Lualhati
Torres Bautista (born
Manila,
Philippines December
2, 1945) is one of the foremost Filipino
female novelists
in the history of contemporary Philippine
Literature. Her
novels include Dekada
'70,
Bata,
Bata, Pa'no Ka Ginawa?, and
‘GAPÔ.
Biography
Bautista
was born in Tondo, Manila,
Philippines on December 2, 1945 to Esteban Bautista and Gloria Torres. She
graduated from Emilio Jacinto Elementary School in 1958, and from Torres High
School in 1962. She was a journalism student at the Lyceum
of the Philippines, but
dropped out even before she finished her freshman year.Despite a lack of formal
training, Bautista as the writer became known for her honest realism, courageous
exploration of Philippine women's issues, and her compelling female
protagonists, who confront difficult situations at home and in the workplace
with uncommon grit and strength.
Works as
novelist
Lualhati garnered several Palanca Awards (1980, 1983 and 1984) for her novels ‘GAPÔ, Dekada '70 and Bata, Bata… Pa’no Ka Ginawa? exposing injustices and chronicling women activism during the Marcos era.GAPÔ, published in 1980, is the story of a man coming to grips with life as an Amerasian. It is a multi-layered scrutiny of the politics behind US bases in the Philippines, seen from ordinary citizens living in Olongapo City point of view.Dekada '70 is the story of a family caught in the middle of the tumultuous decade of the 1970s. It details how a middle class family struggled and faced the changes that empowered Filipinos to rise against the Marcos government. These series of events happened after the bombing of Plaza Miranda, the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, the proclamation of martial law and the random arrests of political prisoners. The oppressive nature of the Marcos regime, which made the people become more radical, and the shaping of the decade were all witnessed by the female protagonist, Amanda Bartolome, a mother of five boys.Bata, Bata… Pa'no Ka Ginawa?, literally, "Child, Child… How Were You Made?", narrates the life of Lea, a working mother and a social activist, who has two children. The novel begun with an introductory chapter about the graduation day from kindergarten of Maya, Lea’s daughter. A program and a celebration were held. In the beginning, everything in Lea’s life were going smoothly – her life in connection with her children, with friends of the opposite gender, and with her volunteer work for a human rights organization. But Lea’s children were both growing-up – and Lea could see their gradual transformation. There were the changes in their ways and personalities: Maya’s curiosity was becoming more obvious every day, while Ojie was crossing the boundaries from boyhood to teenage to adulthood. In the end, all three, and especially Lea, have to confront Philippine society’s view of single motherhood; and the novel itself brazens out to the questions of how it is to be a mother, and how a mother executes this role through modern-day concepts of parenthood.
Lualhati garnered several Palanca Awards (1980, 1983 and 1984) for her novels ‘GAPÔ, Dekada '70 and Bata, Bata… Pa’no Ka Ginawa? exposing injustices and chronicling women activism during the Marcos era.GAPÔ, published in 1980, is the story of a man coming to grips with life as an Amerasian. It is a multi-layered scrutiny of the politics behind US bases in the Philippines, seen from ordinary citizens living in Olongapo City point of view.Dekada '70 is the story of a family caught in the middle of the tumultuous decade of the 1970s. It details how a middle class family struggled and faced the changes that empowered Filipinos to rise against the Marcos government. These series of events happened after the bombing of Plaza Miranda, the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, the proclamation of martial law and the random arrests of political prisoners. The oppressive nature of the Marcos regime, which made the people become more radical, and the shaping of the decade were all witnessed by the female protagonist, Amanda Bartolome, a mother of five boys.Bata, Bata… Pa'no Ka Ginawa?, literally, "Child, Child… How Were You Made?", narrates the life of Lea, a working mother and a social activist, who has two children. The novel begun with an introductory chapter about the graduation day from kindergarten of Maya, Lea’s daughter. A program and a celebration were held. In the beginning, everything in Lea’s life were going smoothly – her life in connection with her children, with friends of the opposite gender, and with her volunteer work for a human rights organization. But Lea’s children were both growing-up – and Lea could see their gradual transformation. There were the changes in their ways and personalities: Maya’s curiosity was becoming more obvious every day, while Ojie was crossing the boundaries from boyhood to teenage to adulthood. In the end, all three, and especially Lea, have to confront Philippine society’s view of single motherhood; and the novel itself brazens out to the questions of how it is to be a mother, and how a mother executes this role through modern-day concepts of parenthood.
Works
Short
fiction collectionsBuwan,
Buwan, Hulugan Mo Ako ng Sundang: Dalawang Dekada ng Maiikling
Kuwento
- Sakada
- Kung
Mahawi Man ang Ulap
- Bulaklak
sa City Jail
- Kadenang
Bulaklak
- The
Maricris Sioson Story
- Nena
- Bata,
Bata...Pa'no Ka Ginawa?: The Screenplay
- Dekada
'70
- Ang Tondo ay May Langit din – Khonde
2.Linda
Ty Casper
Linda Ty Casper is
a Filipino writer who has published over
fifteen books,
including the historical
novel DreamEden and the political novels Awaiting Trespass, Wings of Stone, A Small Party in a Garden,
and Fortress in the Plaza.
She has also published three collections of short stories
which present a cross-section of Filipino society.[1]
n 1992, Tides and Near
Occasions of Love won the Philippine PEN short
story prize; another at the UNESCO International Writers' Day,
London; and the SEAWrite Award in Bangkok "Triptych for a Ruined Altar"
was in the Roll of Honor of The Best
American Short Stories, 1977.[2]
Her novel Awaiting Trespass
which is about the politically sensitive theme of torture by the Marcos regime
was published by Readers International of
London.
This work gained her major critical attention in the United States
for the first time, and in Britain the novel was chosen as one of the five best
works of fiction by a woman writer published in 1985-86
Biography
Born as Belinda Ty in Malabon, Philippines in
1931. She spent the World
War II years with her grandmother while her father worked in
the Philippine
National Railways, and her mother in the Bureau of Public Schools. Her
grandmother told her innumerable of stories about the Filipino’s struggle for
independence, that later became the topics of her novels. Linda Ty Casper
graduated valedictorian in
the University
of the Philippines, and later earned her Master's degree in
Harvard
University for International Law.
In 1956, she married Leonard Casper, a professor
emeritus of Boston College
who is also a critic of Philippine
Literature. They have two daughters and reside in Massachusetts.
Published
worksThe Transparent Sun (short
stories), Peso Books, 1963
- The Peninsulares
(historical novel), Bookmark 1964
- The Secret Runner
(short stories), Florentino/National Book, 1974
- The Three-Cornered Sun
(historical novel), New Day, 1974
- Dread Empire
(novella), Hong Kong, Heinemann, 1980
- Hazards of Distance
(novella), New Day, 1981
- Fortress in the Plaza
(novella), New Day, 1985
- Awaiting Trespass (novella), London, Readers International, 1985
Ingrid Chua-Go is
a Filipino- Chinese fashion and lifestyle blogger based in Manila,
Philippines. She is known for her fashion blog The Bag Hag Diaries
and her society blog, Manila Social Diary. She blogs for The Huffington Post-UK
and writes columns for the both the Philippine Daily Inquirer and Look
Magazine. She has also contributed fashion week photographs for online retailer
Luisa Via Roma and Harrods of London. She co-owns Accessory Lab, a jewelry
store specializing in crystals and semi-precious jewelry.
Biography
Ingrid Chua-Go is the daughter of Benjamin Chua, Jr. and
Pacita Ong Chua. When she was a child, her mother gave her a Tomy
typewriter, which sparked her fascination with writing.[1]
This interest was further stimulated by her father during the summers that they
would spend in San Francisco. He would assign her books to read over the
vacation and required her to write book reports on each one. This developed her
writing proficiency at an early age and she considers her father a great
influence on her chosen profession.
Career
After graduating from Saint Mary's College with a
bachelor's degree in communication arts,[1]
Chua-Go worked in broadcast news in Hong Kong, before becoming the managing
editor of Metro Weddings Magazine, a top bridal publication in the Philippines.[2][3]
After she left Metro Weddings in 2007, she started blogging full time.
Fashion and society blogger Ingrid Chua-Go posing in a
black evening dress.
In 2005, Ingrid Chua-Go started a personal blog to answer
a personal question of whether she should buy either a Louis Vuitton
bag or a couch for her home. The blog’s main purpose was for her friends to
help her decide, but after a number of responses from both friends and other
readers, it evolved into The Bag Hag Diaries where bag enthusiasts come to for
information regarding the newest trends in bag fashion.[4]
The blog has gathered an international following in the world of fashion in
Europe, Asia, and the United States.[1]
The Bag Hag Diaries features Chua-Go's commentaries on
the latest bag fashions, trends, and styles. Since its inception, it has
expanded to include other fashion items like clothes, footwear, and accessories
to appeal to a diverse array of interests and readers. The blog also includes
some of her collaborations with different fashion houses, institutions, and personalities.
4.Gilda Cordero-Fernando
Gilda Cordero-Fernando is
a multiawarded writer, publisher and cultural icon from the Philippines.
She was born in Manila,
has a B.A. from St. Theresa's College-Manila, and an M.A.
from the Ateneo
de Manila University.
Gilda Cordero-Fernando was born on June 4, 1932.
Cordero-Fernando has two landmark collection of short
stories: The Butcher, The Baker and The Candlestick Maker (1962) and A
Wilderness of Sweets (1973). These books have been compiled and reissued
later as Story Collection (1994). Another book, Philippine Food and
Life, was published in 1992. Together with Alfredo Roces,
Cordero-Fernando worked on Filipino Heritage, a
10-volume study on Philippine history and culture published by Lahing
Pilipino in 1978. Afterwards, she founded GCF Books which published
a dozen titles that deal with various aspects of Philippine culture and
society. Cordero-Fernando has also worn numerous other hats as a visual artist,
fashion designer, playwright, art curator and producer. In February 2000, she
produced a hugely successful extravaganza entitled Luna: An Aswang Romance.....
5. Jessica Hagedorn
jessica Tarahata Hagedorn
(born 1949) is an American playwright, writer, poet, and multimedia performance
artist.
Biography
Hagedorn was born in Manila to a Scots-Irish-French-Filipino
mother and a Filipino-Spanish father with one Chinese ancestor.[1]
Moving to San
Francisco in 1963, Hagedorn received her education at the American
Conservatory Theater training program. To further pursue playwriting
and music, she moved to New
York in 1978.
Joseph Papp
produced her first play Mango Tango in 1978. Hagedorn's other productions
include Tenement Lover, Holy Food, and Teenytown. Her
mixed media style often incorporates song, poetry, images,
and spoken dialogue.
In 1985, 1986, and 1988, she received MacDowell Colony
fellowships, which helped enable her to write the novel Dogeaters, which
illuminates many different aspects of Filipino
experience, focusing on the influence of America through radio, television, and
movie theaters. She shows the complexities of the love-hate relationship many
Filipinos in diaspora
feel toward their past. After its publication in 1990, her novel earned a 1990 National
Book Award nomination and an American
Book Award. In 1998 La
Jolla Playhouse produced a stage adaptation.
She lives in New York City with her younger daughter.
Bibliography
Hagedorn in San Francisco, California 1975
- Chiquita Banana. Third World Women (3rd World Communications, 1972)
- Pet Food & Tropical Apparitions (Momo's Press, 1975)
- Dangerous Music
(Momo's Press, 1975)
- Mango Tango (Y'Bird
Magazine January 1, 1977)
- Dogeaters (Penguin Books, 1990)
- Danger and Beauty
(Penguin Books, 1993)
- Charlie Chan is Dead: An Anthology of Contemporary Asian American Fiction (editor) (Penguin Books, 1993)
6.Nick Joaquin
Nicomedes Márquez Joaquín (May 4, 1917 – April 29, 2004) was a Filipino writer, historian and journalist, best known for his short stories and novels in the English language. He also wrote using the pen name Quijano de Manila. Joaquin was conferred the rank and title of National Artist of the Philippines for Literature.
Nicomedes Márquez Joaquín (May 4, 1917 – April 29, 2004) was a Filipino writer, historian and journalist, best known for his short stories and novels in the English language. He also wrote using the pen name Quijano de Manila. Joaquin was conferred the rank and title of National Artist of the Philippines for Literature.
He is considered[by whom?]
one of the most important Filipino writers in English,
and the third most important overall, after José Rizal
and Claro
M. Recto.
Biography
Joaquín was born in Paco, Manila, one of ten children of
Leocadio Joaquín, a colonel under General Emilio Aguinaldo in the 1896
Revolution, and Salome Márquez, a teacher of English and Spanish. After being
read poems and stories by his mother, the boy Joaquín read widely in his
father's library and at the National Library of the Philippines. By then, his
father had become a successful lawyer after the revolution. From reading,
Joaquín became interested in writing.
At age 17, Joaquín had his first piece published, in the
literary section of the pre-World War II Tribune, where he worked as a
proofreader. It was accepted by the writer and editor Serafín Lanot. After
Joaquín won a nationwide essay competition to honor La Naval de Manila,
sponsored by the Dominican Order, the University of Santo Tomas awarded him an
honorary Associate in Arts (A.A.). They also awarded him a scholarship to St.
Albert's Convent, the Dominican monastery in Hong Kong.
Career
After returning to the Philippines, Joaquín joined the Philippines
Free Press, starting as a proofreader. Soon he attracted notice for his
poems, stories and plays, as well as his journalism under the pen name Quijano
de Manila. His journalism was both intellectual and provocative, an unknown
genre in the Philippines at that time, and he raised the level of reportage in
the country.
Works
- May Day Eve (1947)
- Prose and Poems
(1952)
- The Woman Who had Two Navels (1961)
- La Naval de Manila and Other Essays (1964)
- A Portrait of the Artist as
Filipino (1966)
- Tropical Gothic
(1972)
- A Question of Heroes
(1977)
- Jeseph Estrada and Other Sketches (1977)
- Nora Aunor & Other Profiles (1977)
- Ronnie Poe & Other Silhouettes (1977)
- Reportage on Lovers
(1977)
- Reportage on Crime
(1977)
- Amalia Fuentes & Other Etchings (1977)
- Gloria Diaz & Other Delineations (1977)
- Doveglion & Other Cameos (1977)
- Language of the Streets and Other Essays (1977)
- Manila: Sin City and Other Chronicles (1977)
- Tropical Baroque
(1979),
- Pop Stories for Groovy Kids
(1979)
- Reportage on the Marcoses
(1979)
- Language of the Street and Other Essays (1980)
- The Ballad of the Five Battles (1981)
- Reportage on Politics (1981)
7.Alejandro Roces
Alejandro Reyes Roces
(13 July 1924 – 23 May 2011) was a Filipino author, essayist, dramatist and a National Artist of the Philippines
for literature. He served as Secretary of Education from 1961
to 1965, during the term of Philippine
President Diosdado
Macapagal.
Noted for his short stories, the Manila-born Roces was
married to Irene Yorston Viola (granddaughter of Maximo Viola),
with whom he had a daughter, Elizabeth Roces-Pedrosa. Anding attended
elementary and high school at the Ateneo
de Manila University, before moving to the Arizona
State University for his tertiary education. He graduated with a B.A. in
Fine Arts and, not long after, attained his M.A. from Far
Eastern University back in the Philippines.[1] He
has since received honorary doctorates from Tokyo University, Baguio's St.
Louis University, Polytechnic University of the Philippines, and the Ateneo de
Manila University. Roces was a captain in the Marking’s Guerilla during World War II
and a columnist in Philippine dailies such as the Manila Chronicle and
the Manila
Times. He was previously President of the Manila Bulletin and
of the CAP College Foundation.
In 2001, Roces was appointed as Chairman of the Movie and
Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB). Roces also became a member
of the Board of Trustees of GSIS (Government Service Insurance System) and
maintained a column in the Philippine Star called
Roses and Thorns.
Literary
works
During his freshman year in the University of Arizona,
Roces won Best Short Story for We Filipinos are Mild Drinkers. Another of his
stories, My Brother’s Peculiar Chicken, was listed as Martha Foley’s Best
American Stories among the most distinctive for years 1948 and 1951. Roces did
not only focus on short stories alone, as he also published books such as Of Cocks and Kites
(1959), Fiesta (1980), and Something to Crow About (2005). Of Cocks and Kites
earned him the reputation as the country's best writer of humorous stories. It
also contained the widely anthologized piece “My Brother’s Peculiar Chicken”.
Fiesta, is a book of essays, featuring folk festivals such as Ermita's Bota
Flores, Aklan's Ati-atihan, and Naga's Peñafrancia.
Something to Crow About, on the other hand, is a
collection of Roces’ short stories. The book has been recently brought to life
by a critically acclaimed play of the same title; the staged version of
Something to Crow About is the first Filipino zarzuela in English. This modern
zarzuela tells the story of a poor cockfighter named Kiko who, to his wife's
chagrin, pays more attention to the roosters than to her. Later in the story, a
conflict ensues between Kiko’s brother Leandro and Golem, the son of a wealthy
and powerful man, over the affections of a beautiful woman named Luningning.
The resolution? A cockfight, of course. Something to Crow About won the Aliw
Award for Best Musical and Best Director for a Musical Production. It also had
a run off-Broadway at the La Mama Theater in New
York.
When once asked for a piece of advice on becoming a
famous literary figure Roces said, "You cannot be a great writer; first,
you have to be a good person
8.Bienvenido Santos
Bienvenido N.
Santos (1911–1996) was a Filipino-American
fiction, poetry and nonfiction writer. He was born and raised in Tondo, Manila. His
family roots are originally from Lubao, Pampanga, Philippines.
He lived in the United
States for many years where he is widely credited as a
pioneering Asian-American writer.
Biography
Santos received his bachelor of arts degree from the
University of the Philippines where he first studied creative writing under Paz
Marquez Benitez. In 1941, Santos was a government pensionado
(scholar) to the United
States at the University of Illinois, Columbia
University, and Harvard
University. During World War II,
he served with the Philippine government in exile under President Manuel L. Quezon in
Washington,
D.C., together with the playwright Severino Montano
and Philippine National Artist Jose Garcia
Villa.
In 1967, he returned to the United States to become a
teacher and university administrator. He received a Rockefeller
fellowship at the Writers
Workshop of the University of Iowa where he later taught as a Fulbright exchange
professor. Santos has also received a Guggenheim
Foundation fellowship, a Republic
Cultural Heritage Award in Literature as well as several Palanca Awards
for his short stories. Scent of Apples
won a 1980 American
Book Award from the Before
Columbus Foundation.
Santos received an honorary doctorate degrees in
humanities and letters from the University
of the Philippines, and Bicol University (Legazpi City, Albay) in 1981.
He was also a Professor of Creative Writing and Distinguished Writer in
Residence at the Wichita
State University from 1973 to 1982, at which time the university awarded
him an honorary doctorate degree in humane letters. After his retirement,
Santos became Visiting Writer and Artist at De
La Salle University in Manila;
the university honored Santos by renaming its creative writing center after
him.
Works
- Villa Magdalena (1965)
- The Praying Man (1982)
- The Man Who
(Thought He) Looked Like Robert Taylor
(1983)
- What the
Hell for You Left Your Heart in San Francisco? (1987)
The poet
and literary critic Gémino H. Abad was
born on February 5, 1939 in Sta. Ana, Manila.
At present,
he is a University Professor Emeritus at the University of thePhilippines. His
current writing and research include “Upon Our Own Ground”, a two- volume
historical anthology of short stories in English, 1956- 1972, with critical
introduction; “Our Scene So Fair”, a book of critical essays on the poetry in
English since 1905 to the mid- 50s, and; “Where No Words break”, a volume of
his own poems.
His parents
are the noted novelist, playwright and essayist in Sugbuanon and Spanish,
Antonio M. Abad, who was at one time Chair of the Department of Spanish in UP,
and Jesusa H. Abad, professor of Spanish in UP. He is married to Mercedes A.
Rivera, with whom he has five children.
He
graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English, magna cum laude, from UP on 1963, and has been
teaching English literature and creative writing since then in the UP
Department of English and Comparative Literature, even after his retirement in
2004. He earned his Master’s degree with honors, 1966, and Ph.D in English, at the University of Chicago under
a Rockefeller Fellowship Grant. In 1993, he was appointed University Professor
in Literature, the highest academic rank at the University of
the Philippines.
In UP, he
served as Secretary of the University and the Board of Regents from 1977- 1982;
as Vice- President for Academic Affairs, 1987- 1990, and; as Director of
Likhaan: the UP Creative Writing Center, 1995- 1998. He was the first holder of
the Carlos P. Romulo Professional Chair in Literature from 1982- 1983, and received
the UP Outstanding Faculty Award for 1985- 1986. He was also holder of the
Irwin Chair for Literature at the Ateneo de Manila University, 1993. He
received the Chancellor’s Award as Best Office Administrator in 1998 for his
management of the UP Creative Writing Center as its
Director.
He was a
Fellow at the Cambridge Seminar, Trinity College, University of Cambridge,
1988; a Fellow in the International Writers Program, University of Iowa, 1990;
a Visiting Professor at the Center for Philippine Studies, University of
Hawai’i at Manoa, 1991; a Fellow at the Oxford Conference on Teaching
Literature Overseas, Corpus Christi College, 1995, and; Exchange Professor in
Literature at St. Norbert College Wisconsin, 1998, and at Singapore Management
University, 2003; represented the Philippines in the 3rd “Mediterranea
International Festival of Literature and the Arts” in Rome, July 2006.
Abad is
also a member of the UP Writers Club and founding member of the Philippine
Literary Arts Council (PLAC), which puts out the Caracoa (since 1982)- the only poetry journal in
English in Asia. He has served as director and member of the teaching staff in
numerous Writers Workshops in UP, Siliman/ Dumaguete, MSU- IIT, and San
Carlos University/ Cornelio Gaigao Workshop. He is a judge in various
literary contests such as the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards, Graphic, Free
Press, NVM Gonzales Fiction Awards, and Maningning Miclat Literary Awards. He
is a speaker/ paper reader in various writers’ national conferences and various
international conferences of scholars.
He was a
columnist in The Manila Chronicle, a weekly
column called “Exchange”, with NVM Gonzales, Sylvia Ventura and Luning
Bonifacio Ira; The Evening Paper, a weekly column
“Coming through”, with NVM Gonzales and Cristina Pantoja Hidalgo; Musa: The Philippine Literature Magazine, a monthly
column called “Vates: Our Poets Speak”, and; Flip, a monthly
column “Poet’s Clearing”.
He is cited
in The Oxford Companion to the English Language, 1992, as
among “poets of note”. He is also included in the Encyclopedia of Post- Colonial Literatures in English, ed.
Eugene Benson and L. W. Conolly (London: Routledge, 1994) and the CCP Encyclopedia of Philippine Art (IX: Philippine
Literature, 1994).
His awards
include the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for
Literature: first prize for poetry in English, 1976 (The Space
Between); second prize, 1980 (Counterclockwise); first prize, 1983 (The Outer
Clearing), The CCP Award for Poetry: second
prize, 1973 (In Another Light), Manila Critics Circle National
Book Award for poetry, 1988 (Poems and Parables); for
anthology, 1989 (Man of Earth), 1993 (A Native Clearing), 1999 (A Habit of
Shores); for personal anthology, 2002 (A Makeshift Sun) and 2005 (In Ordinary
Time), Asian Publishers Catholic Authors Award, 1990, Free press Literary Awards: third prize for the
short story (Tarang), 1993; first prize for the short story (Introibo), 1997;
first prize for the essay (A Day in One’s Life), 1997; second prize for the
poem (A Description), 2000, Gawad Pambansang
Alagad ni Balagtas, 1996, for lifetime achievement in
poetry and literary criticism, UP Alumni Association
Professional Award in Literature, 1997, Ellen F. Fajardo Foundation grant for Excellence in
teaching, 2000- 2001, Chancellor’s Award for Best
Literary Work, 2002 (A Makeshift Sun), and Patnubay ng Sining at Kalinangan sa Larangan ng Panitikan, Lungsod
ng Maynila, 2004.
Some of his
poetry, fiction, critical essays and short stories are Fugitive Emphasis, State
of Play, Orion’s Belt and Other Writings, Father and Daughter, Getting
Real: An Introduction to the Practice of Poetry and Who’s Afraid of Ching
Dadufalza?
He edited
books like The Likhaan, The Likhaan Book of Poetry and Fiction, An Edith Tempo
Reader, 100 Love Poems: Philippine Love Poetry in English since 1905, Father Poems,
Honoring Fathers: An International poetry Anthology, NCAA Ubod Project, The NVM
Gonzales Awards Stories and Supreme Court Decisions as Literature. His edited
textbooks are The Likhaan Anthology of Philippine Literature in English from
1900 to the Present, Frequently Asked Questions on Poetry, and Our People’s
Story: Philippine Literature in English.
His
syllabi-textbooks include Philippine Literature in English: Poetry, Fiction,
and Drama; Greek and roman Literature, and; Introduction to the Writing of
Poetry. His index is Index to Filipino Poetry in English, 1905 to
1950.
This year
2009, Gemino Abad won the Feronia Prize in Rome, Italy.
Carmen
Acosta was born in Manila on February 1, 1904 and died on September
13, 1986. She was the daughter of Godofredo B. Herrera, and Paterna Santos. Her
father was a journalist and served for a time as municipal president (or mayor
in modern usage) of Caloocan during the American colonial rule. She
was a University of the Philippines Bachelor of Philosophy graduate and taught
at theTorres High School in Manila.
A
trilingual writer (Filipino, Spanish and English), Acosta soon left the
teaching profession to become a full time journalist. She became editor of the
Filipino weekly magazine Sampaguita, where she also published her essays, short
stories and novels. She also wrote for other publications such as Liwayway
magazine which honored her with a Short Story Writer of the Year Award" in
c. 1952 for her story "Kandidata." She contributed essays in English
to some Philippine magazines, writing about relevant national issues of the
day.
She became
editor of Pagina Azul (Blue Page) the Spanish section of a Philippine magazine.
Here she published her short stories in Spanish. She was also a radio
playwright and her plays were aired over the government station DZFM, then
managed by Francisco "Koko" Trinidad.,
She first
joined government service in the early 1940s working as a linguistic researcher
at the Institute if National Language (Surian ng Wikang Pambansa) then headed
by the Father of Tagalog Grammar, Lope K. Santos. She was the first
Administrator of the government agency which was later to be called the Philippine
Housing Authority.
She later
joined the Department of Labor in various supervisory capacities. She traveled
extensively across the United States of America, observing the labor
conditions in that country. Later she also traveled
to France,Spain, Italy and Lebanon. In 1961 Herrera Acosta
was appointed by President Carlos P. Garcia as the first Director of the Bureau
of Women and Minors, an agency of the Department of Labor. As such, she helped
in the formulation of labor laws to improve the working conditions of female
laborers.
A
multi-awarded writer, Herrera Acosta's published books include "La Carta
Redentora y Otros Cuentos" (The Saving Letter and Other Stories) in
Spanish; and in Filipino, "Kandidata at iba pang mga Kuwento" (The
Woman Candidate and other Stories); "Dangal ng Pangalan at Iba pang Mga
Dulang Panradyo" (An Honorable Reputation and other Radio Plays);
"Bulaklak ng Pag-ibig at Iba pang Mga Tula" (Flower of Love and other
Poems); and "Kahapon at Ngayon" (Yesterday and Today), a book of
essays.
She married
Florinio Robles Acosta, a certified public accountant in 1940, and had one
child, Carmencita H. Acosta who like her, became a journalist.
Permission to use one of these po for our PowerPoint presentation,thank you po!!
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