When I Met Gilda

As a young writer many, many years ago accused of disregarding and disrespecting the works of national greats by “not” reading them, all my attempts at defending or at least trying to explain myself were silenced. It was never intentional on my end. Another problem was no writer SPOKE to me through their works.

The latter remains a problem-not to me but to anyone who finds out what I prefer reading. It took some growing up, a lot of pain, maybe a sliver of wisdom, to stop repeated flayings of my self still trying to find stories from writers that speak to me. I have since stopped apologizing for what I like and whose works I enjoy reading. I no longer bother to explain. I just write and write and write. Reaching that kind of peace is what got my work published.

I would have stopped writing had I not discovered this book in a sale bin while still raw over accusations about being “ungrateful” to the paths forged by writers many believed I should be reading and should only read.

“Story Collection” is the no-nonsense title of Gilda Cordero Fernando’s first and I believe only collection of short stories. Found in the bottom of the sale basket, its bluish, dark green algae cover with the photo of the author in front was under a rainbow pile of novels with orange covers, children’s books in pink, green and neon blue, and a few coffee table books in arctic white. The bookstore was having a huge sale then so people were encouraged to dig around. I got down on my knees and scavenged, fired up by the promise of a good book that met my limited allowance rather than knowing exactly what I was looking for.

That was how I came by Story Collection, and I’d like to think, the first time I ever met Gilda.

Her prose was of another world. Not in the Elvish sense. It was English I knew, and also English I never realized could be. Everyday words like wings, eggs and house were quicksilver with fairy dust. Stories about housewives unable to speak of their boredom became fairy tales, runaway youths in a museum a love story and artists heady with dreams steering to devastation. Calling her book merely Story Collection seemed, I don’t know–it was a lot more than just that to me. But now, I think calling it anything else besides Story Collection seems frivolous and the magic of her stories dissipates.

When you’re constantly fed in school the same stories about doom (and just my luck, exactly the same story all the way to college), you WILL turn away from them. If they never spoke to you the first time, they never will. That’s why I turned to Charles Dickens and Jane Austen. I was not looking for happy endings but stories that fed hope into the world.

Gilda’s stories are a mix of that. On one hand, a world where all you can do is pick yourself up off the floor and right the ravished chairs, on the other,after taking to bed with blankets and tranquilizers after another heartbreak, you step outside at last and see that the sun in still shining. The world is scarred and fissured in her stories, the deluge without end. Despite these, the sun still shines. Not everyday, and the brightness varies but it does. It will.

Her book is what got me writing again, word by word. I wouldn’t meet her in person many years later.

I wish I can say that after the first time I met Gilda we became friends. Or at least she became a mentor. How amazing would that have been? But that’s a privilege not for me. It was her words, meeting her, and I think, being able to write after my heart got stomped on that was the gift, really.

I did manage to tell Gilda which stories of hers I liked the best and I got what was probably the warmest, tightest hug of my life (sorry, Mom). It’s a miracle I managed to do it because I was shaking so much–I went to her table, introduced myself and just shattered. It was her hug that fused me back together. I would eventually have Story Collection signed by her, a few years after that first meeting.

2016 would be the last time I saw her.

That last time she hugged me again. It was tighter. She also held my hand while I rambled chains and knots of nonsense. By then she was in a wheelchair.

With her gone, I know there will never again be another writer who could speak as her stories had with me. It’s heartbreaking, knowing this. But her stories, and her as well, have shown that despite this wounding, the sun will still come out. Some days the brightness could be blinding. Other days faint, milky streaks in the sky. But it will come out. There will always be that hope. Such is the legacy of her art, and the wonder her stories have shown.

Traditionally a politically marginalized sector, the military responded well to the overtures of a commander-in-chief who was selling a vision of a New Society where the military, or at least its most senior officers, could be recognized as playing influential roles. With the declaration of martial law in 1972, the operational influence of the military men in local and national politics, in practically all branches of government including the judiciary, significantly increased. At regional and local levels, military men often found themselves in a position to overrule traditional politicians who were not key Marcos people.

The politicization of the military took other forms. Promotions were clearly indicated for military officers who were openly uncritically supportive of Marcos. Traditional military career patterns with their built-in constraints broke down before politically inspired decisions to promote and extend the services of pro-Marcos military men. The perquisites attending the politicization of senior military men were clearly translated into highly visible material gains, which legitimate military pay and allowances could not have put together. Prime real estate, mansions, luxury cars, high living, and other excessive practices were indicators of a lifestyle among many military men who traded their professionalism for loyalty to Marcos and his oligarchical cronies.

—Felipe B. Miranda,The Political Economy of National Plunder: The Philippines Under Marcos, from Memory, Truth Telling, and the Pursuit of Justice: A Conference on the Legacies of the Marcos Dictatorship

jester-mereel:

Children’s publisher Adarna offers ‘#NeverAgain’ book bundle discount

tala-paraluman:

Tuso ang mga kano. Ikinundisyon nila nag isip natin sa Amerikanisadong pananaw. Nilikha nila ang isang ekonomiyang-pinoy na nakasandal sa dikta ng Estados Unidos. At kung paanong ang kalupitan ng mga Kastila'y nag-anak ng maalab na pagkamakabayan sa libu-libong Pilipino, ang mga “biyaya” ng kano'y naglibing sa mga katangian nito.

Lualhati Bautista, mula sa “‘GAPÔ (at isang puting Pilipino, sa mundo ng mga Amerikanong kulay brown)”

Kung gusto mong magsabi ng masasamang words, si Bob Ong rin sa librong ito. Dito maraming masasamang words hahahaha

allofthehousethatstood:

Willing to re-acquaint yourself with history but Rappler is ew? I got you! Literature is how I teach myself history and the human condition, so perhaps it will be the same for you. Here are some works that I recommend:

• Dekada ‘70 by Lualhati Bautista
• Gun Dealers’ Daughter by Gina Apostol
• State Of War by Ninotchka Rosca
• Killing Time In A Warm Place by Jose Dalisay
• The Jupiter Effect by Katrina Tuvera
• Days of Disquiet, Nights of Rage: The First Quarter Storm & Related Events by Jose F. Lacaba
• Subversive Lives by Susan and Nathan Quimpo
• Tutubi, Tutubi, 'Wag Kang Magpahuli Sa Mamang Salbahe by Jun Cruz Reyes

Of course, these will not teach you everything you need to learn, but literature is a good springboard to start your journey in delving deeper into a certain topic.

#KwentoNa10To

Rosas at Magmahal books written by 150+ Filipino volunteers who saw HOPE for the Philippines.

Mada-download ng libre ang mga librong Kulay Rosas Ang Bukas at Mas Radikal Ang Magmahal. Magpunta lamang sa link na ito.

Maaari mo ring mapanuod ang book launching sa Youtube:

Gina Apostol won the 2022 Rome Prize in Literature for Book on Filipino Women Radicals

In an interview with CNN Philippines’ Rico Hizon on May 5, 2022, Apostol shared that her work-in-progress, The Treatment of Paz, is about the 1880s and 1890s and will look at the “Filipino revolution from the point of view of women.

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Ang larawan ay kuha sa Gina Apostol website

Ang balita ay kuha sa Good News Pilipinas