Unbounded

[I've just finished F. Sionil Jose's The Pretenders, whilst our group blog's topic is on poverty. Put two and two together, and here I am writing about Jose's fourth Rosales novel.
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Good God, how boring could this be??! upon rereading this entry, it convinced me that a documentary on worm racing is far more interesting. Never realized that one could write a blog entry that's so stoic.]

I.

It is but without doubt that there is an importance in studying the Filipino Psyche in the HUKBALAHAP era. Francisco Sionil Jose’s My Brother, My Executioner (Manila, 1988), is an impeccable example. Fourth of the five Rosales Novels that spanned one hundred years of Filipino existence, not only is this literary piece of art an appraisal worthy of its epic achievements (many would like to consider Jose to be Asia’s hope to finally bag the Nobel for literature, and a South East Asian at that. This writer disagrees. Toer of Indonesia, mainly known for his version – the Buru Quartet, is just as a prime candidate for the prize as Jose), but it also serves as a valuable source of data that tells about the lifestyle and way of thinking of the typical Filipino in the 50’s.

What is important in terms of Psychology, is that why did the Filipinos, whether marginalized or financially endowed, still had a positive outlook in life and lived as if nothing was wrong, despite the fact that the country at that time was enveloped in national turmoil, more so in the suburbs?

II.

Deconstruction, developed by what people arguably recognize as the best literary critic of the twentieth century, Jaque Derrida, is a strategy for analysis that has been applied primarily to Linguistics, Literature, and Philosophy. Its purpose is to expand the conceptual limits of the meaning of a text from its syntax, and to explore its innumerable interpretation. It has four levels of analysis, namely the literal level, the symbolic level, the social-political level, and the deconstructive level. Despite the criticisms that it receives, it is still being widely used because of its ease and effectiveness.

Finding the true, deeper, and therefore hidden message of a particular manifest content of a literature begins with identifying its literal meaning, or simply, what the text literally talks about. From there, the second, symbolic level of meaning is derived from the literal content. These two levels of meaning have social and/or political implications that reflects society and is also identified, and thus emerges the third level of meaning, that is, the socio-political level. Finally, from all of these, the deconstructive level of meaning is derived that refutes all of the other three other levels.

III.

Chapter eighteen is particularly significant due to its pre-climactic conflict. This was the part where the two protagonist blood siblings, Luis and Victor, met each other for the last time. The hero and antihero conversed and finally understood each other and themselves respectively. This particular conversation that transpired somehow depicts the totality of the psyche of the rich and the poor in the 1950’s.

Victor’s concern for his brother’s safety is symbolically seen as a kind of “oneness”, that although both of them lived in dichotyny (where one enjoyed luxury while the other half-brother struggled through poverty), they still had a gut feeling of connection to one another; a “oneness” if you will. Collectively speaking, this oneness, and that they both recognized one mother symbolizes for the countrymen and his country.

Now seeing this from a social/political aspect, it is impossible for the impoverished and the excess to exist alone. This is a fine operational example from an acclaimed European writer who is quoted saying “contrasts and limitations are necessary for anything to be considered valuable”. Also coincidentally, communist idealism thrived during this era, and this marked the time where the country faced literal (speaking in terms of infrastructure and economy) and symbolic (referring to the esteem and morale of the people) rebuilding.

What [then] meaning is there to exist when the poor has no one to look up to and for the rich to look down to? When all dreams are real and when all efforts come in vain?

Be as it may that the aforementioned social classes (who in reality) look for the welfare for each other, the fact that unconscious utilitarianism still remains. The “resiliency” and optimism is nowhere to be found when you take away something forcibly, imperiling the welfare of another party. In the novel’s case, Victor is without a doubt prepared to kill Luis if he does not heed his warning (that is to leave the hacienda as a HUKBALAHAP attack to claim the land that they so “rightfully owned” is imminent). The Huks would probably take the land no matter what, and that is not the resiliency nor the optimism and hope of the people at the time that we see. Undeniably, it’s an example of finding the easy way out.

Filipinos are resilient; there is no doubt about it. A national conference on Filipino Work Psychology was held in 2004 in De La Salle University – Dasmariňas, and in one forum, the speaker compared the Filipino to the carabao. This animal was described as the embodiment of the Filipino – industrious and persistent.

While true, that parallelism is also only half of the truth because it is also true that Filipinos will take the shorter course of action if it would gain personal benefit, and they would not think of the welfare of others at that.

This literary analysis is far from being comprehensive. With enough time and effort, a better analysis can be made, and its findings can even contribute to Filipino Psychology, either as a concept, or as a movement, and ultimately to change the notion of mainstream Psychology, which at the moment, is mostly western.

xxx