To the young writer

Some 300 fledgling journalists were convened the other week by the Varsitarian, the University of Santo Tomas student paper, for a three-day session on ethics, journalism practice, and the future of mass media. The Varsitarian’s literary editor, Sarah MJ Ramos, asked me to open the conference, perhaps in deference to the fact that when I was in Santo Tomas in the late ‘40s, as the Varsitarian editor in chief.

I find it always pleasurable talking with young people, particularly those aspiring to be writers, out of nostalgia, and because I’ve always felt that we oldies can learn so much from them and draw from them inspiration in our flagging and rickety years. Somehow, I also hope that they will learn from our hindsight — which is the lowest form of wisdom — how to avoid the mistakes, the crippling misjudgments that we made.

I repeated what I have said so many times before to young writers: that first, they must master and respect the word, learn the rules before they break them.

Integrity — this is very precious virtue that will make or sunder them. You can’t have integrity for breakfast, but try and keep it because it is perhaps the single most important word that defines not just writers but all human beings.

I told them to be alive — not just in their prose, but in themselves as persons. They must struggle to survive, to be the honest witnesses of their time.

I tossed around the old, raggedy verities, including my very own “We who hold the torch of freedom, should not burn our house down.” In a time demeaned by gross commercialism, by media motivated by profit, and blighted by corruption, such declarations are now quaintly ironic, even irrelevant. But they must be made, shouted from the rooftops, even just as rituals. The young are not blind; they know ancients like myself are always hallucinating about the past. Will they, someday, do the same and with regret?

Be observant and activist if they can, particularly now as we sink deeper and deeper into this swamp of corruption and poverty. What can they — all of us — do to drain this bog of its slime?

A fundamental question for any Filipino who truly cares.

For an old pen pusher, the succeeding question and answer period was routine but some of the questions needed emphatic replies.

• What kind of lifestyle should a writer have?

You should live in a manner that should enable you to devote time to writing, and contemplation. As is often said, the writer is at work even when he is simply looking out the window. You should be perennially inquisitive and open to ideas and experiences that you can use later on in writing. You should at least get roaring drunk once, and from it, get a dreadful hangover. Try shabu — I have tried opium, LSD, marijuana, but in going after these experiences, be strong enough not to be harmed by them. Sure, imagination always helps — but there is nothing like experiencing life, whether raw or sweet. Such experiences reinforce the skill that allows you to infuse your prose with all the human senses.

• Is it in silence that one writes better?

Yes. Contemplation, cerebration — they help a lot.

Writing is a solitary profession; you are really alone when you write. Then the emotions become well shaped and distinct. But their transition into words must be done deliberately and with rigid artistry. When writing about sadness — don’t let your prose drip with tears. Write in such a way that it is the reader, upon reading you, who will be teary instead.

• How do you get rid of distraction?

A very common problem solved by writers, each according to his means. Way back when my children were growing and we lived in a small apartment, I could concentrate on what I was writing with all the domestic noise around. Sometimes, I wrote in the office when everyone had left. Later on, I got away from Manila to write abroad — usually on fellowships. It is better this way. Then I could think more lucidly and write with a continuity that removed all the seams.

• And writers’ block?

Another common problem may be caused by stress, boredom or indigestion. My cure? I go to the refrigerator.

• Are there limitations in literature?

Absolutely none, the way there is no limit to the imagination. There are no rules as such. But the writer must know grammar, the language he uses, resonance, the narrative technique. He can throw all these out the window to create new, exciting forms, to validate his style. Incidentally, writers should not worry about so-called style. They should write the way they want to; eventually the style develops from their own personalities.

• Is there ethics in writing?

Yes. Borrow, steal, imitate, but do not plagiarize. Is literature moral? Literature in its pristine self is not moral but its effects on the mind and heart are almost always moral. The first writers were not just historians. Above all, they were moral teachers. The great books, like the Bible, are essentially moral in nature. Literature is the noblest of the arts although writers themselves are not often noble. Some are cheats, corrupt, self indulgent, wife beaters. There are writers I like reading but I don’t want to meet them.

• Do you read other writers?

Every other writer is a rival but the writer’s greatest rival is his own self. I read a lot of our writers from way back as literary editor. Many of them are very good, better than some of the native English speakers abroad. But they are not all that appreciated in our country. Too, Filipinos do not read.

• You write in English. Why not in the national language?

I have been asked this question before. Is it hypocritical for me to do so? First, I am not Tagalog. I am Ilokano and as I often tell chauvinist Tagalistas, Ilokano is far superior to Tagalog because Ilokano has an epic while Tagalog does not. A major characteristic of a language is its literature, beginning with an epic.

I repeat, write in the language you know best, which you are comfortable with. For me, that is English. The reason is in our history, which we cannot change. We must remember, and use it because history unites us — not language, because in a country with eight major languages and 80 minor ones, language tends to divide. Which is why, when English was introduced by the Americans, it was accepted quickly — it made all of us equal.

South America’s indigenous languages still exist, but Latinos use Spanish, the Brazilians Portuguese. The former colonials of the French use French, ditto with the former British colonials — they use English. Besides, English has become the lingua franca of the world.

I regard my mother tongue with great affection and I try to reflect it in my writing. For this reason, I often journey to the north to listen to a language buried in my heart and mind, and am alive again when I speak it with Ilokanos. I have not abandoned it, although I have forgotten so many Ilokano words.

• What is you greatest inspiration?

Forget inspiration. Writing is basically hard work and iron commitment to the craft. The reward in terms of money is niggardly — there are no rich writers in this country. You can see that I am still writing at this enfeebled age. It is passion — much of it anger and sadness — which urges me on. Memory, too. We were very poor — yes, I am now comfortable but I see so many Filipinos now much poorer, hungrier than when I was a boy. When I was young, the poorest ate only twice a day during what we Ilokanos call the Gawat — the planting season from June to August. The first rice harvest was in September. Now, the poorest Filipino eats only once a day the whole year — at high noon. We were Southeast Asia’s richest, most progressive country in the ‘40s, the ‘50s, the ‘60s. Who brought on this manmade disaster? Our irresponsible and corrupt leaders. But it is also our own fault. How I loathe the shallowness, the docility and acquiescence of our own people, ignorant of their colonization by our own elites. Verily, as a people, so the leaders.

I ended my presentation by telling them about my generation, which failed to unite and change this fractured nation. My generation produced so many of the scoundrels who dirty the political landscape today. Some of these mephitic hacks and politicians were colleagues, traumatized by World War II. The three years of brutal Japanese occupation also matured us in our teenage years, forced us to experience flight, hunger, fear.

I recalled how, after the trauma of that war, as youths in our universities, we had bonded and talked about the effulgent future that we would try and build.

So after school we toiled over the next four decades; some of us rose to power and looted incredible wealth from the public coffers. But some were left behind, stuck in humdrum professions without the panoply of privilege that corruption brought.

I told those young, dreamy-eyed aspiring writers how I wish I could live another 40 years so I could meet with them again. I am sure many of them will stray, just as a few of them will also persevere. I will remind them then: I told you so.

I told them if they were looking for writers they can look up to and even emulate, there are a few living and dead.

I gave them just one name who all of them knew, Jose Rizal.