Some Notes on the (Post) Modern Philippine Historical Novel in English

Authors

Cristina Pantoja Hidalgo, University of Santo TomasFollow

Abstract

Compared to the Philippine short story in English, the Philippine novel in English was slow to develop. Some critics attributed this to the pressure to write only “big novels,” i.e., historical novels, following in the footsteps of Jose Rizal. Bienvenido Lumbera opined that Filipino writers in English could not produce this kind of narrative because of their alienation from that part of the national experience that antedated the literary use of English. The exceptions to this were F. Sionil Jose and Linda Ty-Casper, who, in the 1960s, were already producing multiple historical novels in the realist style. By the 1980s and the 1990s, however, there emerged a clear bias, on the part of novelists, for historical novels. Not for traditional, realist novels but for “historiographic metafiction.” Among the noteworthy examples were Ninotchka Rosca’s State of War, Linda Ty Casper’s Awaiting Trespass, Gina Apostol’s Insurrecto and Cristina Pantoja Hidalgo’s Recuerdo.

Recommended Citation

Hidalgo, Cristina Pantoja (2025) "Some Notes on the (Post) Modern Philippine Historical Novel in English," Perspectives in the Arts and Humanities Asia: Vol. 5: No. 2, Article 29.
Available at: https://archium.ateneo.edu/paha/vol5/iss2/29