The National Artists of the Philippines for Literature
FRANCISCO "FRANZ" ARCELLANA
National Artist for Literature (1990)
(September 6, 1916 – August 1, 2002)
BIOGRAPHY:
Francisco Arcellana, writer, poet, essayist, critic, journalist, and teacher, is one of the most important progenitors of the modern Filipino short story in English. He pioneered the development of the short story as a lyrical prose-poetic form. For Arcellana, the pride of fiction is “that it is able to render truth, that is able to present reality”. Arcellana kept alive the experimental tradition in fiction, and had been most daring in exploring new literary forms to express the sensibility of the Filipino people. A brilliant craftsman, his works are now an indispensable part of a tertiary-level-syllabi all over the country.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Arcellana’s published books are Selected Stories (1962), Poetry and Politics: The State of Original Writing in English in the Philippines Today (1977), The Francisco Arcellana Sampler(1990).
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1990)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Short Story
VIRGILIO " RIO ALMA" S. ALMARIO
National Artist for Literature (2003)
(March 9, 1944)
BIOGRAPHY:
Virgilio S. Almario, also known as Rio Alma, is a poet, literary historian and critic, who has revived and reinvented traditional Filipino poetic forms, even as he championed modernist poetics. In 34 years, he has published 12 books of poetry, which include the seminal Makinasyon and Peregrinasyon, and the landmark trilogy Doktrinang Anakpawis, Mga Retrato at Rekwerdo and Muli, Sa Kandungan ng Lupa. In these works, his poetic voice soared from the lyrical to the satirical to the epic, from the dramatic to the incantatory, in his often severe examination of the self, and the society.
Many Filipino writers have come under his wing in the literary workshops he founded –the Galian sa Arte at Tula (GAT) and the Linangan sa Imahen, Retorika at Anyo (LIRA). He has also long been involved with children’s literature through the Aklat Adarna series, published by his Children’s Communication Center. He has been a constant presence as well in national writing workshops and galvanizes member writers as chairman emeritus of the Unyon ng mga Manunulat sa Pilipinas (UMPIL).
FAMOUS WORKS:
Rio Alma also redefined how the Filipino poetry is viewed and paved the way for the discussion of the same in his 10 books of criticisms and anthologies, among which are Ang Makata sa Panahon ng Makina, Balagtasismo versus Modernismo, Walong Dekada ng Makabagong Tula Pilipino, Mutyang Dilim and Barlaan at Josaphat.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2003)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Poetry in Filipino (Gawad Carlos Palanca sa Tula)
3. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Essay in Filipino (Gawad Carlos Palanca sa Sanaysay)
CIRILIO F. BAUTISTA
National Artist for Literature (2014)
(July 9, 1941 – May 6, 2018)
BIOGRAPHY:
Cirilo F. Bautista is a poet, fictionist and essayist with exceptional achievements and significant contributions to the development of the country’s literary arts. He is acknowledged by peers and critics, and the nation at large as the foremost writer of his generation. Throughout his career that spanned more than four decades, he established a reputation for fine and profound artistry; his books, lectures, poetry readings and creative writing workshops continue to influence his peers and generations of young writers.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Summer Suns (1963), Words and Battlefields (1998), The Trilogy of Saint Lazarus (2001), Galaw ng Asoge (2003).
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2014)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Poetry
3. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Poetry in Filipino (Gawad Carlos Palanca sa Tula)
4. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Essay
5. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Short Story
NVM GONZALEZ
National Artist for Literature (1997)
(September 8, 1915 – November 28, 1999)
BIOGRAPHY:
Nestor Vicente Madali Gonzalez, better known as N.V.M. Gonzalez, fictionist, essayist, poet, and teacher, articulated the Filipino spirit in rural, urban landscapes. Among the many recognitions, he won the First Commonwealth Literary Contest in 1940, received the Republic Cultural Heritage Award in 1960 and the Gawad CCP Para sa Sining in 1990. The awards attest to his triumph in appropriating the English language to express, reflect and shape Philippine culture and Philippine sensibility. He became U.P.’s International-Writer-In-Residence and a member of the Board of Advisers of the U.P. Creative Writing Center. In 1987, U.P. conferred on him the Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa, its highest academic recognition.
FAMOUS WORKS:
The Winds of April, Seven Hills Away, Children of the Ash-Covered Loam and Other Stories, The Bamboo Dancers, Look Stranger, on this Island Now, Mindoro and Beyond: Twenty -One Stories, The Bread of Salt and Other Stories, Work on the Mountain, The Novel of Justice: Selected Essays 1968-1994, A Grammar of Dreams and Other Stories.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1997)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Short Story
AMADO V. HERNANDEZ
National Artist for Literature
(September 13, 1903 – May 24, 1970)
BIOGRAPHY:
Amado V. Hernandez, poet, playwright, and novelist, is among the Filipino writers who practiced “committed art.” In his view, the function of the writer is to act as the conscience of society and to affirm the greatness of the human spirit in the face of inequity and oppression. Hernandez’s contribution to the development of Tagalog prose is considerable — he stripped Tagalog of its ornate character and wrote in prose closer to the colloquial than the “official” style permitted. His novel Mga Ibong Mandaragit, first written by Hernandez while in prison, is the first Filipino socio-political novel that exposes the ills of the society as evident in the agrarian problems of the 50s.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Bayang Malaya, Isang Dipang Langit, Luha ng Buwaya, Amado V. Hernandez: Tudla at Tudling: Katipunan ng mga Nalathalang Tula 1921-1970, Langaw sa Isang Basong Gatas at Iba Pang Kuwento ni Amado V. Hernandez, Magkabilang Mukha ng Isang Bagol at Iba Pang Akda ni Amado V. Hernandez.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1973)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for One-act Play in Filipino
NICK JOAQUIN
National Artist for Literature (1976)
(May 4, 1917 – April 29, 2004)
BIOGRAPHY:
Nick Joaquin, is regarded by many as the most distinguished Filipino writer in English writing so variedly and so well about so many aspects of the Filipino. Nick Joaquin has also enriched the English language with critics coining “Joaquinesque” to describe his baroque Spanish-flavored English or his reinventions of English based on Filipinisms. Aside from his handling of language, Bienvenido Lumbera writes that Nick Joaquin’s significance in Philippine literature involves his exploration of the Philippine colonial past under Spain and his probing into the psychology of social changes as seen by the young.
Nick Joaquin has written plays, novels, poems, short stories and essays including reportage and journalism. As a journalist, Nick Joaquin uses the nom de plume Quijano de Manila but whether he is writing literature or journalism, fellow National Artist Francisco Arcellana opines that “it is always of the highest skill and quality”.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Doña Jeronima, Candido’s Apocalypse, The Order of Melchizedek, The Woman Who Had Two Navels, A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino, Manila, My Manila: A History for the Young, The Ballad of the Five Battles, Rizal in Saga, Almanac for Manileños, Cave and Shadows.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1976)
2. Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature, and Creative Communication Arts
3. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Full-length Play
4. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Short Story
F. SIONIL JOSE
NATIONAL ARTIST FOR LITERATURE (2001)
(DECEMBER 3, 1924)
BIOGRAPHY:
F. Sionil Jose’s writings since the late 60s, when taken collectively can best be described as epic. Its sheer volume puts him on the forefront of Philippine writing in English. But ultimately, it is the consistent espousal of the aspirations of the Filipino–for national sovereignty and social justice–that guarantees the value of his oeuvre. F. Sionil Jose is also a publisher, lecturer on cultural issues, and the founder of the Philippine chapter of the international organization PEN.
FAMOUS WORKS:
The Pretenders, Tree, My Brother, My Executioner, Mass, and Po-on.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2001)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Short Story
3. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Novel in English
4. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Essay
BIENVENIDO LUMBERA
NATIONAL ARTIST FOR LITERATURE (2006)
APRIL 11, (1932)
BIOGRAPHY:
Lumbera was born in Lipa on April 11, 1932. He was barely a year old when his father, Christian Lumbera (a Shooting Guard with a local basketball team), fell from a fruit tree, broke his back, and died. Carmen Lumbera, his mother, suffered from cancer and died a few years later. By the age of five he was an orphan. He and his older sister were cared for by their paternal grandmother, Eusebia Teru.
Bienvenido Lumbera, is a poet, librettist, and scholar. As a poet, he introduced to Tagalog literature what is now known as Bagay poetry, a landmark aesthetic tendency that has helped to change the vernacular poetic tradition.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Likhang Dila, Likhang Diwa (poems in Filipino and English), 1993; Balaybay, Mga Tulang Lunot at Manibalang, 2002; Sa Sariling Bayan, Apat na Dulang May Musika, 2004; “Agunyas sa Hacienda Luisita,” Pakikiramay, 2004.
Tagalog Poetry, 1570-1898: Tradition and Influences in its Development; Philippine Literature: A History and Anthology, Revaluation: Essays on Philippine Literature, Writing the Nation/Pag-akda ng Bansa.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2006)
2. S.E.A. Write Award: Philippines
EDITH L. TIEMPO
National Artist for Literature (1999)
(April 22, 1919 – August 21, 2011)
BIOGRAPHY:
A poet, fictionist, teacher and literary critic, Edith L. Tiempo is one of the finest Filipino writers in English. Her works are characterized by a remarkable fusion of style and substance, of craftsmanship and insight. Born on April 22, 1919 in Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya, her poems are intricate verbal transfigurations of significant experiences as revealed, in two of her much anthologized pieces, “The Little Marmoset” and “Bonsai”. As fictionist, Tiempo is as morally profound. Her language has been marked as “descriptive but unburdened by scrupulous detailing.” She is an influential tradition in Philippine literature in English. Together with her late husband, Edilberto K. Tiempo, she founded and directed the Silliman National Writers Workshop in Dumaguete City, which has produced some of the country’s best writers.
FAMOUS WORKS:
A Blade of Fern (1978), The Native Coast (1979), and The Alien Corn (1992); the poetry collections, The Tracks of Babylon and Other Poems (1966), and The Charmer’s Box and Other Poems(1993); and the short story collection Abide, Joshua, and Other Stories (1964).
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1999)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Poetry
3. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Short Story
LAZARO FRANCISCO
National Artist for Literature (2009)
(February 22, 1898 – June 17, 1980)
BIOGRAPHY:
Prize-winning writer Lazaro A. Francisco developed the social realist tradition in Philippine fiction. His eleven novels, now acknowledged classics of Philippine literature, embodies the author’s commitment to nationalism. Amadis Ma. Guerrero wrote, “Francisco championed the cause of the common man, specifically the oppressed peasants. His novels exposed the evils of the tenancy system, the exploitation of farmers by unscrupulous landlords, and foreign domination.” Teodoro Valencia also observed, “His pen dignifies the Filipino and accents all the positives about the Filipino way of life. His writings have contributed much to the formation of a Filipino nationalism.”
Francisco gained prominence as a writer not only for his social conscience but also for his “masterful handling of the Tagalog language” and “supple prose style”. With his literary output in Tagalog, he contributed to the enrichment of the Filipino language and literature for which he is a staunch advocate. He put up an arm to his advocacy of Tagalog as a national language by establishing the Kapatiran ng mga Alagad ng Wikang Pilipino (KAWIKA) in 1958. His reputation as the “Master of the Tagalog Novel” is backed up by numerous awards he received for his meritorious novels in particular, and for his contribution to Philippine literature and culture in general.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Ama, Bayang Nagpatiwakal, Maganda Pa Ang Daigdig and Daluyong
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2009)
CARLOS P. ROMULO
National Artist for Literature (1982)
(January 14, 1899 – December 15, 1985)
BIOGRAPHY:
Carlos P. Romulo‘s multifaceted career spanned 50 years of public service as an educator, soldier, university president, journalist, and diplomat. It is common knowledge that he was the first Asian president of the United Nations General Assembly, then Philippine Ambassador to Washington, D.C., and later minister of foreign affairs. Essentially though, Romulo was very much into writing: he was a reporter at 16, a newspaper editor by the age of 20, and a publisher at 32. He was the only Asian to win America’s coveted Pulitzer Prize in Journalism for a series of articles predicting the outbreak of World War II.
FAMOUS WORKS:
The United (novel), I Walked with Heroes (autobiography), I Saw the Fall of the Philippines, Mother America, I See the Philippines Rise (war-time memoirs), Forty Years: A Third World Soldier at the UN, and The Philippine Presidents.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1982)
2. Boy Scouts of America Silver Buffalo Award.
3. United States Presidential Medal of Freedom, (January 12, 1984.)
4. Nobel Peace Prize nomination in (1952)
JOSE GARCIA VILLA
National Artist for Literature (1973)
(August 5, 1908 – February 7, 1997)
BIOGRAPHY:
Jose Garcia Villa is considered as one of the finest contemporary poets regardless of race or language. Villa, who lived in Singalong, Manila, introduced the reversed consonance rime scheme, including the comma poems that made full use of the punctuation mark in an innovative, poetic way. The first of his poems “Have Come, Am Here” received critical recognition when it appeared in New York in 1942 that, soon enough, honors and fellowships were heaped on him: Guggenheim, Bollingen, the American Academy of Arts and Letters Awards. He used Doveglion (Dove, Eagle, Lion) as pen name, the very characters he attributed to himself, and the same ones explored by e.e. cummings in the poem he wrote for Villa (Doveglion, Adventures in Value). Villa is also known for the tartness of his tongue.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Footnote to Youth,Many Voices, Poems by Doveglion, Poems 55, Poems in Praise of Love: The Best Love Poems of Jose Garcia Villa as Chosen By Himself, Selected Stories,The Portable Villa, The Essential Villa, Mir-i-nisa, Storymasters 3: Selected Stories from Footnote to Youth, 55 Poems: Selected and Translated into Tagalog by Hilario S. Francia.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1973)
2. Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts, US & Canada
ALEJANDRO ROCES
National Artist for Literature (2003)
(July 13, 1924 – May 23, 2011)
BIOGRAPHY:
Alejandro Roces, is a short story writer and essayist and considered as the country’s best writer of comic short stories. He is known for his widely anthologized “My Brother’s Peculiar Chicken.” In his innumerable newspaper columns, he has always focused on the neglected aspects of the Filipino cultural heritage. His works have been published in various international magazines and have received national and international awards.
His unflinching love of country led him to become a guerilla during the Second World War, to defy martial law and to found the major opposition party under the dictatorship. His works have been published in various international magazines and received numerous national and international awards, including several decorations from various governments.
FAMOUS WORKS:
We Filipinos Are Mild Drinkers, My Brother's Peculiar Chicken, Of Cocks and Kites (1959), Fiesta (1980), and Something To Crow (2005).
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2003)
2. Patnubay ng Sining at Kalinangan Award
3. Diwa ng Lahi Award
4. Tanging Parangal of the Gawad CCP Para sa Sining
5. Rizal Pro Patria Award
ROLANDO S. TINIO
National Artist for Theater and Literature (1997)
(March 5, 1937 – July 7, 1997)
BIOGRAPHY:
Rolando S. Tinio, playwright, thespian, poet, teacher, critic, and translator marked his career with prolific artistic productions. Tinio’s chief distinction is as a stage director whose original insights into the scripts he handled brought forth productions notable for their visual impact and intellectual cogency.
Subsequently, after staging productions for the Ateneo Experimental Theater (its organizer and administrator as well), he took on Teatro Pilipino. It was to Teatro Pilipino which he left a considerable amount of work reviving traditional Filipino drama by re-staging old theater forms like the sarswela and opening a treasure-house of contemporary Western drama. It was the excellence and beauty of his practice that claimed for theater a place among the arts in the Philippines in the 1960s.
FAMOUS WORKS:
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (1997)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Poetry
3. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Full-length Play
4. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Poetry in Filipino (Gawad Carlos Palanca sa Tula)
5. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for One-act Play
6. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for One-act Play in Filipino
7. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Screenplay in Filipino
8. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Essay in Filipino (Gawad Carlos Palanca sa Sanaysay)
LEVI CELERIO
National Artist for Literature / Music (1997)
(April 30, 1910 – April 2, 2002)
BIOGRAPHY:
Born in Tondo, Celerio received his scholarship at the Academy of Music in Manila that made it possible for him to join the Manila Symphony Orchestra, becoming its youngest member. He made it to the Guinness Book of World Records as the only person able to make music using just a leaf.
Levi Celerio is a prolific lyricist and composer for decades. He effortlessly translated/wrote anew the lyrics to traditional melodies: “O Maliwanag Na Buwan” (Iloko), “Ako ay May Singsing” (Pampango), “Alibangbang” (Visaya) among others.
A great number of his songs have been written for the local movies, which earned for him the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Film Academy of the Philippines. Levi Celerio, more importantly, has enriched the Philippine music for no less than two generations with a treasury of more than 4,000 songs in an idiom that has proven to appeal to all social classes.
FAMOUS WORKS:
“O Maliwanag Na Buwan” (Iloko), “Ako ay May Singsing” (Pampango), “Alibangbang” (Visaya) among others.
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature & Music (1997)
2. Lifetime Achievement Award from the Film Academy of the Philippines
3. Awit Award for Best Christmas Recording
4. Awit Award for Best Traditional Recording
RESIL B. MOJARES
National Artist for Literature (2018)
September 4, 1943
BIOGARAPHY:
A teacher and scholar, essayist and fictionist, and cultural and literary historian, Resil Mojares is acknowledged as a leading figure in the promotion of regional literature and history. As founding director of the Cebuano Studies Center—an important research institution which placed Cebu in the research and documentation map—he pioneered Cebuano and national identity formation. As a leading figure in cultural and literary history, he networked actively in many organizations. For over 50 years, Mojares has published in diverse forms (fiction, essay, journalism, scholarly articles, and books) across a wide range of discipline (literature, history, biography, cultural studies, and others). To date, he has 17 published books (3 more in the press) and edited, co-edited, or co-authored 11 books, and written numerous articles for popular and scholarly publications.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Origins and Rise of the Filipino Novel: A Generic Study of the Novel Until 1940 (Quezon City, UP Press, 1983; second ed. 1998), The Man Who Would Be President: Serging Osmeña and Philippine Politics (Cebu: Maria Cacao, 1986), Waiting for Mariang Makiling: Essays on Philippine Cultural History (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2002), Theater in Society, Society in Theater: Social History of a Cebuano Village, 1840-1940 (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1985), and The War Against the Americans: Resistance and Collaboration in Cebu, 1899-1906 (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1999)
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2018)
2. Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Short Story
RAMON L. MUZONES
National Artist for Literature (2018)
(20 March 1913- 17 August 1992)
BIOGRAPHY:
Ramon Muzones was a Hiligaynon poet, essayist, short story writer, critic, grammarian, editor, lexicographer, and novelist who authored an unprecedented 61 completed novels. A number of these represent groundbreaking “firsts’ in Hiligaynon literature such as the feminist Ang Bag-ong Maria Clara, the roman a clef Maambong Nga Sapat (Magnificent Brute,1940), the comic Si Tamblot (1946), the politically satirical Si Tamblot Kandidato Man (Tamblot is Also a Candidate, 1949), the 125- installment longest serialized novel Dama de Noche (1982-84), etc. Hailed by his peers as the longest reigning (1938-1972) among “the three kings of the Hiligaynon novel,” Muzones brought about its most radical changes while ushering in modernism.
FAMOUS WORKS:
Shri-Bishaya (1969), Malala nga Gutom (Malignant Hunger,1965), Babae Batuk sa Kalibutan (Woman Against the World,1959), Ang Gugma sang Gugma Bayaran (Love with Love Be Paid, 1955), Si Tamblot (1948), and Margosatubig (1946)
AWARDS:
1. National Artist for Literature (2018)
SOURCES:
https://ncca.gov.ph/about-culture-and-arts/culture-profile/national-artists-of-the-philippines/
http://salinasmerife.blogspot.com/2015/11/8-life-and-works-of-alejandro-r-roces.html
for awards its just google.com. For example Levi Celerio awards.
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