Writers for National Unity

By Edith L. Tiempo
 About Edith L. Tiempo
 Born in April 22, 1919
 Died in August 21, 2011 (Age 92)
 born in Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya
Honors and awards
 National Artist Award for Literature (1999)
 Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature
 Cultural Center of the Philippines (1979, First Prize in Novel)
 Gawad Pambansang Alagad ni Balagtas (1988)
 About Writers for National Unity
 The essay is an informal essay
 It is a first person view essay
 The essay talks about the writer’s theme that we’re sent by National Writer’s of the Philippines.
And how it’s very distinct from other nation’s ways for unity.
 Writers for National Unity
 THE THEME of the PEN Conference this  62 Examples of the works of writers in the
year is a very enduring one. And just how past show that the thrust for national unity
and why it endures is something to reflect had almost always involved the exhortation,
upon. It would be interesting to know how the usually a violent one, to overthrow an
writers in the past, as well as current writers, existing order that is replete with dissensions,
have responded to the condition of writing and thereafter to establish a new condition of
for national unity. And most important, about peace and unity. Having said this does not
the works that are created in the light of this mean I am advocating the idea that our
theme, are these works actually more justified writers here are suited to foment violent
as literature; to put it in a rather clichéd revolutions in order to set up a more united
metaphor: Could our writing for national nation, in the classic bloodletting way of
unity really be the watershed to feed into the Thomas Paine and Patrick Henry, or of Jean
depths of our literary springs? Paul Marat during the French Revolution.
 Writers for National Unity
 For neither do I wish our writing force disrupted  It is of course a universal dream to have
by even a relatively bloodless war of ideas, as in writers writing in the single framework of a
the case of a certain bishop and philosopher in nation that is united; many thinkers have
the eighteenth century whose works forcefully thought it an ideal situation for both writer
attacked the principles of John Locke. These two
and nation. And looking beyond the writers'
philosophers were disputing over the nature of
involvement, the idea of national unity in
reality -- a comparatively safe topic to wrangle
over, not at all immediately provocative of general has been even more fundamental in
bloody altercations. In any case we are sure it is the last half-century, starting with the close
not in violent spirit that this theme of PEN is of World War Two, which also marked the
adopted, but that more peaceful objectives are end of a narrow concept of nationalism for
surely implied. However, before going into the all the countries of the world.
more reasonable implications of this theme, I
believe it would be prudent, first of all, to try
briefly defining its more contemporary limits.
 Writers for National Unity
 After that global turmoil we recall how the  Whether we in the Philippines fifty years ago
Third World nations underwent a span of were aware of it or not. our own framework
self-assertion about national identity and for national unity. national aspirations.
territorial objectives -- a necessary and national identity in thought, language, and
understandable act of setting the national desidemta had already gone beyond the idea
house in order after that great world that we encompass only the home context.
disorder. We may recall one example of this And nationalism having now expanded into
national housekeeping in the decision of an admixture with involvements that are more
Indonesia and Malaysia to set up a common international. the theme of this conference
official bulimia: by this act the two countries does show the need to look into limits.
declare the concept of an expanded
individual nationhood by asserting their
corrunon regional identity.
 Writers for National Unity
 For consider how today our country is also in the  On the other hand we, too, see the spectacle
position of others in the world -- that is, no country of our nation presently working like mad to
can presently think of purely national necessities, drain other countries, not of their brains but
but has to bring the international ingredient into its
concerns— especially the larger concerns -- so that
of their capital. to keep the home fires
today we take for granted such realities as micro- binning. We are internationally entangled.
and macro- economics, the latter now inevitably So, fellow writers for national unity, how
intersecting with international economics. really national can we get in our times? For
Moreover, in our educational system our academic it is clear that the context has moved. and by
giants were no strangers to international all that is sensible and obvious, the writers
sponsorships like the Fulbright-Smith Mundt and also move; otherwise. in grubbing up
German and Dutch and Japanese and other foreign
sponsoring agencies. So that, ironically, partly as a
subjects and demos and materials for our
consequence of the extended training in various writing. we find ourselves beating the dead
fields of expertise we now decry the "brain- horse of some outwom or moribund context.
drain" in the ranks of our intellectual
 Writers for National Unity
 What I have said and am still going to say  I Only mean that the reference for whatever
about expanded frameworks do not mean writing that we choose to do is always the
that I disbelieve in the very necessary framework in which we live and nourish our
condition of writers writing to contribute to being, and that it is a framework ever
the unity of the nation— for obviously the expanding, and that we keep a healthy
considering of outside contexts in no way awareness of it and keep moving with this
means spinning the domestic scene; nor do 1 reference. In other words. I am not advocating
negate our writing on national and the sedulous aping and adoption of foreign
indigenous materials and issues: nor do I models, like the minimalist. the structuralist,
turn up my nose at good vernacular uniting. the post-modern, the deconstructionalist. ad
of which I am in great envy, wishing that I, naseum. True. it is enriching and broadening
too can create with the needed versatility. to have these interesting innovations -- but no
sedulous oping.
 Writers for National Unity
 thank your Rather. what I have been somewhat   In this connection. I believe that our more
euphemistically descanting upon so for is the attuned writers have indeed been writing with
writers' familiar obligation to be relevant. reference to our extended domestic world.
Concerning the writer. particularly. what are the particularly since all that I have said so far has
implications of such an extraneously involved been quite obvious -- but the point is rather that
framework? In writing with a weather eye on this we have taken up the stance with no deeply
diverse reference, do we not risk producing a considered awareness of the implications of our
mishmash of relevancies that are incongruous. choice. Fortunately, there are those among us
that. ultimately, are neither domestically nor who do know the score. For instance. there is one
internationally perrinenl?l say that we should Alfred Yuson, who has written a volume of poems
not worry about that. The writer who writes entitled. Trading in Menmr'ds, and even as he
meaningfully is provided with the trappings of wrote it, I'm sure he knew that many readers
art that could allow him to create these relevant would find its articulation an extraneous and
oxymorons. these works that are diverse in fearsome thing (in the way that a mermaid is!).
composition but singular in their effect
 Writers for National Unity
 Anyway.l know from the evidence of this   One Ophelia Dimalanta has composed a poem
particular work that Krip Yuson knew the with a historical basis: it is about an ancient
implications of his choice. That is. as a Chinese emperor who had his body buried
sensibly discriminated mix of home-grown together with his whole martial retinue --
soldiers, horses, weapons and shields, and the
and esoteric insights, Trading in Mermaids
other appurtenances of war -- the implication
will be judged by all our readers as
being that his horses and his men were either
culturally composite, if not disparate. and sacrificially slaughtered or entombed alive with
therefore the poems themselves are his royal corpse. The subject of this poem is
mermaids in their composition. But within Asian-alien. but the articulation is a triumph of
the expanded locale, such works are Western craft; for the latter is strongly evident in
congruous, and so long as they are crafted the special use of two poetic devices, which
with a good discrimination for the generate the unmistakable Western twist in the
constituents that could blend. such poems poetic operation. Being constituted plurally, is
are de rigueur and are even mandated to be this poem, then, a schizophrenic production? 
 Writers for National Unity
 Not a bit of it, and carping critics can read it   Most admirably. all this Pinoy obstreperousness is
delivered with Cebuano aplomb and dry Western
and see for themselves. Simeon Dumdum, Jr.
obliqueness and sophistication. From these
and Rene Amper in Cebu have been likewise representative examples we do see the reference
interlarding in their articulation. Jun pluralized in the features of our writers' works. But so
Dumdum celebrates the indigenous with much for this plural or expanded context. We could go
quickly into the matter of unity; as a term in the PEN
third world operas and canticles to peerless theme, the word unity. as our good lawyers here would
barbers, and with contemplative lechers put it. does need a bit of a priori' justification. Is it the
viewing Mt. Mayan with disinterested total unity of the nation that is meant for the writers to
lewdness. Rene Amper wrote an address? If otherwise, what segments of the national life
need this help to be unified? And how would the writers
unforgettable poem about a menopausing respond to a predetermined objective like this? For
mother, and another poem has spooky writers are acknowledged to be intrasigent creatures
pythons and karukas that keep invading concerning their individual convictions; they would
one's bed; in another poem he subtly evokes refuse to amble along with the herd, but for every step of
the way must consult their individual compasses.
the interesting affinity between the village
 Writers for National Unity
 Further, are the writers expected to write in a unity of   One can never go wrong on the human and
effort and direction? If so, then begging pardon for universal themes. which are not just revelatory of
this pemsnickety grammarian of an English teacher. meanings. but profoundly so. Issues and events are
the preposition in the theme should be changed, from perceived with more depth and significance in the
writers for unity to writers in unity. Be that as it may, light of these human and universal perspectives of
these questions may not matter in a totalitarian literature. And the scope of these themes is limitless
country, where writers are mandated to push their and of infinite variety; since these themes are based
pens only in certain directions, but in a free on the breadth and variety of life itself, they are
environment the individual has earned the right to be limited only by the inventiveness of the writer and
contentious to safeguard his convictions. Still, even in the reach of his imagination. ranging all the way
the midst of divergent views, there is one never-failing from the ridiculous to the sublime. Nothing that is
ground for writers on which to work in and for human is alien to the writer's perception. And should
national unity, with practically all the fringe he balk at writing on the disgusting vices that the
questions answered thereby -- and that reliable human flesh is heir to, he knows at least that his
common ground is the matter of the durable kind of
obligation is to understand these corruptions and not
literary themes to write about.
to pretend that they don't exist.
 Writers for National Unity
 We get a contemporary insight into the scope   This is the laughter in the humurous and sardonic
and variety of these durable themes by looking classics of Andeng Roces. the robust and tragic
at certain stray statements made by the laughter of Bulosan's father. the laughter of the
laughing man in the story of the German writer,
eminent writers today. Here are just a handful.
Heinrich 1361]. William Manchester. in his famous
James Baldwin in one of his essays shows how essay on the battle of Okinawa, published not too long
laughter is a great literary theme. He says: ago, writes of wounds that never heal. He tells of a
This laughter is the laughter of those who certain Japanese stranger named Yazaki. who was.
consider themselves to be at a safe remove like Manchester. a wounded veteran of the Okinawa
from all the wretched ones. I had heard it so massacre. Some well-meaning friends thought that
often in my native land that Ihad resolved to Manchester and Yazaki should meet as a gesture of
peace and reconciliation on the eve of the celebration
find a place where I would never hear it of Flag Day. But let us hear what Manchester says of
anymore. In some deep. bleak. stony. and the encounter: when we confronted each other. we
liberating way. my life, in my own eyes. began froze ...And I could see. from his expression. that this
when it was borne in on me that this laughter was difficult for him, too. Nations may make peace.
 Writers for National Unity
 It is harder for fighting men. On simultaneous   No grasshopper was caught. but just one very rare
impulse we both turned and walked away. I set species called a bell cricket. which at first everyone
this down in neither pride nor shame. The fact is thought was the common grasshopper. The boy who
that some wounds never heal Men are irrational. caught it gave it to a girl, and the transfer of the
Yazaki explains [to some mutual friends], and bell cricket from the hands of the boy to the fingers
adds that he feels very sad. 68 "So do I. of the girl is very tenderly sketched in the story. The
Yazaki-san. so do I." At least Manchester writer ends this way: There are not many bell
has no rancor in the end. only sadness, and so it crickets in the world. Probably you will find a girl
is. too, with Yazaki-san. The Nobel Prize-winning like a grasshopper whom you think is a cricket. And
finally, to your clouded, wounded heart, even a true
Japanese writer. Yasunari Kawabata. writes of
bell cricket will seem like a grasshopper. Should
the never-to-be in this life. He has a story about
that day come.I think it a pity that you have no way
a festival of lanterns when at night some
to remember tonight's play of light. when by your
adolescents go hunting for grasshoppers in the
beautiful lantern your name was written in green on
bushes as a kind of pastime. Each lantern had a girl's breast.
the owner's name cut out on it, so that the name
 Writers for National Unity
 Finally. these statements on the present   We do not fear ghosts but we fear the ghost of
ourselves... We fear the awesome powers we have
global problem of our endangered lifted out of nature and [which we] carmot return to
environment. Richard Rhodes in his essay her. We fear the weapons we have made. the hatreds
on the death of the Everglades in Florida we engendered. We fear the crush of the fanatic people
writes with great indignation on the to whom we readily sell these weapons...We fear to
walk . in our streets at evening. We have come to fear
despoiling of these national preserves. even our scientists and their gifts... [we fear for] the
However. in a very moving essay. Loren contending multitudes all crying for liberation without
Eiseley. the renowned naturalist and responsibility. From these four themes as unfolded in
the hands of these writers - - laughter, the wounds that
literary writer. encompasses not only the never heal. the nevereto'be in this life. the endangered
dangerous and endangered environment. and dangerous environment of humankind -- it is plain
but all the death-dealing foibles of that all our materials. no matter how indigenous and
mankind in our time. He writes: constricted to local concerns. could wear the
universal, depth—evoking mask of art.
 Writers for National Unity
 Actually, l have spoken this morning of only two matters: the need to
keep up with the implications of the expanded context. and using the
perspectives of the universal themes, those themes that bring out the
meaningfulness of our materials as we write for and in unity for the
nation.