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Archive for the 'Creative Nonfiction' Category
Creative Nonfiction by Dominique Gerald Cimafranca | August 29th, 2010
In what must have been a first for any writers workshop in the country, last summer’s Ateneo de Davao Writers Workshop featured stories from the genre of fanfic. As the screener for the applications, I take responsibility for the ensuing misadventures; but I confess I also found much amusement in the resulting collision of cultures between the panel and the fellows.
Fanfic, if you’re not aware of the term, is short for fan fiction. Its writers take characters from juvenile books, TV series, video games, and anime, and cobble together new stories around them. Because of this lack of originality, the genre doesn’t get much respect. But because of the popularity of the source material, many young people gravitate to the genre, either as readers or writers.
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Creative Nonfiction by Jeepy Compio | August 22nd, 2010
Ang kahalagahan ng panitikan ay animo’y walang katapusang daloy ng tubig sa batisan sa bawat panig ng mundo lalo na dito sa ating bansa. Ito ay mamamatay lamang kung ang mga nakalimbag na titik ay mawawala sa daigdig at kung ang mga manunulat ay wala nang kakayahang magpahayag ng kanyang damdamin at isipan.
Maaaring mawala ang mga imbensyon, ang mga kaunlarang materyales dito sa ibabaw ng mundo gayundin ang diwa ng nasyonalismo, ngunit hindi mawawala’t mawawasak ang tunay na diwa at kaluwalhatian ng panitikan.
Sa unang mga pahina ng kasaysayan ng daigdig ay hindi kailanman nakilala ang Latin na siyang wika ng Italya. Ngunit nang isulat ni Dante Alighieri ang Divina Commedia ay nakilala ang Latin sa daigdig at nagbigay karangalan sa Italya. Latin ang unang wika ng Inglaterra, ngunit napalitan ito sa Ingles nang isulat ang Canterbury Tales ni Goeffrey Chaucer at nabasa ito ng daigdig. Ang bansang Gresya ay naging tanyag dahil sa mga kilalang pilosopo, artista, at sa kanyang lliad at Odyssey ni Homer, The Republic ni Plato, ang tanyag na pabula ni Aesopo, at marami pang iba na sadyang nagbigay-buhay sa larangan ng sining.
Sa ating bansa, si Gat. Jose P. Rizal ay sumulat din at gumamit ng sandata hindi tabak kundi isang panulat upang gisingin ang mga Pilipino sa pagkaalipin sa ilalim ng mga Kastila. Nagising ang mga Pilipino sa kanyang mga nobela tulad ng Noli Me Tangere at El Filibusterismo) na naging buhay at nanatiling lakas ng sambayanang Pilipino.
Bago pa man dumating ang mga kastila, ang panitikang Pilipino ay buhay na at ito’y nasa iba’t ibang anyo tulad ng alamat, kwentong bayan, sanaysay, salawikain, sawikain, bugtong, awit, palaisipan, kasabihan at mga tula. Nang tayo’y napasailalim sa mga Kastila, nagkaroon nang pagbabago at nag-iba ng anyo; ang mga paksa ay naging makarelihiyon, kaya naging fanatiko o (fanatic) ang mga tao. Ang dating makarelihiyong panitikan ay naging makabayan at mapaghimagsik dahil nagising na tayo sa makabayang damdamin nating mga Pilipino na siyang nagbukas sa isipan hanggang naunawaan na nila ang kalagayan ng ating bayan sa ilalim ng mga dayuhan.
Ito ay naging tulay sa puso ng ating mga manunulat, at maging buhay ay ibinuwis hanggang napukaw at naging hagdan ang panitikan tungo sa tagumpay at mga natamong adhikain. Kaya ang Pilipinong Panitikan ay di mawawasak at mamamatay kailanman.
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Si Jeepy P. Compio ay kasalukuyang mag-aaral sa Unibersidad ng Mindanaw sa korsong Batselyer sa Pag-aaral ng Pangsekundarya sa wikang Filipino.
Creative Nonfiction by Leah Judith Jacobe | August 8th, 2010
I went home today taking the long route. Traffic was bad and the trip had a lot of stops and turns along the way. I looked at people’s weary faces in the jeepney as they stared blankly at the traffic jam or in space.
I watched them and thought what could they be thinking at this hour of day. Perhaps they thought of the day’s events, summarizing it. Some of them,who were clad in corporate attire could possibly be thinking of end day’s rest at home, or the sumptuous meal waiting for them, or the company of family. Others seemed to be drowned in their thoughts not caring about what was happening at the moment.
Indeed, riding in a jeepney or bus would provoke reflection of what has been, what is, or what is to come. The idle time spent in travel gives us the chance to ponder the many aspects of our lives.
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Creative Nonfiction by Arian Rey Tejano | July 25th, 2010
I used to live in Tabon-Tabon, a remote barrio in Tandag — a place where people wake up early to the crowing of roosters and the coming of dawn. People here wash clay pots at a nearby well, chop logs for fire behind their homes, and carry shovels, rusted sickles, and enough food and water to last the whole day in the farm. Early each morning, men and some women walk in a ceremonial procession — a troop of farmers in layers of thick coats, torn jeans, boots, and mud-dried palm hats. Men drill ostentatiously on the narrow paths along irrigations to separate their own portion of rice land.
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Creative Nonfiction by Fritz Gerald M. Melodi | July 18th, 2010
I think I was the last person she saw before she went into coma. Her vitals dropped earlier that morning and so we gathered by her bedside at two in the morning. A few of her friends were there, family members, me and my sister, while she took deep heaves for elusive oxygen. Our pastor friend was there and by the looks of it, I could guess, he suffered a momentary distress as to what to pray for. What could we pray for? Plaster all the punctures in the heart? Revive the collapsed left lung? Scrape off all the cancer from the liver? In one miraculous swoop? I’m sure God could do all that, but I’m quite content that God was just there in the love of the people she spent her life with.
So the pastor, finally asked us: “What do you want to pray for?” Nobody answered. It was as if it was all too much to ask. But someone had to answer. “If she’s going, I pray she does so painlessly,” I replied. Almost everyone bowed their heads. Was that too rash? Heartless? Too fast?
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Creative Nonfiction by Arvin Antonio Ortiz | July 11th, 2010
Almost two decades ago, writer Doreen Fernandez, a noted critic herself, pleaded that this country should have more critics. They do an important work in telling the readers which stories are good and which are not, which plays are worth watching and which are not, which books are worth buying and which are not.
Yet to us Filipinos whose sensibilities are not like the Americans’ it is hard to have critics around. We cannot withstand criticism nor have our work—the mere completion of which took us a long time to achieve—subjected to it. We take criticism, however constructive it may be, personally. We mistake criticism as an assault on our very being.
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Creative Nonfiction by Rowena Rose Lee | June 20th, 2010
I’ve always said it: I just want to write. Some of my classmates in Creative Writing were born to become professors passing on their knowledge to the next generation of students, others were born to edit, to analyze other writers’ works, and to put together papers that become chapters of textbooks. I firmly believe that my niche in this world belongs to writing. And so I became a web content writer.
But the life of a web content writer is not as glamorous as it sounds. I can assure you, the pay is just as bad. On the other hand, I encounter situations my former classmates do not.
In my quest for a better paying job and in the misguided belief that I needed to step up my game, I accepted online editing work for a company based in the United Arab Emirates.
My new employer was the head of human resources of a drilling company. As to what the company was drilling, I could only venture guesses: oil? water? sewage? Sensitive documents never came my way, but what editing work that did kept me busy for days on end.
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Creative Nonfiction by Arvin Antonio Ortiz | June 13th, 2010
Nervous, I inserted my ballot into the PCOS (Precinct Count Optical Scanner) machine. I was nervous because the PCOS might reject my ballot like it did to the woman’s before me. She had to insert it six times before her ballot was counted. Less than a minute passed, and the words, “Congratulations! Your vote has been counted” appeared. I sighed. I was done.
What the COMELEC (Commission on Elections) said was really true. With the automated elections, the counting of the ballots would no longer take a long time, unlike the manual elections. But it’s too early to celebrate. Lest we forget, the searching of polling precincts, the lining up—all that, too, is part of the elections. And there are so many things that can be said of them. So many, in fact, that I don’t know where to begin.
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Creative Nonfiction by Iryne Kaamino | May 23rd, 2010
I decided to stop writing almost a year ago for certain personal reasons. But becoming a part of the workshop made me reevaluate things. The moment I stumbled on the announcement of DAGMAY (online page of the Davao Writers Guild) calling out for aspiring writers to submit pieces for the Davao Writer’s Workshop 2010, I got a jolt I couldn’t ignore. I felt I should give it a shot. What the hell, if they ignore me then it’s not for me; but if I get accepted—well, I’ll have to see where it goes.
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Creative Nonfiction by Marvin Doods de Castro | May 16th, 2010
While my friends fret with their laptops to do their assignments, I calmly write down ideas from my mind. Somehow, even with the proliferation of computing machines, I still find myself sticking it out with pen and paper. There is courage and strength when I hold a pen in my hand and set out to conquer the clean, empty space of the paper. Not that I disdain the computer. In fact, my games of Plants vs. Zombies show my fondness for it. the computer helps me with a lot of things, like the submission of reports and assignments. However, I enjoy contributing to the bin by writing my thoughts first before typing them.
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