canonical authors and

works of Philippine
National Artists in
Literature
What is this word?

RUTSOAH

AUTHORS
What is this word?

NCNOA

CANON
WHAT IS THIS WORD?

CBONROUTTI IN

CONTRIBUTION
 CONTRIBUTION OF
CANONICAL AUTHORS
THINGS TO REMEMBER:

The term “literary canon” refers to a body of books,

narratives and other texts considered to be the most
important and influential of a particular time period
or place. 
 CANONICAL AUTHORS

Writers whose works have been

well appreciated and considered
representatives of certain genre
of literature
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 other works include : Mga Ibong
Mandaragit, Bayang Malaya, Isang Dipang
Langit, Luha ng Buwaya, Tudla at Tudling: Katipunan
ng mga Nalathalang Tula 1921-1970, Langaw sa
Isang Basong Gatas at Iba pa.
Jose Garcia Villa was a
Filipino poet, writer, and
critic. He used the pen name
“Doveglion,” which was a
combination of the words
“dove,” “eagle,” and “lion”

he believed was his true

persona. His notable works
include The Anchored
Angel, The Emperor’s New
Sonnet, and Footnote to
Youth. 
Philippine novelist, poet, playwright,
biographer, and essayist writing in
English, the National Artist for
Literature.  Joaquin wrote largely
about the Spanish colonial period
and the diverse heritage of the
Filipino people. Often he dealt with
the coexistence of 'primitive' and
'civilized' dimensions inside the
human psyche. After World War II
Joaquin worked as a journalist,
gaining fame as a reporter for
the Free Press. His most acclaimed
play is A Portrait of the Artist As
Filipino  (1952)
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.
Romulo, in all, wrote and published 18 books, a range of
literary works which included 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).

His other books include his memoirs of his many years’

affiliations with United Nations (UN), Forty Years: A Third
World Soldier at the UN, and The Philippine Presidents,
his oral history of his experiences serving all the Philippine
presidents.
National Artist for Literature (1990)
(September 6, 1916 – August 1, 2002)
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’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).

Some of his short stories are Frankie, The Man Who

Would Be Poe, Death in a Factory, Lina, A Clown
Remembers, Divided by Two, The Mats, and his poems
being The Other Woman, This Being the Third Poem This
Poem is for Mathilda,  and To Touch You and I Touched
Her.
NVM GONZALEZ
National Artist for Literature (1997)
(September 8, 1915 – November 28,
1999)
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.
Major works of N.V.M Gonzalez include the
following: 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.
LEVI CELERIO
National Artist for Literature /
Music (1997)
(April 30, 1910 – April 2, 2002)
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
Edith L. Tiempo
National Artist for Literature (1999)
(April 22, 1919 – August 21, 2011)
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.

Tiempo’s published works include the novel 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).
National Artist for Literature
(2001)
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.
In the five-novel masterpiece, the Rosales saga,
consisting of The Pretenders, Tree, My Brother, My
Executioner, Mass, and Po-on, he captures the sweep
of Philippine history while simultaneously narrating
the lives of generations of the Samsons whose
personal lives intertwine with the social struggles of
the nation. Because of their international appeal, his
works, including his many short stories, have been
published and translated into various languages.
F. Sionil Jose is also a publisher, lecturer on cultural
issues, and the founder of the Philippine chapter of the
international organization PEN. He was bestowed the
CCP Centennial Honors for the Arts in 1999; the
Outstanding Fulbrighters Award for Literature in 1988;
and the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism,
Literature, and Creative Communication Arts in 1980.
National Artist for Literature (2003)
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 Peregrinasyo
n, 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.
He has 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.
ALEJANDRO ROCES
National Artist for Literature (2003)
(July 13, 1924 – May 23, 2011)
“You cannot be a great writer; first, you have
to be a good person”
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.
Bienvenido L. Lumbera
He spent most of his youth in
Batangas until he entered the
University of Santo Tomas in 1950 to
pursue a degree in journalism. He
completed his M.A. and then his
Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at
Indiana University in 1967. Lumbera
writes in English and Filipino, and
has produced works in both
languages.
He has a poetry collection entitled Likhang Dila, Likhang Diwa
(1993), and Balaybay: Mga Tulang Lunot at Manibalang, a
collection of new poems in Filipino and those from Likhang Dila.
He has several critical works, including Abot-Tanaw: Sulyap at
Suri sa Nagbabagong Kultura at Lipunan (1987) and Writing the
Nation/Pag-akda ng Bansa (2000). He has also done several
librettos, among them Tales of the Manuvu (1977) and Rama
Hari (1980). Sa Sariling Bayan: Apat na Dulang May Musika
(DLSU, 2003) collects the four historical musicals Nasa Puso ang
Amerika, Bayani, Noli Me Tangere: The Musical, and Hibik at
Himagsik Nina Victoria Laktaw.
LAZARO FRANCISCO
National Artist for Literature (2009)
(February 22, 1898 – June 17, 1980)
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.
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.
National Artist for Literature (2014)
(July 9, 1941 – May 6, 2018)

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.
Major works: Summer
Suns (1963), Words and
Battlefields (1998), The Trilogy of Saint
Lazarus (2001), Galaw ng Asoge (2003).
 Of all the Canonical
authors we talked, whom
would you like to meet
and talk in person? What
would like to learn from
him/ her?
 Performance Task 1:
Make a multi- Media presentation about ONE
Literary Canon by Canonical Author

What to include in your presentation?

Character/s of the short story
Importance events happened in the story/poem
What is the important message of the short
story/poem?