All about PLAC, and a Caracoa revival

Several weeks ago, I received one of those usual e-mailed questionnaires from a student doing a paper. What was unusual with this one was that it wasn’t asking me about myself, or my writing, but about a group I have always delighted in being associated with: the Philippine Literary Arts Council or PLAC.

Of course one can’t expect questions backed up by already formidable research when the objective is simply to address an assignment from a teacher. One has to be patient and explain matters in nearly elementary fashion, even politely disabuse a certain level of naiveté born of false assumptions.

Still, the exercise was welcome, as the interest came at the right time, at least on the year of PLAC’s silver anniversary, and maybe right on time, too, for heralding a return of the poetry journal Caracoa.

Here’s the resultant Q&A on a literary organization that has certainly helped inspire, enhance and sharpen poetry in our country.

Why did the organization disband?

Who said it did? PLAC hasn’t disbanded. Last Sept. 8, we had our 25th anniversary bash at Jimmy and Mercy Abad’s place in Antipolo.

How exclusive is the Council? How does one become a member of PLAC?

It’s exclusive in the sense that official membership is by invitation only. Our original requirement was for members to be award-winning poets in English, and/or to have authored a fine collection or two of poetry. In the early ’90s, we started inviting prose writers with the same qualifications.

What are its political influences, if any?

None at all. We think independently of one another, imposing no socio-ideological or any other kind of stance on the group. We just enjoy poetry and one another’s company.

What is the hierarchy within the organization?

None, really, though the five founding members of 1981 – Gémino H. Abad, Cirilo F. Bautista, Alfrredo Navarro Salanga (bless his soul), Ricardo M. de Ungria and Alfred A. Yuson – have been regarded as the origs and Trustees. And naturally we’re the oldest.

How does PLAC get its funding?

We used to get funding from individuals and entities. Our major consistent funder in the 1980s, a few years after our founding, and lasting for several years, was British businessman Michael Adams who was also a writer. (He produced a novel during that period.) We had managed to put out the first three or four issues of Caracoa: The Poetry Journal of the Philippine Literary Council, but when Adams came into the picture, it became a regular quarterly for several years. Mr. Adams also provided administrative help. When that support faded, we would occasionally manage to raise special funding for certain issues, until our last Caracoa issue in 1998.

The poetry journal has been in hibernation since, but a younger generation of poets who are not even PLAC members have initiated an effort to revive it. The manuscript, which would be the 28th issue of Caracoa, might find a printer soon.

This young generation I speak of includes Lourd de Veyra, Joel Toledo, Angelo Suarez, Mookie Katigbak, Marie la Viña, Mikael Co, Naya Valdellon and others.

Way back in the 1980s, the next generation of PLAC members after the "Orig 5" included Felix Fojas, Juaniyo Arcellana, Eric Gamalinda, Fidelito Cortes, Cesare Syjuco, Ramon Sunico, Danton Remoto, Fatima Lim (now Wilson), Marjorie Evasco, Luisa Igloria (then Aguilar-Cariño), Ruel de Vera, plus the non-Manila-based poets Simeon Dumdum Jr. (of Cebu), Cesar Ruiz Aquino (Dumaguete), Clovis Nazareno (Bohol)...

What are the main objectives of PLAC?

No formal objectives, really. Just to help promote poetry, organize readings and reading tours (in the 1980s, we did tours among educational institutions, as well as in Baguio, Dumaguete and Cebu), and try to produce a poetry journal as regularly as we can.

How did PLAC envision itself in the realm of Philippine literature?

I don’t know. I guess we weren’t into visioning or envisioning beyond what we may do individually. PLAC was never a pormal org, with Vision-Mission statements, preambles, charters, rules or whatnot. It was all just light camaraderie, and a few tacit rules whenever we’d organize anything that involved other people.

By the way, also in the ’80s, we mounted exhibits in visual arts galleries – the "Chromatext" series, which involved artworks either based on, coupled with, or related to words/poems, or just any kind of visual art executed by poets/writers, including abstract, sculptural and conceptual.

In January 2007, we’re scheduled to mount a "Chromatext Reloaded" exhibit at the CCP’s Main Gallery. It will include works by poet-friends and artist-friends of PLAC. I guess that’s because we’ve really stopped inviting and/or claiming official members. Not that we don’t want to accept new ones. It’s just become a very loose group, one that doesn’t feel like having to deal with formalities.

Why did you add the genre of fiction to Caracoa after 1995?

It seemed a good idea then to open up the membership to outstanding fiction writers who didn’t write poetry. We wanted to enjoy their company, too, e.g. Jing Hidalgo, Butch Dalisay, Charlson Ong, Susan Lara...

Regarding the revival, who is behind it?

No one in particular. The young kids (30-40 years our junior) just broached the idea, of reviving Caracoa in particular. They sought our guidance on how to go about it (in particular, Jimmy, Ricky and me). Then we also realized earlier this year that we would be turning 25 on Sept. 8, 2006. So we sought an arrangement with fellow poet Sid Hildawa of the CCP for a Chromatext revival under his and Cesare and Jean Marie Syjuco’s curatorship.

So why are they reviving it?

If you mean the young ones, I don’t know. It seemed a good idea to them, I guess, and they felt like it. We appreciated their notion of manifesting and stretching a continuum.

Does the revival of the Caracoa journal mean that the PLAC is being revived, too?

Not in any formal way, as far as I know. We talk of publications we might do, like thematic poetry anthologies, but we’re all quite lazy to bother to seek out funding. It’ll happen when it happens.

Any future plans for the Caracoa and PLAC?

Answered above. Oh, wait. A nephew of Jimmy Abad is preparing a CD album with the Orig 5’s recording of our poems some 20 years ago, which Jimmy found his audio-cassette copy of. It might come out for Christmas daw. Maybe just as a holiday gift among ourselves. Or perhaps we’ll have a few peddled in Quiapo and Greenhills.

Thanks again, Sir. And if you think there is any more information about PLAC that might benefit our group paper, it would be much appreciated if you would send it to us as well. Thanks again. :)

Okay. I’ll see if I can also e-mail you other info, like some notes on the upcoming Caracoa. It would also be good if you guys can check out a few of the vintage or last issues for a full roster of PLAC members, including honorary fellows (usually the major voices we respected). I might not have named everybody.