On the passing of a mentor

MANILA, Philippines - I received some sad news this week. At the age of 66, my favorite professor from university, Salvador Bernal, passed away suddenly on October 26th. He was a National Artist for Theater in the Philippines, a brilliant production designer, a talented poet and a beloved member of the arts community, but I knew him as the best English professor I’ve ever had and, by the end of our year together, a mentor and friend.

He taught me literature and writing for two semesters in my freshman year. We were a block of less than 30 students who had the privilege of being in his classes for ten months. I remember the first writing assignment he gave us  write about anything  and the way he figuratively shredded our essays in front of the class, telling us we had a lot to learn. I didn’t know yet that his frank, almost rude style of criticism was actually a very thin veil for a passionate love of literature and a warm affection for his students that would emerge periodically throughout the year.

He would call all of us by our last names, but with a level of respect usually reserved for peers. I was “Ms. Romualdez” to him. By December, he was calling me “Melissa.” He gave all of us a copy of his book of poems, The Firetrees Burn All Summer, as a Christmas gift and signed each one with a personal note; I still asked him to write “To Ms. Romualdez,” because that’s the way I wanted to remember him.

Under his guidance, I developed a love for poetry that I never expected after all my years of devouring only prose. He made me think critically about literature and, by forcing me to be more than a passive reader, nurtured my love of stories even further. For the last paper I ever did in Professor Bernal’s class, I wrote about the Beats, Allen Ginsberg and his triad of poems mourning the death of his mother: Kaddish, White Shroud and Black Shroud. I met with Professor Bernal to discuss the paper later on; it was the first time he gave me direct, unabashed praise of my work. When I think about those poems now, I’ll always remember how my professor encouraged me in my writing.

I loved his teaching so much that in my senior year, I used one of my electives to take his Film and Design class. I had very little interest in production design, but with Salvador Bernal as my professor, I developed an honest love for the art through the films he shared with us. When he suffered an accident midway through the semester, I was only too happy to become his assistant, screening the films and collecting papers for him until he was well enough to take on the work alone. He would wake me up at 7 in the morning with his calls, but even that was a privilege.

We lost touch after I graduated, but I still thought of him from time to time. It was just last Friday that I was talking to a friend from the same English block and we were wondering how Professor Bernal was doing. The news of his passing shocked me and made me remember how much I learned from him in the short time I had him as a teacher. Of all the gifts Salvador Bernal gave me, what I treasure most is how he made me a better writer. I may never achieve the level of writing he always pushed me towards, but I know that without his tutelage, I would never have continued writing so much. He did exactly what the most inspirational teachers are supposed to do: help their students grow. I would have liked to be able to thank him one last time for that. There isn’t a lot I’m able to do to adequately express the impact this man had on my life, but I can write about him in a way that is sincere and heartfelt, just the way he taught me.