–

Who’s Preying on Whom?: Two Experiences

By M. S. A. Sereno:

When I first read Mga Ibong Mandaragit I was fourteen, a high school senior with bad study habits and even worse Filipino reading skills. Our teacher had given us a list of books and told us to write a report on one of them; I had rather shortsightedly chosen the longest, the one featuring “what happened after the Fili” and then forgotten all about it until a day before the deadline. I spent an afternoon hacking through what felt like huge, thorny thickets of words and emerged from my room with a migraine pounding at what remained of my brain. Needless to say, I did not enjoy reading that book.

That experience doesn’t give me the right to pronounce judgment on Mga Ibong Mandaragit, of course; to be honest, I read the book too quickly to form a coherent, lasting impression, and now all I can recall is a sort of grudging resignation to the events unfolding throughout its pages and unrelenting dislike towards one of the main characters (who, I thought, was a selfish floozy who didn’t suffer half as much as she should have). All I can say is that the author wrote well and his work can be read, difficult as it may be. And it was hard reading; I don’t doubt that if I had more time — say, several days or a week — I’d still have found it difficult. Many students probably feel the same way.

So while I disagree with her, I have a lot of sympathy — in the sense of shared experiences of pain — for Connie Veneracion, the author of The Birds of Prey and Batjay, a (by now) infamous article published in her column in the Manila Standard Today and posted on her blog (http://houseonahill.net/the-birds-of-prey-and-batjay/). In the article, Ms. Veneracion wrote about how difficult it was to read the book, then went on to tackle her issues with overly complex usage of language and elitism in literature. She calls Mga Ibong Mandaragit “[a] case of substance muddled by incomprehensible form” and goes on to ask “What is so objectionable about the use of simple language in literature? Is literature naturally elitist and meant to be appreciated only by a few? Is it what makes it special? Is that what makes it good?” Near the article’s ending, she writes, “Just what is the difference between [classic literature and popular literature] if not old age? Language evolves. Culture evolves. If we keep on defining literature based on the number of obsolete words used, literature will always be something for the enjoyment of men who like to shut themselves up in a room dissecting letters.”

Fighting words. (My knee-jerk reaction: “But… we don’t define literature based on the number of obsolete words! And… I’m not a man, nor do I dissect letters!”) Quite a few writers and bloggers responded: slamming Ms. Veneracion’s insistence on “quick and easy payoffs”; emphasizing the value of working hard to understand great literature; bemoaning the increasing inability, especially among the young, to read Filipino well; showing how important art is to life. I was moved to tears by Exie Abola’s response, Preying on Ignorance, which appeared as a column and was also reposted on his blog at http://dogberryexie.blogspot.com/2008/05/preying-on-ignorance.html. He wrote: “While entertainment strokes our ego and makes us content with ourselves and the world we live in, art calls us to go beyond our comfort zone, to expand the limited spheres of our existence. It admonishes us to become more than who we already are. … Art disturbs us into living.” What a beautiful way to put it.

But the reactions, well-written and passionately argued as they were, left me wanting. It took me a while (a long while) to articulate precisely what i felt they lacked, and in that interval more blog posts were written, more comments posted. There were so many posts that reading all of them and sorting through the web of links and trackbacks took me several hours, but having gone through what I could find I still didn’t see something: a reaching out to people who didn’t like reading, an offer to help readers trapped in the mire of “philistinism” make their way out and begin learning, an answer to the question: “You say this is wrong — so what now?” Putting myself in the shoes of someone who agreed with Ms. Veneracion — and that type of reader is not uncommon — reading the reactions would only make me more entrenched in my wrongly-held beliefs, more convinced of the strength of my position. To that hypothetical me, people insulting Ms. Veneracion’s intelligence and/or ranting about stupidity (called for though it may be) would serve as more evidence, yet again, of the elitism of the Filipino literati. And no matter how beautifully written other posts on literature might be, they still wouldn’t reach me. How could they? I would read them without fully understanding their arguments, because I wouldn’t actually have experienced the beauty of literature — despite all assumptions to the contrary.

The original article is indeed as guilty of elitism as the literati it accuses: in its case a reverse elitism, a prejudice against difficult reading and books considered “high literature” (a concept still valid to most of the people who agreed with Ms. Veneracion). However that does not diminish the fact that there really is elitism in the way many Filipinos view, read, and write literature. That there are people disgruntled with the current status quo — or at least their perception of it — should come as no surprise, and though some of them take it to extremes it doesn’t excuse the apparent lack of material written to change their perspectives, especially in light of the amount of effort that has gone into discrediting Connie Veneracion.

What would have been a possible alternative? For starters, impassioned defenses of literature, the worth of art, and the Filipino language might have fared better had they been tempered with attempts to bridge the divide rather than widening it. We could say: deep and thoughtful reading is important too, enjoyable as dipping into junk food manga with titles like Perfect Girl Evolution and Kateikyo Hitman Reborn! might be. And look — some books are difficult, yes, nobody’s saying aren’t, but they aren’t impossible, and trying is certainly worth it. Trying to understand why is just as meaningful as knowing what. You don’t have to like something because critics and professors say it’s good; come to think of it, you don’t have to like something even if you think it’s good (for instance, though I think Haruki Murakami is a good writer I don’t like his work, for reasons entirely my own). You don’t have to like anything. But you could at least try — try to read, to understand, to form your own, informed, opinion.

I was dismayed to see a writer denigrate “simple” and “easy” literature in her reaction to Ms. Veneracion’s article. Not only is it entirely possible for a book to be both simple and complex, easy to read and thought-provoking, what sort of mindset is the putting down of “simple and easy writing” perpetuating? Wouldn’t this just reinforce the association, “incomprehensible = deep”? Wouldn’t this just encourage some writers to make their work as complex and linguistically obscure as they can, for the sake of appearing profound? Wouldn’t this just be off-putting and discouraging to many would-be readers? It isn’t very effective to answer “If they’re put off, they should work harder” even though it may be true. I had a professor who, in the first day of class in a general education subject, filled the board with so many equations many of my classmates lost whatever drive or energy they had and just gave up on getting a good grade. He said he did this to highlight the seriousness of the subject. That may be so, but he probably should have said something about the importance of physics first, or maybe mentioned its applications to real life, the beauty and simplicity of its principles — little things, which might have been obvious to him but were totally new to his students — before stunning his audience into near-insensibility.

It’s true: we should work harder. We shouldn’t stop trying. We ought to challenge ourselves, to struggle, to learn. But our quest for understanding doesn’t involve looking down on those who are just beginning to learn (maybe even unwilling or unable to learn) or attempting to drag down people who’ve advanced to higher slopes and steeper ground. There’s no reason to draw anything downwards when there are still so many ways to go up.

By M. R. R. Arcega:

I confess it was ages since I last read Mga Ibong Mandaragit, and that was when it was required for high school. I didn’t retain any of it. That probably means I didn’t like it and wasn’t inspired in any way by it.

However, I don’t consider that my fault. I don’t consider it Amado Hernandez’s fault either. So whose fault is it?

I believe this is essentially what’s being discussed in one of the hottest online topics in the Philippine blogosphere: who’s to blame for children not liking classical Filipino literature? Somehow, this historically significant novel by Amado Hernandez became representative of every classical work turned out by Filipino authors, and indeed by every piece of “high literature” ever written. And Connie Veneracion, who brought it up in the first place, became the demon in the dark everybody had to hunt down, because now she represents everything wrong with the readership of the country.

I’m not going to say that not being able to appreciate classical literature should not be given attention as a national problem: it matters, and it definitely merits further discussion. But I do wonder if the discussion should proceed like this. Reading through the reactions, and through the column itself, one wonders if Connie Veneracion’s column truly deserved the ire it garnered, or if it just turned into an effigy because it’s high time for these issues to come to light.

Perhaps we needed something to demonize, to pour all our frustrations about literacy and literary appreciation onto, and this article just happened to come up at exactly the right time.

A different (we cannot exactly say “deeper,” as some of the reactions have in fact gone so far as to overanalyze particularly inflammatory sections) analysis of Miss Veneracion’s column would yield a genuine concern for the country’s educational standards. The classics are losing an audience among readers - especially young readers - with more contemporary tastes, and our educators are failing to address that loss.

Thanks to the opinions exchanged, it became clear that there IS resentment between readers and literary writers in the Philippines, and it has been brewing under the surface for ages. It’s certainly not a one-way street - some readers resent writers for feeling like they’re being deliberately alienated from the text and then made to feel inferior about it. But some writers also feel alienated from their intended readers because the latter don’t make an effort to understand their work - and even passionately discourage each other from doing so!

The thing is, this whole war appears to be going badly, as it’s now lending itself more to typecasting than to any sort of righteous indignation. If there was a rift between writers and readers before Ms. Veneracion’s article was written, it could well have grown after our respected literary bodies have turned it into something to be blindly despised.

Of course, this doesn’t mean many of the children who actually have to sit through Mga Ibong Mandaragit will be affected by this whole ordeal. A great many of them still 1) don’t have access to the Internet or 2) have difficulty comprehending old Tagalog, or both. The problem of why some classical required reading material in our schools comes across as incomprehensible is not solved - however, the problem of why people have a negative view of the classics is brought to light.

A different (we cannot exactly say “deeper,” as some of the reactions have already gone so far as to overanalyze particularly inflammatory sections) analysis of Miss Veneracion’s column would yield a genuine concern for the country’s educational standards. The classics are losing an audience among readers - especially young readers - with more contemporary tastes, and our educators are failing to address that loss.

I believe no writer actually consciously makes oneself hard to understand. At the same time, no person who actually likes to read would outright say “That’s just one of those snobby intellectuals/dead writer dudes spewing nonsense again, don’t waste your time with that.” People generally want to understand and be understood - especially if it’s impressed upon them that something is Important, in the sense that they could not have been free Filipinos if it had not been written and published. Literacy is still prized in the Philippines both as a personal achievement and a tool for success.

I don’t side with Ms. Veneracion on this issue; I don’t even like the way she wrote her column. But I also don’t like how people contributed to the growth of the already massive rift between the people who earnestly work toward a deeper understanding of high literature (aka aspiring writers) and the people who simply wish it was easier to appreciate historically and culturally significant text, because it is difficult to achieve an immediate connection with it (aka “philistines”).

So, in attempting to answer the questions I asked earlier, I’m saying it’s nobody’s fault that I didn’t like the text. That doesn’t make me a bad Filipino, or make Ka Amado a bad writer, or even my literature teachers bad educators. But if I dislike all classical works just because I didn’t understand it, that’s different - there is definitely a problem.

As a reader, I found it particularly interesting that the default reaction of literary writers to being told “we don’t understand you and we don’t like it” appears to be “you’re just not trying hard enough!” This in itself I think speaks of another deep-set problem, one of modern writers losing touch with their readership. And it would be disastrous for all of us - readers and writers alike - if this issue is not properly addressed, and soon.

On the other hand, as a writer, I find it exhilarating that some people - young people, especially - are revisiting Mga Ibong Mandaragit and making an honest effort to understand it, if only to see what the hoolaballoo is about. I hope this doesn’t stop at Ka Amado’s novel, suddenly controversial again after so many years - I hope young people are able to see that their appreciation and understanding of a text, especially of a classical text, is not limited to what they are handed out in class or on their textbooks.

However, I am also appalled that literary advocates needed to roast, spit and burn a fellow literary advocate alive just to prove a point.

–
Fun facts:

- Haven’t edited out typos, sorriez. Maybe later.

- I wrote my side of the article in a few hours, amidst noisy boys playing DotA. The funny thing is I probably wrote faster than I would have if I’d done it at home, even with electricity. (A storm knocked out the power at my house; I ended up going to Katipunan, where I wrote half the article in longhand in Starbucks and finished it in Paradigm.)

- The title… yeah, it’s awful, isn’t it? In our defense (haha) we were panicking and hyper by the time we remembered “WTF WALA PA TITLE AAAA.” (For comparison, my working title (for my article draft) was Carcasses as Fertilizer. WHICH IS MUCH WORSE.)

- I would have been much more restrained (and awkward, and artificial, and… you know, maybe I wouldn’t have finished it at all!) if not for Bhex. Share the misery and blame! It’s kind of like dragging teammates into Luna’s Eclipse with you.

- K, hiding now.

I focused on the etc. part. Since I didn’t really feel like discussing JPEPA or the rice crisis, I chose to talk about (what else?) Mga Ibong Mandaragit and what’s been written about it in various blogs over the past few days.

I liked discussing that issue with my professor, and I think he found it interesting as well. We ended up talking about blogs and Wordpress and feed readers. Good times.

–

Just before I took the exam, my professor looked at the attendance sheet and asked, “What high school did you come from?”

I paused, trying to gauge whether this was a good question or… a bad question. The last time a professor asked me that he ended up launching into a tirade against: me, drawing in class, misuse of intelligence, and the arrogance of the youth. “Pisay,” I said, in approximately the same tone I use to shamefacedly admit stupid mistakes.

“Ah, I thought you were from Assumption or– one of those schools? Where did you learn to write like that?” He pointed at the name I’d written on the attendance sheet.

Oh. I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding. “Um, well, I don’t really know…”

–

After the exam my professor handed me my midterm result and said, “Your score here’s so low, why?”

“I don’t… memorize things very well?”

–

Despite not having written anything coherent about that infamous “Birds of Prey” post and the resulting furor, I haven’t remained unaffected by it. My reactions to frustration consist of either getting sick or coming up with a semi-related crack project in response to it, and apparently, since I’m almost done with the “getting sick” part, I’m moving on to the crack.

To wit:

- Florante at Laura translation project (because I enjoy translating)
- LOLcat Noli and Fili scripts (because!)
- Basilio+Maria Clara and Flerida+Laura fic

I was going to do the whole Noli in LOLcat summaries, but then I came across this site, created by Paurong and Zine2hamster, and what caught my attention — apart from both of them having an admirable love for the classics — was that the comments were 10% gratitude and 90% “bakit hindi ninyo linagay yung (obscure detail)? kailangan namin yun, palagay pls” or “may script ba kayo nito, pahingi po”.

It’s probably better to laugh than to get angry, at least in this situation, since ranting about lazy students and lackluster teaching won’t get me anywhere. Solution? LOLcat scripts. Elias: I r dai nao, wivout cheez or shiniez. But you who dun dai, say hai to teh shiniez, taek care of teh cheez! Dun forget ded kittehs! Maybe I could even include the characters’ distinctive speaking styles! Don Tiburcio would be all *whimper whimper crai* and Simoun would go WHUT MARIA CLARA IZ DED? NOEZ. We’ll see.

Of course I’ll put up a disclaimer gently hinting that if you found the LOLcat while looking for a Noli script, sorry, but maybe you should make your own? Still…

(This should be fun. I mean, when I was doing Kthxbai fo realz I almost hurt myself laughing. And I got to analyze Mi Ultimo Adios line by line while doing it! Literature and crack: winning combination.)

I don’t have a copy of the Noli yet, though (NO, RLY! kitteh no has moniez!) so I’ll work on Florante at Laura for now. I also bought Dekada ‘76 and will try translating it after I’m done with Florante at Laura. I’d do Mga Ibong Mandaragit, but I couldn’t find it, woez.

There are probably easier ways to get over frustration than embarking on half-baked projects, but honestly I can’t think of any right now that are as useful or as interesting. I’m not doing it just for the lulz — believe it or not I thought carefully about motivations and possible criticisms before I decided to go ahead and do it — but sparkly shiny cracky lulz does help a lot.

More pictures at the sneak peek Multiply album.

Notes to come, kind of sleepy. Miamor is currently undergoing tweaking, please excuse the mess.

Gift for my mother. A bag charm in pearl, abalone, crystal, glass, and silver wire.

Notes: Helloooo huge jump rings! I’ll probably buy more — sterling silver ones this time — when I move on to making bracelets. I used white and purple freshwater pearls strung on silver wire (the rings the pearls are hanging on are made of wire twisted together; I liked the organic look); abalone and mother of pearl chips; clear (aurora borealis) and pale yellow crystals; champagne crystal bicones; assorted silver bead spacers; golden glass seed beads. My favorite part is the pearl ring at the end — I left the pearls a little space to move on the wire, and I think it made the way the charm hangs a lot more interesting. The dragonfly at the very end is actually a pretty detailed charm, but the photo didn’t manage to capture that. I’ll take pictures of the details tomorrow.

Acrylic on illustration board. First in a series featuring short poems or snippets of poems.

Is it true that the meteor
was a dove of amethyst? (Pablo Neruda)

I did it tonight in a rare burst of energy. The baselines are tilted and I really wish I could re-do the placement, but it still makes me smile. It feels warm, and that’s a very good thing considering how cold and listless I’ve been feeling lately.

You are tired,
(I think)
Of the always puzzle of living and doing;
And so am I.

Come with me, then,
And we’ll leave it far and far away—
(Only you and I, understand!)

You have played,
(I think)
And broke the toys you were fondest of,
And are a little tired now;
Tired of things that break, and—
Just tired.
So am I.

But I come with a dream in my eyes tonight,
And knock with a rose at the hopeless gate of your heart—
Open to me!
For I will show you the places Nobody knows,
And, if you like,
The perfect places of Sleep.

Ah, come with me!
I’ll blow you that wonderful bubble, the moon,
That floats forever and a day;
I’ll sing you the jacinth song
Of the probable stars;
I will attempt the unstartled steppes of dream,
Until I find the Only Flower,
Which shall keep (I think) your little heart
While the moon comes out of the sea.

I’m not really a fan in the “member of FANDOM IN ALL ITS GLORY” sense of the word. I like some anime and manga. Occasionally I write stories about them, the majority of which never leave my head for the less comfortable territory of the digital world. But I don’t feel the need to interact with other fans (it’s very nice, of course, and I love sharing my interests with my friends, but fandom for the sake of fandom, I can do without) nor the desire to win the approval of other people (exception: I look for feedback from friends who have encouraged me to write about all sorts of crazy things, YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE). So all this self-seeking, narrow-mindedness, outright hostility… it’s utterly foreign to me. I will not say incomprehensible, because I understand insecurity all too well.

It’s saddening to see so many people looking for — no, rather, expecting — close friendship and affection in fandom communities, then lashing out violently when they feel betrayed. Or young writers judging each other solely by how well they turn sentences or spin illusions; fans twisting characters to fit their own molds of how those characters should be, then turning on each other when their molds do not match; people supposedly bound together by their mutual love for a work of art ripping each other apart. Out of– what? Loneliness? Spite? A need to be proved superior? But then again, superiority contests are pointless, not only on the internet but in real life as well.

I see writers desperate for affirmation, out to (heh) show the world that hey, they’re witty and smart (!). The thing is, does it really matter if you’re more intelligent than the average person? Will it guarantee a happy life? I’m reasonably certain my IQ is way above the average — in high school, during the yearly tests we took, my results didn’t even appear on the scale — but what does it matter, when it comes to loving and losing and winning and rising from defeat? What will it matter, ten years from now? Fifty?

I’m not saying that intelligence necessarily goes with pride or meanness of spirit. But there have been times I’ve wished I could trade my brain for a little more kindness, a softer heart. I may be smart but I’m also a bitter, sharp-tongued shrew, and I don’t find any joy in that. Putting people down by dint of your superior intellect might seem fun, but it’s a hollow amusement.

–

This reminds me of one of the reasons I decided to be selfish and write not to be read, but write for people. I wrote once,

When you write you must have something meaningful to say. Something larger than your characters. Something that doesn’t belong just to them, but to truth.

There must be purpose. There must be meaning. And it must be comprehensible outside that world.

As long as I can see that in my writing, exceptions being made for crack and PWP and fluff, I’m happy. It doesn’t matter if anyone hears what I’m saying or not. Birds will sing whether or not your ears are open.

–

from Death by caramel at Another Miyaw

I came to you one rainless August night.
You taught me how to live without the rain.
You are thirst and thirst is all I know.
You are sand, wind, sun, and burning sky,
The hottest blue. You blow a breeze and brand
Your breath into my mouth. You reach–then bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
You wrap your name tight around my ribs
And keep me warm. I was born for you.
Above, below, by you, by you surrounded.
I wake to you at dawn. Never break your
Knot. Reach, rise, blow, Sálvame, mi dios,
Trágame, mi tierra. Salva, traga, Break me,
I am bread. I will be the water for your thirst.

He remembers sunlight. Most probably he is wrong: it was August then, that first Monday morning, and the skies would have been overcast, cloudy gray. Yet his mind, thinking back, is filled with gold sunshine on white flowers and green leaves, with twitters of birdsong bubbling up amidst silence, with the stone bench warm beneath his touch, with the sudden, unexpected beauty of her face.

He must have stopped and bowed to her, but he cannot remember it. Nor can he recall much, after that overwhelming lightness.

“Who are you?” she had asked, and he, stumbling over his words, trying to breathe past the tightness in his chest, had answered. Years later he will still be wondering what he could have said.

He remembers her smile.

Even then Basilio did not believe in God. But Mary…!