Dual Transactions: Fragments Towards a “Philippine” Cartography
in the Poetic Archipelago of Ma. Luisa A. Igloria
by Francis Xavier R. Salcedo
(the following write up is the introductory part of the dissertation I am currently working on)
Literary works like novels and poems often yield insights into political events in ways that traditional historical accounts cannot. History tells us of war, rebellion and the process of state formation, but it is not concerned with describing the complex human emotions that lie behind such events. Literary works, on the other hand, are able to bring its readers into the hidden narratives of the characters involved or untold stories behind histories despite being “fictional” in nature. We may think we know everything there is to know about an event but literary works have a way of reminding us of the mystery that remains.
Considering such, it can be said that the poems of Luisa A. Igloria are as much “flags” of national identity as are the more obvious symbols of national belonging: coins, costumes, anthems, ceremonies and historical accounts. This is because her poems “map out” or provide a system of reference within which aspects of the “Philippine” nation are used, consumed and experienced. It is worth considering how her poems operate so that a better understanding can be gained into how a sense of national belonging and identity is communicated and maintained through them.
Her poems like “They Say Filipina is Another Name for Maid,” “Fil American Barbie,” “American Beauty Roses” (about a Filipino couple who migrated to the US and grew old there), “Prayer to the Third World Madonna” (about Our Lady of Edsa), “Christopher Reeve’s Filipino Nurse,” “Simoom” (about Pinay domestic workers in the Middle East and elsewhere) “Mrs. Wilkin Teaches an Igorot the Cakewalk,” “On the Difficulty of Vigilance” (about an activist friend and batchmate of Luisa who was abducted by persons of still unconfirmed identity), Filmfest (about the 1994 Metro-Manila Filmfest scam), “Pregnant Stone Virgin” (about a reported statue of the Virgin Mary in Manila who was miraculously pregnant), “The Legend Of Yamashita's Treasure,” “Archipelago,” “To the Angel of History” (about EDSA revolution), “Juan Luna’s Revolver,” “Tamasak of Barotac,” “Auit/Song,” “Ampatuan Ghazal” (about the Ampatuan massacre) and “Regarding History” give readers an overview of her imagined version of things that are Philippine-related.
In an interview conducted by Literary Blog in 2006, Igloria opines:
“Poets frequently ‘see’ and ‘interpret’ – that is, find ways to move from a physically sensuous validation of the world (“seeing” is part of that) to finding in language the means, the shape, the form in which to express it. ‘Seeing’ has never equated to a “neutral” activity to me. Even when I’m people-watching, I quickly realize I’m making up stories, wondering about the hidden narratives: who’s that old couple in the parking lot? where are they going, what are they thinking, who will they meet? what did they have for breakfast?”
When asked about her views on the way imagination exerts an influence on what is given, Igloria adds:
“That’s one of the things that still continually amazes and humbles me – that on the one hand historical reports might say of events in the past, “these things are over, they’re done” - but that on the other hand, poetry can say, let’s look at it again; and what if? So yes there is critical reading, but there is also a sense that meaning can be remade or that a closed door is not necessarily what we think it is. We might think we know everything there is to know about something. But poetry always reminds us of the mystery that remains.”
Ma. Luisa Aguilar Igloria (born 1961) is a Filipina-American poet, fictionist, essayist who speaks several different languages, both artistically and literally. She has also lived in two countries, had two marriages and two mothers. She higlights that this unforeseen multiplicity shaped her poetry in an interview with her by Lantern Review in 2009:
“The duality, the multiplicity, definitely affects my poetry. If you're a writer, you do get pulled toward that, attracted toward that idea of duality, because it is what attracts you to language. The idea of language as not just attentive to the surface matter of experience, but to the other things that might lie underneath, is why we write.”
Igloria received her undergraduate degree from the University of the Philippines, Baguio in 1980 (B.A. Humanities - Cum Laude - major in Comparative Literature, minor in English, cognate in Philosophy), and the M.A. in Literature at Ateneo de Manila University at Manila, Philippines in 1988 as a Robert Southwell Fellow. She received a Ph.D. in English/Creative Writing at the University of Illinois at Chicago in July 1995, where she was a Fulbright Fellow.
While in Chicago, Igloria was an active member of PINTIG, a Filipino-American cultural and theatre group. She was a member of PINTIG's cultural and education committee and co-wrote some scenes for Chris Millado's stage play, Scenes from an Unfinished Country: 1905-1995. She was a Visiting Humanities Scholar in 1996 at the Center for Philippine Studies at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. She also taught briefly at De La Salle University where she became the Graduate Programs Coordinator and Senior Associate for Poetry at the Bienvenido N. Santos Creative Writing Center at De La Salle University.
Before migrating to the United States, Igloria is highly decorated for her expanse of work in the Philippines. Luisa is an eleven-time (five First Prizes, plus six lesser prizes) recipient of the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature in three genres (poetry, nonfiction, and short fiction); the Palanca award is the Philippines' highest literary distinction. In 1996 she became the first Filipina woman of letters installed in the Palanca Literary Hall of Fame.
Among her recent literary awards is the 2009 Ernest Sandeen Poetry Prize for Juan Luna’s Revolver where Igloria traces journeys made by Filipinos in the global diaspora that began since the encounter with European and American colonial power. Her poems in this book allude to historical figures such as the Filipino painter Juan Luna and the novelist and national hero José Rizal, as well as the eleven hundred indigenous Filipinos brought to serve as live exhibits in the 1904 Missouri World’s Fair. “The image of the revolver fired by Juan Luna reverberates throughout the collection, raising to high relief how separation and exile have shaped concepts of identity, nationality, and possibility.” (book cover entry by the University of Notre Dame Press)