the contemporary.
It will continue to evolve as writers continue to write about the
realities and conditions of the country. Exceptional literary
artists such as those mentioned above have all immensely
enriched Philippine literature through their timeless narratives
of the Filipino spirit.