DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 25 February) – The two-volume book on a century of Mindanao literature — from 1890 to 1990 — will be launched at the Ateneo de Davao University on Monday, February 27.
Edited by the multi-awarded writer Ricardo M. de Ungria, the landmark publication, “Kalandrakas: Stories and Storytellers of/on Regions in Mindanao, 1890 – 1990. A Preliminary and Continuing Survey and Literary Mapping” – is “the most comprehensive anthology of Mindanao literature to date, covering poetry, fiction, drama, and essays. Works in eleven languages are represented here, most of which are translated into English.”
The two volume book consists of 2,048 pages. Volume 1 (883 pages) focuses on the period 1890 to 1945 while Volume 2 (1,165 pages) focuses on the years 1946 to 1990. The launch of the two-volume book published by the Ateneo de Manila University Press is being organized by the Department of Languages, Literature and Arts and the University Libraries of the Ateneo de Davao University.
The book includes the writings of 249 writers, de Ungria’s Introduction, biographical notes of the writers, appendices (which regions the writers are from, directory of Mindanao writers and proposed framework for archival project and developing literature in the Regions), photographs and bibliography.
Venue of the Davao launch is the Bapa Benny Tudtud auditorium at the ADDU near the Jacinto gate. Another book launch will be held at the XU Little Theater of the Xavier University in Cagayan de Oro City on March 23.
Editor De Ungria is a poet, educator, winner of 13 National Book Awards for his poetry and anthologies, who settled in Davao City in 1999 when he joined UP Mindanao as its first Dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, the same year he organized the Davao Writers Guild. De Ungria served as Chancellor of UP Mindanao for two terms, from 2001 to 2007. UP Mindanao is in Davao City.
Kalandrakas is “multigeneric, multilingual, and multisubcultural”—like the great island it writes about. While it is mainly literary, it also embraces texts that are historical, sociological, cosmological, spiritual, and anthropological.
The introduction provides “a historical background to the development of literature and writers on the island. The whole anthology is an ongoing recuperative archival project intended to be picked up, continued, corrected, and enriched by writers, researchers, and educators in the island’s six regions for the initialization and sustenance of their own archives, literary and historical awareness, and development of distinctive artistic practices independent of Western influences.” The book includes a literary map that “locates the storytellers in the identified places in the regions where they were born, lived, or worked, or else passed through.”
The book spans a hundred years, from 1890 to 1990. The year 1990 was chosen because that was the year the existence of a “Mindanao literature” was officially recognized through the ANI issue on Mindanao.
From there, the book’s editor worked back a century to cover a hundred years of writings in the island. Volume 1 features the island’s colonial literature while Volume 2 tackles the post-colonial and the modern.
According to the book, the term ‘stories’ includes all genres of literature – including oral literature translated into English – published within the timeframe of the book, with a few exceptions. “The whole anthology is an ongoing recuperative archival project intended to be picked up, continued, corrected, and enriched by writers, researchers, and educators in the island’s six regions for the initialization and sustenance of their own archives literary and historical awareness, and development of distinctive artistic practices independent of Western influences,” it said.
“Thus, the book includes a literary map that, based on available information, locates the storyteller’s herewith in the identified places in the regions where they were born, lived or worked or else passed through. It assumes that there are individuals and/or groups in the regions who care for their history, literature and the arts, as well as for the people involved in these endeavors, and who are willing to write and articulate their own local histories and respective arts and literatures and ways of reading and appreciating them in their own languages, hopefully, and gradually begin to wear their pride of place as badge of honor.”
Only a limited number of guests will be accommodated at the February 27 launch here as the event abides by the Campus Health and Safety Protocols.
The two volumes can be bought per piece or as a pair. They will be available at the Ateneo de Davao bookstore, Ateneo Xavier University bookstore, and Ateneo de Zamboanga library.
De Ungria has urged writers featured in the book to attend the book launches in Mindanao nearest their areas “so you can join the other writers in signing copies of the book where your contributions appear.”
“There are just a few of you senior writers still active in the postwar era, and it would be good to get to meet the others too, as well as the relatives of those who have passed away already. I am sure the other guests who will be there are also eager to meet you,” de Ungria said.
In the book’s Introduction, de Ungria wrote: “We need to know more of our own writers and thinkers and engage with their own writings and thoughts instead of favoring those of other countries with different cultures and modes of thinking from us. This is the only way we can sustain a tradition or traditions of our own and help communities develop attention, respect, and esteem for the writers and artists in their midst without needing contests or prizes to do so. I hope for Mindanawon writers to find some shards of insights from the works of the past that can stimulate and sustain, on artisan artistic practice and scholarship for the nonce, a body of writings true and responsive of the needs of their respective communities and should no longer left behind in ignorance of and indifferent to the arts. They should learn how to modernize without or with less Westernizing, developing ways of appreciating the arts based on their own values and needs, disposing of the plasticity of hierarchies and the canons of meritocracy and keeping the literary and artistic landscapes flattened, respecting the variety of cultures in their midst, and simply accommodating and enjoying one another’s creative company with the support of a responsive community and in full awareness that in this land of diversity, there is a voice for everyone and a place for works of all kinds.”
Karl Gaspar, Mindanao’s most prolific writer, described the two-volume book as a “rare treasure” and “monumental work.”
In his review of the two-volume book, he wrote: “Once in a rare while, a book appears on the horizon so unbelievably magical that it takes one’s breath away! It is as if a rare treasure drops down from the heavens handed down by the gods and goddesses who wish that the lesser mortals could open their eyes and realize how precious this gift is.”
“The gift that needs to be acknowledged and appreciated – especially for those of us who would claim to be Mindanawons (born and raised in Mindanao or have adopted Mindanao as their home) – is the rich legacy of writings of poets, essayists, playwrights and novelists written throughout a century from 1890 to 1990. The literary tradition of those writing on Mindanao – initially the early colonizers and migrants who inhabited Mindanao and later Mindanawons themselves – can now be easily accessed through the two volumes of KALANDRAKAS,” Gaspar wrote.
On the book’s title, Gaspar said: “For those who do not understand Cebuano-Bisaya, kalandrakasmeans the following: miscellaneous, motley, varied, medley or constituted by things of all different kinds and varieties coming at once, or a conglomeration of various things or kinds. It is the perfect Mindanawon word to serve as title of this monumental work.” (MindaNews)
