Philippine Literature During Martial Law

By: Ryan Jay Q. JamisolaminAB-2

Martial LawProclamation № 1081

was the declaration of Martial Law in the Philippines by President Ferdinand E. Marcos. It became effective throughout the entire country on 21 September 1972, and was announced to the public two days later. It was formally lifted on 17 January 1981, six months before the first presidential election in the Philippines in twelve years.

What Happened to Philippine Literature During Martial Law?

It is not quite correct to argue that it was only in 1972 that Filipino writers started to use their writings to explore socio-political realities. The tradition of protest has always been a potent force in the production of socially committed writings, as a number of critics such as Bienvenido Lumbera, and Epifanio San Juan Jr. have argued. The 1970s, for example, witnessed the proliferation of poems, short stories, and novels which grappled with the burning issues of the times. In a large number of magazines and journals, writers in both English and Pilipino faced the problems of exploitation and injustice, and appropriated these realities as the only relevant materials for their fiction

Themes/Forms of Literature During Martial Law

Protest Literature

Proletarian Literature

Prison Literature

Circumvention Literature

Protest LiteratureProtest literature—at other times, in other contexts, referred to as revolutionary literature, literature of engagement, combat literature, committed literature, literature of resistance, proletarian literature, people's literature, socially conscious literature, and perhaps a Philippine contribution to the taxonomy, the literature of circumvention (simply defined as "a body of works that expressed social and political protest in veiled terms")—has had a long history in the Philippines.

Proletarian Literature

The call to create proletarian literature ...was too strong to ignore. It was deemed unimaginable, for the committed writer doing political work, to still think of poetry as "beauty recollected in tranquility"...

Prison

Literature

Not a few writers ended up behind bars from day one of martial law. Journalists and prominent political opposition figures were the first to be ensnared in the dragnet cast by the Marcos intelligence and police apparatus, followed by militant activists, including academics who were also noted for their critical literary writings.

Circumvention Literature

It was in the precious little space afforded, wittingly or unwittingly, by certain publications and institutions sanctioned by the martial law administration, that the so-called 'literature of circumvention' began to appear.

Notable Works

POEM NOVEL

TALE

POEM PROMETHEUS UNBOUND

If a poem was just

PROMETHEUS UNBOUND

Sometime in 1973, a poem entitled "Prometheus Unbound" appeared in Focus, a magazine published and edited by an established and respected writer who had chosen to be associated with the Marcos regime.

PROMETHEUS UNBOUND

This poem may sound too sophomoric by half, with its profuse, seemingly overwrought treatment of the theme from Greek mythology—the renegade Titan called Prometheus who stole fire from Mt. Olympus to give to mankind, surely the mother of all liberation theologies.

A poem which brought down the anger of heaven not upon the Promethean poet, but upon the publisher of Focus Magazine which printed the seemingly harmless poem. It featured an acrostic, the first letters of the lines spelling out the favorite war-chant and taunting slogan of demonstrators all over the country: "Marcos Hitler Diktador Tuta", the last two words among the most common sobriquets applied to the strongman: 'dictator' and 'puppet'

Prison

LITERATURE

A poem "kung ang tula ay isa lamang" ('if a poem was just'), deceptively simple in construction and elemental in prosody, has been held up as yet another fine example of protest writing that does not suffer from the sloganeering, poster-&-placard style which proliferated during the First Quarter Storm.

A poem which, for all intents and purposes, summed up the social critique of the developmentalist state propped up by martial law and cosmeticized with beautification campaigns and the foisting of cultural renaissance myths

Days of Disquiet, Nights of Rage

The First Quarter Storm & Related Events” by Jose F. Lacaba (Anvil Publishing, Inc.): Originally published in 1982, before the actual end of the Marcos era, this gripping, first-person account of the political awakening of the Filipino youth is considered by most to be the definitive chronicle of latent student and labor activism in the Philippine setting. It is also the best place to begin reading up about martial law as the wave of protests, so poetically and powerfully reported by Lacaba, eventually runs into the stormy shoals of what would later become the Marcos dictatorship. Here are the seeds that bloomed into steely demonstrations on the street for some, and total revolutionary resistance by others. Read this book to see where all the courage came from and why it all began.

NOVEL

“Killing Time in a Warm Place” by Jose Y. Dalisay, Jr.

NOVEL

This textured, award-winning roman a clef is a lovely fictionalization of Dalisay’s own experiences as a student activist and writer during the martial law years. At the beginning, Noel Ilustre Bulaong could be any of us, until his quiet life in bucolic Kangleong,is both transformed and shattered by the all-encompassing presence of Ferdinand Marcos. Bulaong becomes an activist and witnesses first hand, through arrest and detention, the shadowy hold of the Marcos era. Perhaps the most haunting part of “Killing Time” is how everyone ended up, and the deaths-both interior and exterior-that they experience. A vivid tale of those dangerous years, this is Dalisay at his best

“ U.G. “ An Underground Tale

The Journey of Edgar Jopson and the First Quarter Storm Generation” by Benjamin Pimentel, Jr. (Anvil Publishing, Inc.): One of the most fascinating and, in turn, tragic personalities connected with martial law was Edgar “Edjop” Jopson. The Ateneo student council leader devoted himself to the nascent student activist movement just in time to face off (at one point literally) with Ferdinand Marcos. But Jopson was serious about his struggle, relocating with his cadre constantly to escape military pursuit. His later death at the hands of the military makes this story of heroism bright and sharp at the same time, delivered with efficient and measured prose by columnist Pimentel. It’s a true story of inspiration and sacrifice you won’t forget. •

Pete Lacaba Jose Ma. Sison,

F. Sionil Jose

Mila Aguilar

Pete Lacaba The name Lacaba has become a literary by-word, for a number of reasons

In the Philippines, writers can easily shift from poetry and fiction to writing for television and film, and it is as a screenwriter that Pete Lacaba has really created an impact on Philippine popular culture. His screenplays produced during the period of martial law constitute further examples of the literature of circumvention, barely squeezing past the censor's nose, although they depicted brutalized lives, social injustice, and the political awakening of people from all walks of life.

He contribute to journalism, poetry, and scriptwriting have become identified with both literary excellence as well as social relevance (another pivotal phrase in the canon of protest literature).

A former English instructor at the University of the Philippines, who spent ten years in prison, and wrote a whole volume of poems (much later set to music out of which a CD would be made) which spoke not only of his privations during his incarceration, but of his steadfast political views

The best-known radical poet who became a political prisoner of the Marcos regime was Jose Ma. Sison,

While still behind bars, his friends in academe and fellow writers put together his poems and published them in a book, Prison and Beyond. One of the pieces in this collection speak of the prisoner's faith in the power of his writings, and of his certainty that outside his prison cell, the struggle which he helped launch continues.

A former teacher of English literature at the University of the Philippines.

She had joined her future husband in the guerrilla movement at the beginning of martial law, and after he was killed in an armed encounter, she continued her revolutionary work as writer and propagandist for resistance.

She published several books of poetry during the martial law period, including two under the name Clarita Roja: Dare to Struggle, Dare to Win! (1974) and The Mass Line /A Second Remoulding ( Manila 1977), and the rest under her real name after she had surfaced and continued the struggle above ground— Why Cage Pigeons? (1984), Pall Hanging over Manila (1984), and A Comrade is as Precious as a Rice Seedling (1984, 1985 and 1987).

F. Sionil Jose The first instrument of censorship in 1972 was the Army Office of Civil Relations which granted licences for new magazines and newspapers

It also imposed guidelines which were often arbitrary. Under these guidelines, the President, his family, and the Armed Forces could not be criticized, only praised. Before any manuscript was published, it had to be examined by the Army censors.

Notable Place

Where the writings are made: In

Jail Many of the writers ended up behind bars from day one of martial law.

Writers who were prison, were composed songs, using newly written lyrics or adaptations of patriotic poetry from the country's revolutionary past.

Many of the poems written in prison were later collected and published.

Among the writers and academics who were imprisoned—at various times between 1972 and 1986—were Bienvenido Lumbera, Luis Teodoro,, Jose Lacaba, Mila Aguilar, Jose Y., and Jose Ma. Sison. At the Bicutan Rehabilitation Center—intended to "rehabilitate" presumably wayward elements of society who had dared oppose Marcos and his oligarchy (the place was also called Camp Bagong Diwa meaning 'new spirit‘.

http://www.oovrag.com/essays/essay2007b-1.shtml

References: Philippine Literature

Through the Years

www.studymode.com/.../philippine-literature-during-martial-law

Philippine Literature: Lumbera

/www.google.com.ph/

search?q=literature+during+martial+law

By:

Ryan Jay Q. JamisolaminAB-2