UP Forum July-August 2011

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES

FORUM VOLUME 12 NUMBER 4

JULY - AUGUST 2011

Holding the Center

The Activism of SP Lopez (1911-1993)

By Luis V. Teodoro

A

ppointed in 1969, Salvador Ponce Lopez assumed the presidency of UP at a time of great political and intellectual ferment in both the university as well as the entire country. Spreading from UP to the media, artists’ groups, students and professors in other schools, among workers and peasants, that ferment examined and questioned what had become conventional wisdom in politics and governance, the state of the economy, culture and the arts, and Philippine-US relations, among others. Increasingly finding expression not only in the mass media but also in the streets, the turmoil gave birth to three great events crucial to the present and future of UP: the First Quarter Storm (FQS) of 1970; the Diliman Commune of 1971; and the declaration of

martial law in 1972.

The First Quarter Storm—a phrase coined by UP alumnus Jose Ma. Sison to refer to the first three months of 1970 during which the country was rocked by demonstrations, strikes, marches, protests and other mass actions that in most cases involved tens of thousands of men and women—was among the expressions of the intellectual ferment that, already simmering in UP since the late 1960s, had spread to the entire student community and created a student movement that included secondary as well as tertiary level students.

Led mostly by UP students, the January 26 and 30 demonstrations before Congress and Malacañan Palace

that were part and maker of the storm were violently suppressed by the Marcos administration, but became the inspiration for the mass actions, not only by students but also by workers, peasants and other sectors, that erupted throughout the country in that crucial year.

From the mid-1960s onward, a virtual cultural revolution spearheaded by UP students and faculty had been challenging the conventional wisdom—in politics, the economy and in culture—that had justified the existence of a state of affairs that perpetrated the poverty based on the feudal relations that reigned in the countryside, and the web of agreements that assured the country’s status as a US client-state. In seminars, teachHOLDING THE CENTER, p. 2

2

FORUM July-August 2011

Left: Prof. Luis V. Teodoro. Above: UP faculty presenting to Marcos a list of concerns, a result of the January 26 rally. Photo taken from The First Quarter Storm Library (http://fqslibrary.wordpress).com/).

law period, the university, its constituencies and its institutions were major targets of state repression.

SP Lopez and social unrest HOLDING THE CENTER, from p. 1 ins, lectures and discussion groups, a coherent critique of the state of Philippine society had emerged. It identified imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat capitalism as the basic causes of its poverty and underdevelopment, and proposed “national democracy”—the dismantling of feudalism in the countryside and the realization of authentic independence—as the solution .

The Diliman Commune of 1971, during which progressive students and faculty took control of the UP Diliman campus (although on the surface in response to a UP math professor’s shooting of a student at the University Avenue barricades erected in protest against oil price increases) was also a test of the capacity of UP’s organized sectors to defend the campus against state security forces. In the aftermath of the commune, among UP’s participating student and faculty organizations a consensus was emerging that it was a dress rehearsal for similar initiatives elsewhere, and a preparation for bigger things to come.

The declaration of martial law in 1972, while primarily driven by Ferdinand Marcos’ determination to remain in power beyond 1973—when, having been reelected in 1969, the 1936 Constitution bans his running again—was at the same time intended to put an end to the burgeoning movement toward democratization, reform and revolution that had engulfed the country’s schools, factories and rural communities.

The martial law period was the most dangerous for the university in its entire 64-year history, but UP had also been in peril both during and in the aftermath of the FQS and the Diliman Commune. UP had been identified not only as the center of the radical student movement, but also as the main intellectual and cultural resource of the student, worker and peasant sectors that were demanding a larger voice in governance in furtherance of the restructuring of the Philippine economic and social systems. This perception on the part of the state explains why, both before and during the martial

Into the cauldron of unrest that was the university arrived SP Lopez in 1969. Barely a year after his appointment as UP president, he was confronted with the police’s forcible suppression of the January 26 demonstration before Congress, which, together with the January 30 demonstration at Malacañan Palace, generated the wave of marches, demonstrations and strikes that were so much part of Philippine life and politics in 1970.

Lopez had been all his life a government functionary, having been ambassador to several countries and the United Nations as well as secretary of Foreign Affairs.

But he was also a man of letters and a literary critic whose essays, particularly “Literature and Society,” had argued for a literature committed to the making of a just society.

Instead of taking the Marcos administration line, as would have been expected of a career government official focused on protecting his job, that the suppression was justified because it was in response to a threat to the lives of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos, Lopez declared that “The night of January 26 must be regarded as a night of grave portent for the future of the nation.” Continuing, he asked if, under these circumstances, it was “still possible to transform our society by peaceful means so that the many who are poor, oppressed, sick, and ignorant may be released from their misery, by the actual operation of law and government.” Lopez implied that that time had passed because of the government’s fear and suppression of protest.

Taking a cue from the UP president, the UP faculty also denounced in a statement “the use of brutal force by state authorities against the student demonstrators” and expressed their “unqualified support” for the students’ “exercise of their democratic rights in their struggle for revolutionary change.” Further, they declared that it was “with the gravest concern that the faculty views the January 26 event as part of an emerging pattern of repression of the democratic rights of the people. This

pattern is evident in the formation of paramilitary units such as the Home Defense Forces, the politicalization of the Armed Forces, the existence of private armies, foreign interference in internal security, and the use of specially trained police for purposes of suppression.”

In the aftermath of the January 30 demonstration before Malacañan Palace during which some students were killed by the police and elements of the Philippine Constabulary, SP Lopez called a meeting of the faculty during which it was decided that UP deans, professors and instructors, as well as staff members and students who wanted to, would march to Malacañan Palace with Lopez himself at its head. That march did take place, marking the first time in which a UP president was ever involved in a mass action protesting government policy and actions.

During the Diliman Commune, Lopez refused to call in the police and military to oust the student and faculty groups that had taken control of the Diliman campus and its facilities, including the university radio station DZUP. Instead he chose to negotiate for a peaceful end to the take-over of the campus, in which he succeeded by fearlessly meeting with the students, listening to their demands, and granting those that he thought were reasonable. Recalling that period during a conversation with this writer, he mentioned among his reasons for not calling in the police and the military not only the prevention of bloodshed, but also the commune’s being a learning experience for students.

HOLDING THE CENTER, p. 10

Scenes from the protests outside Gate 4 of Malacañan and its vicinity on January 30. Photos were taken from The First Quarter Storm Library (http://fqslibrary.wordpress.com/).

FORUM July-August 2011 3

THE UP FORUM ROUNDTABLE

on

THE LEGACY OF SP LOPEZ

Q

How can UP continue the legacy of SP Lopez?

Ramon Guillermo: Hindi na matitinag ang simbolismo ng pangalang “SP Lopez” sa kasaysayang pangkultura ng Pilipinas.

Higit sa lahat, may permanenteng lugar na siya sa lahat ng mga kasaysayang pampanitikan ng ika20 siglo ng Pilipinas. Dulot ito ng kanyang mapangahas at umaatikabong pagsalungat sa namamayaning pananaw na “art for art’s sake” ng mga manunulat sa wikang Ingles sa panahon ng Commonwealth noong dekada 30. Naimortalisa na ang pangyayaring ito sa katawagang “Debateng Lopez-Villa.”

Anupaman ang mababanaag na hangganan, limitasyon o kakulangan sa orihinalidad ng kanyang nosyon ng proletarian literature na idinetalye niya sa kanyang akdang Literature and Society (1941), masasabing nagsilbing matingkad na sintomas ito ng mas malawakang pagkabalisa ng mga manunulat sa wikang Ingles (noong mga dekadang bago ang Ikalawang Digmaang Pandaigdig) sa nananatiling malabong posisyon ng panitikang Ingles sa loob ng mas malawak na lipunang Pilipino.

Nagkaroon ang kanyang mga maagang kritikal na pormulasyon ng higit na tiyak at mabisang anyo sa mga akdang pampanitikan mismo sa mga akda ng mga kasapi ng Philippine Writer’s League tulad nina Arturo B.

Rotor at Manuel Arguilla. Maging ang Revolt of the Masses (1956), biograpiya ni Andres Bonifacio na sinulat ni Teodoro Agoncillo, ay masasabing tugon din sa panawagan ng proletarian literature. Ipagpapatuloy ang ganitong namumuong tradisyong makalipunan sa wikang Ingles sa mga akda nina Jose Ma. Sison, Ninotchka Rosca, Epifanio San Juan at ng kanilang mga kahenerasyon na humantong sa radikalismo ng dekada 60. Bagama’t tila hindi na nalampasan ni Lopez sa maraming bahagi ang kanyang mga limitadong pananaw hinggil sa panitikang “bernakular” at hinggil sa wikang Filipino mismo, masasabing hindi naman niya hinarang ang malawakang tendensiya ng pagsasaPilipino sa panahon ng nagbabagang nasyonalismo sa hanay ng kabataan. Sa panahon ng kanyang panunungkulan bilang presidente ng Unibersidad ng Pilipinas, lumabas ang unang mga isyu ng Philippine Collegian na may mga artikulo sa wikang P/Filipino at sa panahon ding ito unang isinalin at inawit ang “UP Naming Mahal.”

Hindi dapat malimutan na ang pangunahing islogan ng kanyang termino bilang presidente ng UP ay ang konsepto ng relevance sa edukasyon. Ipinaliwanag niya ang kanyang pilosopiya ng edukasyon sa isang talumpating pinamagatang “The

Ramon G. Guillermo Associate Professor Department of Filipino and Philippine Literature College of Arts and Letters UP Diliman

Maria Alarceli Dans Lee Associate Professor and Dean College of Humanities and Social Sciences UP Mindanao

University as Social Critic and Agent of Change.” Iginiit ni Lopez doon ang pangangailangang harapin ng UP ang dalawang pangunahing tungkulin nito bilang social critic at agent of change.

Uminog ang kanyang matataguriang “aktibistang” pilosopiya ng edukasyon sa dalawang larangang kinikilusan ng unibersidad. Nakatuon ang una sa edukasyon ng mga mag-aaral, samantalang ang ikalawa naman ay hinggil sa responsibilidad ng unibersidad sa lipunang Pilipino.

Kapansin-pansing napapanahon pa rin hanggang ngayon ang kanyang mga iminungkahing reporma sa kurikulum at sa General Education Program.

Ayon kay Lopez, “We have need to strengthen the Filipino elements in our culture and we must give emphasis to the Filipino in our curriculum.

Even as we keep windows open to the outside world, we must open windows into ourselves also.” Patuloy na kinakailangang bigyang-diin ang pagka-Pilipino sa ating kurikulum sa lahat ng aspeto nito (pangwika, pangkultura at panlipunan man). Ito ang mga salita ni Lopez na kinakailangang isaalang-alang ngayong lumalaganap na ang panawagan na magkaroon ng mga rebisyon sa Revitalized General Education Program (RGEP) na nakabatay sa mga prinsipyong pampamilihan.

Sa kasalukuyang panahong laganap ang komersyalismo at panunuot ng negosyo sa lahat ng aspeto ng buhayakademya, nangangailangan muli ang Unibersidad ng Pilipinas ng isang SP Lopez na maninindigan at itataguyod ang papel nito bilang isang kritikong panlipunan at pwersa ng pagbabagong panlipunan.

Marcy Dans Lee: I never met Salvador P. Lopez during my college days at the College of Fine Arts in UP Diliman from 1972 to 1976. But I saw pictures of him; he looked like my grandfather, huggable and approachable. And though I never met him, I eventually discovered a few facts about him.

When I entered UP as a freshman in June 1972, it was in the midst of the First Quarter Storm (FQS). UP had already been known for its incessant protests and rallies against the Marcos regime.

My teachers in the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) were intermittently absent, or when they were present, generally conducted discussions on the deplorable state of the nation. My teachers in the College of Fine Arts (CFA) allowed us to spend time painting placards, posters, murals and designing pamphlets and flyers.

The UP administration then allowed ROUNDTABLE, p. 13

4

FORUM July-August 2011

How SP Lopez influenced my policies as UP President

By Sen. Edgardo J. Angara, UP President (1981-1987)

S

P Lopez’s tenure as UP President from 1969 to 1975 was one of the most vibrant in UP’s long history. Social ideologies and political upheavals were the sweeping currents of those times both in the Philippines and abroad. The Lopez administration responded with dynamism and conviction.

The Diliman Commune of 1971 would not have made so enduring an impact had it not been for the rallying force of Lopez’s fierce and immovable commitment to freedom. Indeed, I believe the seeds of UP’s autonomy—which had grown to a harvest when I became UP president, and is now being enjoyed by the university—had been sown and much nurtured in those days, even when the political climate was unfavorable to it.

There are many great differences between SP Lopez and me, and my time as UP president from 1981 to 1987 has often been spoken of in contrast with his. He had been part of the UP Manila faculty; I was a UP alumnus but virtually uninitiated in the academe. He aggressively participated in the culture of activism; I took the way of consultations and negotiations. He was vocal about his espousal of certain ideologies; I was vocal about the lack of such ideologies informing my policymaking.

Nevertheless, there is much in the man that is worth admiring, even now several decades down the road.

SP Lopez is often credited as the man behind the creation of the UP System.

He wanted to make sure that each UP campus would remain characteristically UP, and would not be left at the mercy of the political tides holding sway in their various locations. He fought valiantly for student freedom, locking arms with and marching alongside the young men

and women whose grievances he made his own. He spoke with courage and daring against the oppressive status quo, even when it would have been safer and easier to remain silent. SP Lopez was a journalist before he was UP president, and he was a journalist after; and it is always a journalist’s mission to give voice to the truth.

I suppose any UP president who came after him would say that much is owed to President Lopez’s legacy.

The reforms I strived to implement in my time would not have been possible if President Lopez had not taken those first, difficult steps; if he had not laid the groundwork upon which we later on could build.

One of the main thrusts of my tenure as UP president was decentralization. We sought to equip our constituent universities to perform just as excellently as our flagship campus. It was also in my time that the separation of the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) into the College of Arts and Letters (CAL), College of Science (CS) and College of Social Sciences and Philosophy (CSSP) was effected. Both these efforts had their accompanying birth pains, but I believe they have given these entities the room to expand where they would not have been able if they remained lumped together under one academic heading, or inside one building.

The resumption of the publication of the Philippine Collegian and the restoration of student representation in the Board of Regents are also among the two proudest achievements of my term as UP president, both of which are rooted in how President Lopez years ago placed uncompromising value on the voice of his student constituents.

The establishment of UP’s fiscal autonomy can also be seen as a realization of the years of struggle for the university to spend and govern as it sees fit for itself, instead of being left at the mercy of bureaucratic entanglements.

SP Lopez fought in the streets. I fought in board rooms and meetings. A lot can and has been said about the upsides and downsides of either. Nevertheless, I find that, however different our ways, SP Lopez and I fought for the same thing. Although the struggle rages on in other ways, I surmise he would be pleased to see the fruits it has since borne.

----------------Email the author at angara_ed@gmail.com.

What I remember of SP Lopez

FORUM July-August 2011 5

By Dr. Francisco Nemenzo, UP President (1999-2005)

M

y high school English teacher assigned me to write a reaction paper on the short essay of SP Lopez titled “Red-Blooded Literature” in Literature and Society. I was so impressed that I asked my mother, then librarian of UP Cebu College, to find me his other works.

As a representative to the UP Student Council in 1956-1957, I proposed a resolution deploring the Board of Regents’ (BOR) inability to choose between Vicente Sinco and Gonzalo Gonzalez. To break the long drawn out stalemate, the resolution suggested SP Lopez as a compromise. The UP Student Catholic Action (UPSCA)-dominated student council approved my resolution, but deleted the provision nominating Ambassador Lopez. I therefore felt vindicated when SP eventually became the UP president in 1969. But my first encounter with him was a painful let down. He did not live up to the image of a liberal and nationalist.

We clashed over the contract with the US Navy at the height of the Vietnam War. The Movement for the Advancement of Nationalism (MAN) had attacked the Romulo administration for the “Americanization of UP.” As the only faculty member in the committee that prepared the MAN white paper, I was blamed for supplying the most damaging information. But in his usual trick of coopting critics, Romulo named me to a special committee to review all contracts with external agencies.

In one of the contracts unearthed by our committee, the US Navy was funding a research project of the Institute (now College) of Public Health on a species of mosquito that caused enlargement of male genitals. The US Navy wanted to know what makes Filipinos immune to this mosquito that was wreaking havoc on American servicemen in Vietnam. The committee members agreed that this project involved the university in a dirty war of aggression against a Southeast Asian neighbor.

Romulo abrogated the contract before he stepped down, but the Institute of Public Health appealed to incoming UP President SP Lopez. The latter urged us to retract. When we refused, he summarily abolished the committee and allowed the project to proceed.

My admiration for him was restored when Marcos declared martial law. It required enormous courage to defy the newborn dictatorship. But SP persuaded the BOR to adopt a policy of automatically reinstating the tenured faculty upon release from detention. I became a beneficiary of

that policy.

Two years after my release UP President OD Corpuz appointed me as dean of the College of Arts and Sciences in Diliman.

Upon assuming office I asked for my personal service file. There I found a letter from the previous dean recommending me and other tenured professors for dismissal, alleging that we were “notoriously undesirable.”

SP wrote at the bottom in big letters: DISAPPROVED. Although he was no longer the president, I consulted SP on my first policy speech laying down an ambitious plan for the College of Arts and Sciences. He gave this precious advice: Do not announce your plan until you have studied your budget and familiarized yourself with the legal and bureaucratic constraints. Do not promise anything you may not be able to deliver.

That was at the back of my mind when I took my oath as the 18th UP President. To the dismay of friends and supporters who expected the launching of a revolutionary plan, I did not unveil a program for the first 100 days.

I just promised to devote the first 100 days learning my job and organizing my team. This led critics to conclude that I had no vision.

In truth, I had a very clear vision and a very detailed plan. But, following SP’s advice, I pruned this down to what could be realistically accomplished within a six-year term.

After his retirement, SP assembled a dozen of us to speculate on “The Philippines into the 21st Century.” Futurism or futuristics was the current fad at that time. But instead of projecting current trends to predict the shape of things to come, our goal was to visualize a preferred future, the Philippines we hope to see in the 21st century. Each of us produced chapters of a book he would co-edit with Dr. Cel Manalang. Unfortunately, both of them died before our manuscripts reached the press.

----------------Email the author at fnemenzo@gmail.com.

6

FORUM July-August 2011

Ambassador SP Lopez signing the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights during the Twentyfirst Session of the General Assembly, United Nations Headquarters, New York, December 20, 1966. Photo from http://untreaty.un.org/cod/avl/images/ha/iccpr/02-l.jpg.

Salvador P. Lopez: Diplomat and Nationalist

By Celeste Ann Castillo Llaneta

O

n a wall on the third floor of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) building along Roxas Boulevard is a bronze plaque bearing former UP President Salvador P. Lopez’s signature. The bronze marker is one of the 11 signature markers the DFA installed last February to honor 11 former Foreign Affairs secretaries who “vigorously promoted Philippine national interests in the international stage.”1 Dedicating an entire floor of the DFA building might seem at first to be an overgenerous tribute to a former Foreign Affairs secretary who served for only a year—from 1963 to 1964—before certain disagreements between him and then President Diosdado Macapagal led him to resign and take on the post of ambassador-at-large.2 The DFA press release also added, rather shortly, that “Lopez likewise served the country as Philippine Permanent Representative to the United Nations for six years”—from 1964 to 1969, and from 1986 to 1987.

What was left unsaid in the press release— and the reason for the bronze plaque on the DFA’s third floor—is Salvador P. Lopez’s contributions not only to nation-building and to Philippine foreign policy but to the United Nations (UN) as well; and his distinguished career in the foreign service spanning more than 23 years in seven countries.3 The consummate diplomat B e f o r e h e b e c a m e s e c r e t a r y o f D FA , Lopez served as deputy chief of the Philippine mission to the UN where he was involved with numerous councils and commissions, including the Commission on Human Rights (CHR).

He was elected to the UN Economic Social Council as rapporteur on matters relating to freedom of information4, and drafted the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) resolution on human rights.5 He served as ambassador to Belgium, the Netherlands and Switzerland. He was ambassador to France (1955-1962) when he was appointed undersecretary of Foreign Affairs (1961-1963)

under then Secretary Emmanuel Pelaez.

After his stint as Foreign Affairs secretary, he served as ambassador to the United States (US) and concurrently as the country’s permanent representative to the UN. He gave this up to become president of the University of the Philippines in January 1969, thereby “exchanging the problems of the world for the problems of the campus,” as Lopez himself put it.6 He returned to a career in diplomacy and the foreign service in 1986, when he was recalled to represent the Philippines in the UN once more.

In 1988, he served concurrently as ambassador in the DFA and consultant in the Office of the Vice-President of the Philippines. He resigned as ambassador in 1989, but continued as consultant in the OVP. 7 “There were many members of the [Foreign Affairs] staff who assisted him, but he was the main brain. In fact, he was the brains behind Carlos P. Romulo. Carlos Romulo was the front man…the president of the UN General Assembly, but all the brain work that had been done at that point was SP Lopez’s,” recalled UP Political Science Professor Emeritus Emerenciana Yuvienco Arcellana. “That’s why SP ascended the diplomatic ladder under Romulo’s time.

In fact, Romulo had Lopez succeed him as UP president, precisely because he believed in the man’s brains.”

Bridging the ideological divide Lopez’s achievements in diplomacy and foreign policy should be understood in the backdrop of the world he moved in. In the years between 1946 and 1969, most of the globe was locked in the ideological conflict known as the Cold War, deeply divided between the US and the Free World, and the socialist countries dominated by the Soviet Union and China. Attempting to moderate this conflict, the newly-established UN worked to maintain peace, security, harmony and respect for human rights and welfare among its polarized member-countries as best as it could.

The Philippines, which had just regained its

independence, found itself caught amidst these divergent geopolitical tides. As Lopez wrote in his essay on “Trends in Philippine Foreign Policy,” which was published in Trends in the Philippines II by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in 1979: “The ‘close and special ties’ which bound the Philippines to the United States—ties which, in Dr. [Onofre D.] Corpuz’s felicitous phrase, were ‘too close for comfort and too special for self-respect’—flourished after independence in 1946…The Military Bases Agreement, the Military Assistance Pact, and the Mutual Defense Treaty were products of this period. PhilippineAmerican bonds were perhaps strongest during the early 1950s when Ramon Magsaysay served, first, as Secretary of National Defense and then as President. The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) alliance was established under the Manila Pact of 1954. Yet, it was also during the Magsaysay era that the slogan ‘Asia for the Asians’ was coined and its underlying philosophy clearly enunciated.”8 “In terms of our foreign policy directions, SP Lopez was at the forefront of redirecting the obviously American–leaning orientation of our foreign policy into a more open and cosmopolitan one, in the sense of giving importance to Southeast Asia, for instance, and China [and other socialist countries],” Prof. Malaya Ronas of the UP Diliman Department of Political Science said.

“I think this was a point of difference between him, when he was secretary of Foreign Affairs, and President Macapagal, and that difference eventually led to his [Lopez’s] resignation.”

“As early as 1964, I had urged the review of our policy towards the Soviet Union and the other socialist states of Eastern Europe—the first high official of the Philippine government to do so,” Lopez wrote. 9 “I advanced two considerations which, in my view, made such a review highly desirable in [the context of] national interest: first, the need for an Asian policy that would take due account of the emergence of China as a power in Asia; and second, the need to reduce DIPLOMAT AND NATIONALIST, p. 7

FORUM July-August 2011 7 Filipino feeling of friendship with the United It was a powder keg of a situation, and DIPLOMAT AND NATIONALIST, from p. 6 States of America, which has given rise over the the Philippines was right in the middle of it. our excessive dependence upon the United States years…to a whole system of ‘special relations.’ “Somehow, the Philippines was more levelby developing a new foreign policy leverage and The Filipinos have obviously needed time to headed,” Ronas said. “Macapagal—of course, broadening our options in international affairs.” enable them to disengage from the established with Lopez behind him—called for a meeting Arcellana recalled that Lopez had wanted to mental habits of the past as well as to assess the among himself, Sukarno and Malaysia, and this establish some sort of rapprochement with the new political and ideological alignments that are served to somehow lower the tension.” The parties countries on the other side of the ideological emerging in the region…” eventually agreed to consult the population of divide. Back then, to even propose such a thing Borneo, which voted in favor of joining Malaysia; Rise of regionalism in Southeast Asia was to invite serious trouble. “At that time, antiin time, the Federation of Malaysia was formed communism was a byword in western countries, Closer to home, relations between the so it [Lopez’s proposal] was anathema, verboten,” Philippines and her neighboring countries were despite the objections of the Philippines and Arcellana said. “If you say as much as one no less tense in Lopez’s time. On the one hand, Indonesia.

According to Ronas, the effort of trying statement in favor of inviting the Russians to there was a rising belief in the need for Asian and to resolve issues peacefully was a concrete cooperate and work with you on any project or African countries that were former colonies to demonstration of the so-called Panchsheel any goal, you must be pro-communist.” band together “on the basis of mutual interest and “This is the context of the Cold War. The national sovereignty,” with the aim of establishing (five restraints) or pancasila in Indonesia—five US and the USSR were both insisting that we their own identity and opposing colonialism and principles presented by Indian Prime Minister had to choose sides, that ‘if you’re not with me, imperialism. This culminated in the first Bandung Jawaharlal Nehru that served as the basis of the you’re against me,’” Ronas said. “Diplomats Conference held in Bandung, Indonesia, on April Non-Aligned Movement. These five principles recall the time when they were told not even to 18, 1955, which represented the first attempt of include the peaceful settlement of disputes, shake hands with communist ambassadors. There the collective effort by the Afro-Asian nations to respect for territorial integrity, and peaceful was a definite separation, even in diplomatic assert their presence in the international scene.10 coexistence—principles that will hold us in good stead throughout our current diplomatic conflicts functions.”

The Bandung Conference paved the way for the “Our policies then were so close-minded. creation in 1962 of the Non-Aligned Movement with China and our Asian neighbors.

“These are the same principles which up to We were afraid to offend the Americans. And we (NAM), an alliance of nations not aligned now are being followed by ASEAN, and these were so benighted; we just took propaganda as formally with or against any superpower bloc same principles are also echoed in the UN gospel. That’s why those scholars who took pains and committed to the “promotion of world peace Charter,” said Ronas. “So you can see that SP was to look at the other side and study [the issue] for and cooperation.” obviously a child of his generation, and it was themselves were so frustrated,” Arcellana said.

Along with this was the rising “Asia for the She added that this sweeping attitude against Asians” sentiment, a phrase coined by diplomat by his generation that the basic foundations of communists and suspected communists persisted and novelist Leon Maria Guerrero in 1954. 11 ASEAN were being formed. So it was not really even until the time of President Corazon Aquino, Lopez wrote: “One of the most Westernized difficult for him to work for Southeast Asian long after Mikhail Gorbachev had already nations of Asia with close political and economic unity during his time, as well as [work toward] instituted his glasnost campaign and perestroika links to the US, the Philippines was under strong opening Philippine foreign policy to socialist countries.” movement. emotional compulsion in the 1950s and 1960s to In the spirit of the UN “[Lopez] was suspected of leaning to the recover her lost Asian identity and to prove her left, but he was not prosecuted or anything like ‘Asianness’.” He related how the Philippines had Arcellana recalled Lopez’s astuteness, that,” she said. “But for being liberal-minded and helped set up the Association of Southeast Asia broadmindedness and gift with words, as well as open-minded—these were held against him.” For in 1961, provided inspiration for Maphilindo his deep commitment to the less fortunate, which this, and other reasons, Lopez lost his cabinet (Malaya-Philippines-Indonesia) in 1963, and stemmed in part from his own humble background position. Or in diplomat-speak, Ronas said eventually helped establish and strengthen and the liberal education he received from UP. that he was “kicked upstairs” and reappointed the Association of Southeast Asian Nations “He was really conscious of the plight of the poor Philippine permanent representative to the UN (ASEAN). man—in [the issue of] human rights, for instance. and ambassador to the US, until Carlos P. Romulo The path for Southeast Asian regionalism, In whatever capacity, his heart really belonged to recommended him as the next UP president. however, was far from smooth. “In Lopez’s time, the underprivileged. He was very humane.”

In this sense, it could be said that Lopez was our problem was [with] the emerging Federation Regarding Lopez’s concern for the less a man ahead of his time. But, Arcellana noted, not of Malaya,” Ronas said. At that time, the United fortunate, Ronas referred in particular to his that far ahead, as a decade later in 1976, during Kingdom had wanted to unite in one state part attempts to implement in the Philippines the Marcos’ presidency, the Philippines did indeed of Sarawak, then Singapore, and the Malayan UN Resolution asking member-countries to open formal diplomatic relations with China and Peninsula into what was called the Federation support the economic embargo against apartheidthe USSR in 1977—again, following the US’ lead, of Malaya. Indonesia considered this a threat ridden South Africa. “He was still working which opened diplomatic relations with the two to their territory because Sarawak is in Borneo, with the UN when all of these sanctions were countries in 1972. and a large part of Borneo is part of Indonesia. introduced—mainly by the Third World, by the “President Marcos’ visit to Peking in June Neither was this desirable for the Philippines, as Afro-Asian bloc. The US was not so sympathetic 1976 resulted in the normalization of Philippine it would have diminished our claim over Sabah. then to the struggle against apartheid,” Ronas relations with the People’s Republic of China. “So we joined Indonesia at that time against said. “In any case, SP was committed to that. So This was long overdue. It took President Marcos Malaysia, and the atmosphere was really tense,” when he became Foreign Affairs secretary, he 10 years since the beginning of his first term to Ronas added. “Indonesia, particularly President recommended to Macapagal to help implement establish relations with the socialist states of the Sukarno, was calling for konfrontasi”—in other the embargo.” One of Lopez’s recommendations world,” Lopez noted in his essay. words, an undeclared war against Malaysia.

DIPLOMAT AND NATIONALIST, p. 8 The 10-year delay in the Philippine government’s attempt to bridge the ideological divide was understandable. “The policy of caution has been necessary,” Lopez wrote.

“There has long been an insurgent movement which draws inspiration from Moscow and Peking.

The Philippines, since the end of the war, has been an active participant in the alliances and other security arrangement by means of which the Free World has sought to contain the advance o f c o m m u n i t y p o w e r.

At the same time, there Left: UP Professor Emeritus Emerenciana Arcellana looking at an old photo with SP Lopez in it. Right: UP Political Science Professor Malaya Ronas. has grown a powerful

8

FORUM July-August 2011

planes and ships to defend the national territory. is not much incentive for a bright young person to DIPLOMAT AND NATIONALIST, from p. 7 was for the Philippines to cease importing “That’s the worst thing!” she said. “You’ve placed follow Lopez’s path. She has taught several such sardines from South Africa. This was countered all your cards on the table. There is no diplomacy promising students, but they are now relegated to by intense lobbying of the business community. at all involved. No matter how weak you are, the role of undersecretaries. “They are very good, “Macapagal overturned his recommendation, so there are ways of getting back. There are ways but they don’t have the chance [to make much of a difference]. They are not the decision-makers. [this resulted in] another spat between Lopez and of fighting [besides] arms or swords.”

What would Lopez have done in such as They are just staff, implementing policies as Macapagal.”

Lopez’s libertarian approach—a global view situation? “I think the first thing is for them to decided by the top guys.”

“If recruitment, promotion and assignments that was ahead of his time—was evident in his keep their mouths shut until they have studied in-depth, width and breadth, the question at hand. are based on political expediency instead of deep diplomatic work and in his generally cosmopolitan And let there be only one voice to speak for all, policy-evaluation, one should not be surprised to view of being open to countries, regardless of ideologies. His open-mindedness was also after due consultations with all relevant agencies.” see a diplomatic service that lacks the capability fostered to a great extent by his work with the UN. As political analyst and UP Professor Walden and motivation to secure our national interest at any cost,” Bello wrote. “[This is] because in the UN, while there were For now, as we wait for the Salvador P. ideological divides, there were attempts always Lopez of the next generation to emerge and take to integrate these, for instance, in the case of up the fight for Philippine and Asian interests in human rights,” Ronas said. “[On one side], you the field of international diplomacy, it pays to had the liberal emphasis on human rights—the learn from the one who was there before. “Lopez civil-political rights—and [on the other hand], was consistent,” Ronas said. “His liberal values there is the egalitarian emphasis, social-economic guided his career in the DFA, as well as here rights, which is closer to the socialist world. But in UP. I believe he had internalized universal, in the UN, they are integrated.” timeless values that are not limited to just one Given Lopez’s long and active involvement people. Freedom is universal [after all].” with the UN and its various agencies, it was “I think he was one of the best of our Foreign no surprise that he would imbibe the broad, Affairs secretaries,” Arcellana said. It is a tribute libertarian and integrative view that the UN whose echoes reach far beyond a bronze plaque on espouses. “This is why I think his idea to open the wall of the third floor of the DFA building, and diplomatic ties [with China and the USSR] was well into the hallowed halls of the United Nations. developed in his work in the UN,” Ronas said.

----------------“And you can see that SP’s libertarian orientation Email the author at forum@up.edu.ph. is deeply rooted in his career…That’s why I was not surprised when he stood for academic freedom NOTES: 1 “DFA Unveils Signature Markers to Honor Former [in his time as UP president].”

Foreign Affairs Secretaries,” Department of Foreign For Lopez, the role of the UN in Affairs (February 21 2011), accessed July 15, 2011, Above: A Philippine stamp commemorating the 50th anniversary of the UN. uplifting the conditions of humankind http://www.dfa.gov.ph/main/index.php/newsroom/ Below: Ambassador Lopez, presiding as chair of the UN Human Rights dfa-releases/2506-dfa-unveils-signature-markers-tomust not be underestimated. “Although Commission, 1966. Photos taken from the UP Vargas exhibit commemorating honor-former-foreign-affairs-secretaries.

SP Lopez’s birth centennial. the United Nations has lost most 2 Helen E. Lopez, ed., “Salvador Ponce of the luster of its early years Lopez (1969-1975): The Conscientious Social Democrat” in At the Helm of UP: and has seen its power eroded Presidential Accents (Quezon City: and its influence diminished Office of the Secretary of the University, UP System, 1999), 146. by the competing forces of 3 Ibid. regionalism and nationalism, 4 “Salvador Ponce S. Lopez (1911it continues to stand as man’s 1993): Man of Letters and UP President," Pambansang Komisyong best hope for the emergence Pangkasaysayan (National Historical of a more rational world order, Institute), accessed July 15, 2011, http:// the only shield of the poor, the www.nhi.gov.ph/downloads/ed0024. pdf. oppressed, and the exploited 5 Oscar L. Evangelista, “Lopez’s nations against the powerful Beleaguered Tenure” in University of the Philippines: The First 75 Years and the rich.” It is as much a (1908-1983) edited by Oscar M. reflection of the values he stood Alfonso (Quezon City: University of the for in his life and career, as a Philippines Press, 1985), 446.

6 Ibid, p. 445. reiteration of his belief in the 7 “Salvador Ponce S. Lopez (1911possibility of a better world.

1993): Man of Letters and UP The shaping of a diplomat-nationalist

For Arcellana, leaders in the mold of Salvador P. Lopez—learned, shrewd, broadminded, committed to the welfare of the people, and skilled in the art and science of diplomacy—are now few and far between. In fact, the situation today is quite the opposite. “We have too many spokespersons, and they can’t even get together on what to say,” Arcellana said, referring to the recent faux pas committed by a prominent cabinet secretary who, in the height of the recent dispute with China over the Spratly Islands, declared before media that the Philippines lacks the troops,

Bello wrote in an essay on Philippine foreign policy: “…[R]egardless of a country’s size, what matters is how you frame, conduct and implement your foreign policy demarches with the ultimate purpose of defending your national interest.”12 Bello noted in his essay that the Philippines has “no shortage of talent for 21st century diplomatic service. But the mere possession of talents is not a guarantee for collective success of a nation. Systematic efficiency and the nature of organizational arrangements determine the extent of a nations’ success.” For Arcellana, there

President”, Pambansang Komisyong Pangkasaysayan (National Historical Institute), accessed July 15, 2011, http:// www.nhi.gov.ph/downloads/ed0024.pdf.

8 Salvador P. Lopez, “Trends in Philippine Foreign Policy” in Trends in the Philippines II: Proceedings and Background paper edited by M. Rajaretnam (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1978), 59, accessed July 15, 2011, http://books.google.com. ph/books?id=aeI-ZknBHq4C&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage &q&f=false.

9 Ibid, p. 56.

10 Editorial of “Revisiting the Spirit of Bandung: Celebrating 50 years”, VIKALP Alternatives, Vikas Adhyayan Kendra (April 2005), accessed July 15, 2011, http://www.vakindia.org/archives/VikalpApril2005.pdf.

11 LMG: The Anthology of Leon Ma. Guerrero, accessed July 20, 2011, http://leonmariaguerrero.com/about/chapter-six/.

12 Walden Bello, “The Poverty of Philippine Foreign Policy”, Transnational Institute (May 2010), accessed July 15, 2011, http:// www.tni.org/article/poverty-philippine-foreign-policy.

FORUM July-August 2011 9

Literature and Society

(Editor’s note: This is SP Lopez’s essay which won in the 1940 Commonwealth Literary Awards.

Reprinted with the permission of Mrs. Adelaida Escobar-Lopez.) he word has soul as well as body. Writers who consider themselves keepers of the word may not ignore the fact that it has a physical body and possesses qualities of sound and color, fancy and imagination. But the word is more than sound and color; it is a living thing of blood and fire, capable of infinite beauty and power. It is not an inanimate thing of dead consonants and vowels but a living force―the most potent instrument known to men.

Whoever uses speech merely to evoke beauty of sound or beauty of imagination is not exploiting the gift of speech for all that it is worth; he is exploiting it only in those qualities that are inherent in the word but external to the mind and soul of men. When a writer uses words purely for their music or purely as an instrument of fancy, he may claim that he is a devotee of pure art, since he insists on using words only in their strictly primitive qualities. In point of fact he is really a decadent aesthete who stubbornly confuses painting with literature and refuses to place words in the employ of man and his civilization.

There is hardly any writer of importance who does not, sooner or later, come to a point where his readers will ask him: “Why do you no longer write as you used to do?” or “The lightness and the laughter have gone out of your writing; you now write almost exclusively on politics, as if life offered nothing besides human folly and the social struggle. Why do you no longer write of pleasant and beautiful things?”

For the young writer is almost certain to start his career by writing mushy poetry and sophomoric philosophy, permitting his fancy to revel hedonistically among lovely phrases culled from books and sayings come down from the ancients―remnants of fascinating courses in literature and philosophy taken in college.

Then slowly, almost imperceptibly, as the years pass, there comes over his writing a change not only in subject-matter but in general temper and attitude.

Daily exposed to the headlines of the newspaper, his Olympian superiority or indifference yields slowly to the persistent hammering of the facts of his own experience and of contemporary history. Upon his sophomoric certainties is cast the shadow of terrible happenings―whole nations in the grip of terror, starved, maimed or killed through no fault of their own, pawns in the bloody game of men lustful for wealth and power, crushed under the heels of dictators. An amorphous idealism or, on the other hand, a precocious cynicism is no longer adequate to meet the vast problems which daily present themselves before his eyes.

Did he use to write on poetry and philosophy, expatiate on the beauty of life and the splendor of human brotherhood? If so, he soon begins to realize that

T

he was merely echoing what he had read in books, for the book of life conveys a different message altogether.

In his heart is no longer merely the exultation over art and nature and living; in his heart is a deep compassion for the sufferings of the oppressed and anger at their oppressors.

Not that he has become blind to the beauty of nature and the works of man; it is only that he has begun to relate his ideas and every important thing that happens to some definite principles of beauty and justice and truth. His eyes have pierced through the veil of deception with which so much of the face of life that is ugly is covered. He has begun to pursue truth instead of phrases.

He is no longer a florist, scissors in hand, gathering lovely blossoms; he has become a tiller of the soil, spade in hand, digging into the roots of things and planting seeds.

This is the usual course of a writer’s literary development. There is no more dramatic illustration of this process than the case of former Director Teodoro Kalaw of the National Library, who, like so many of the outstanding leaders of the older generation, started his career as a newspaperman. His autobiography contains a candid confession which shows the inevitable change that occurs in the attitude and temper of the sensitive writer as he grows older in experience and wisdom.

Mr. Kalaw, it seems, was something of a “columnist” in the early days of his employment on the staff of that famous newspaper of the transition, El Renacimiento He writes: “I must have written my first news items very badly because Guerrero made innumerable corrections on them... My literary reading had not predisposed me to prosaic journalism, which I considered as ephemeral as a wind-blown leaf, but to writing as an art, as an expression of the beautiful. I soon became what today is known as a columnist; but my column was literary, and I made no attempt to comment on political and moral matters as is usual today. My column, written daily, contained short rambling paragraphs on philosophy, literature, love, dreams, illusions, and other such abstractions. To me, in those youthful days, the allimportant consideration was style―the discovery of the beautiful word for the beautiful thought.”

Nor was he unmindful of the adulation of the ladies, for he admits with a disarming frankness: “In common with the rest of the journalists in the office, my secret desire was to have the young ladies avidly peruse my column, and in truth, the column was all the rage among our society girls, who considered my writing piquant and intriguing.”

Yet it was not long before Columnist Kalaw outgrew his Flaubertian preoccupation over the discovery of “the beautiful word for the beautiful thought.”Soon enough he was drawn out of his Ivory Tower of “pure literature” into the social and political currents swirling about him. He says: “Sociological themes greatly inspired me to

more writings. We were then passing a period of real historical transition. Everything was being subjected to change―customs, laws, language, social practices.”

Kalaw, the idealist, romantic and aesthete, had become aware that society had a claim on his attention, and he was not unwilling to oblige. He began writing seriously on political and social questions, criticizing what he believed to be the evils brought about by the American regime, bemoaning the degeneration of the “Filipino Soul,” attacking the abuses of the Constabulary.

When, several years later, he became editor of El Renacimiento, he was one of the principal defendants in the most spectacular libel suit that this country has yet known. Growing out of the strong spirit of nationalism and the universal aspiration for independence from America, this celebrated case may be said to have marked the full intellectual maturity of the young literary journalist, fancier of beautiful thoughts couched in beautiful words.

Having traveled the weary road from the Ivory Tower to jail, he had learned that the only true basis of lasting beauty in literature is―power.

---------There are two perilous roads open to the heedless young writer. One road leads to indifferentism and the other to misanthropy. The writer becomes a confirmed indifferentist either because he is ignorant and does know better or because, knowing better, he believes sincerely, if erroneously, that the things which men live by are beyond the interests of his art. And a writer becomes a cynic and a misanthrope because the waters of his spirit that were once clear and sparkling have become muddied by personal disappointment, weakness of will or intellectual confusion.

Indifferentism is usually an inherent vice, and there is little that can be done to correct it. If it arises from ignorance, it may be possible to apply the remedy of instruction, but if it arises from a twisted point of view, the vice usually runs so deep that all who are thus afflicted may as well be counted lost to the cause of moving and militant speech.

On the other hand, only those men suffer from cynicism and misanthropy who possess a profound and sensitive spirit and who, somewhere along the road, received some injury in the heart or in the will or in the mind. Their affliction is not necessarily incurable.

Since it is almost certain to have been caused, in the first place, by a faulty understanding of the basic principles that underlie human existence, it can be cured by helping the writer stand firmly upon some indestructible faith. For a sensitive spirit is easily prone to cynicism and misanthropy unless it is reinforced by the steel on undeviating principle. Spiritual sensitiveness becomes a vice only when it is not married to toughmindedness.

Although the dogma of “Art for Art’s sake” LITERATURE AND SOCIETY, p. 10

Photos from http://www.adb.org/media/Articles/2002/791_Philippines_STEP-UP_Program/Scan1868.jpg, http://nimg.sulekha.com/others/original700/philippines-poverty-2009-8-25-4-40-46.jpg, and http://streetkidspm.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/filipinos-in-poverty.jpg.

By Salvador P. Lopez

10

FORUM July-August 2011

HOLDING THE CENTER, from p. 2 As it was the police and military were eager to enter the university campus and to disperse and remove the Communards with brute force.

SP Lopez and UP’s democratization Lopez was not solely concerned with national issues. He was also committed to the transformation of UP as an authentic democratic institution despite the ascendancy of authoritarianism in Philippine society. At about the same time that he was making it clear to both its constituencies as well as the larger society that UP would be both the country’s prime intellectual resource as well as the defender of its people’s rights, Lopez was putting in place the mechanisms of democratic consultation in the university.

Among these were the Department, College and Staff Personnel Committees, as well as the College Executive Boards through which wider faculty and staff participation in decision- making at the department and college levels would be possible. Lopez also assured student representation in, among others, the student publication through student participation in the selection of its editor, and the holding of student council elections at the earliest time. The mechanisms of democratic consultation have since then remained in place in UP among the major and lasting legacies of SP Lopez’s democratic outlook.

The martial law period tested SP Lopez’s libertarian and activist outlook most. The chief dangers to UP at that time were its potential transformation into a mouthpiece of the martial law administration through acquiescence with government policies including the dismissal of activist professors and students, and therefore the loss of its academic freedom. Lopez very early on showed that he would resist all such efforts, despite the reality of authoritarian rule.

Concerned over their welfare, SP Lopez visited within days of their arrest UP faculty members who had been detained upon the declaration of martial law on September 23, 1972. He assured them that those who were released with no charges being filed against them would not be dropped from the faculty rolls. Lopez had proposed this policy to the Board of Regents (BOR), and the BOR had adopted it.

SP Lopez and my release from political detention Upon my own release from six months’ detention, and with no charges having been filed, I discovered

that despite the BOR policy, I had nevertheless been dropped from the faculty rolls of the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS). When I went to see him to bring the matter to his attention, SP Lopez suggested that I move to the College (then Institute) of Mass Communication while at the same time being detailed at the Office of the UP President.

At this time SP Lopez was fighting to preserve the UP’s autonomy from the martial law administration.

He could not do anything about the infiltration by military agents of UP campuses and classrooms. But he succeeded in forging an agreement with the police and military in which, whether to arrest any student, member of the faculty or staff, or to intervene in any mass action banned by the martial law government, the police and the military would have to ask for the UP administration’s permission before they entered the campus. This agreement has remained in force since, as a landmark document that ironically was adopted during the martial law period.

SP Lopez further demonstrated his independence when he was invited to deliver the 1974 University of Hawaii’s Dillingham Lecture. He made it clear to me that he was “no drumbeater for the government,” and that in his lecture he intended to tell the truth no matter what the consequences, which, among others, could be his non-renewal as UP president come 1975.

SP Lopez approved with delight my draft of that lecture, which began, appropriately enough for a man of letters such as he, with a quick summary, through a quotation from William Butler Yeats’ “The Second Coming,” of the state of affairs in the Philippines under martial law: Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.

This of course was not the case with UP itself. In its darkest hours, the libertarian and activist UP President SP Lopez had managed to preserve the center and core of UP life: its independence, intellectual honesty and daring, and, as a result, its lasting commitment of service to the Filipino nation.

----------------Email the author at lteodoro2003@yahoo.com.

A scene from the protests outside Gate 4 of Malacañan and its vicinity on January 30. Photo was taken from The First Quarter Storm Library (http://fqslibrary.wordpress.com/).

LITERATURE AND SOCIETY, from p. 9 has been discredited in the minds of most thinking people everywhere, yet it survives in our days in a new disguise that makes it more difficult to identify properly and therefore to combat. The general condition of international chaos has, surprisingly enough, encouraged the revival of a dogma once favored by Oscar Wilde and the coterie of aesthetes who agreed with him.

This is easily explained. The universal fear of insecurity, chaos and war has had the effect of distorting the vision of a beautiful and orderly world that thirdrate artists as a rule are prone to affect. This fear has driven them into fashioning a comfortable philosophy of escape through the medium of which they hope to flee the ugly facts of life and the repulsive realities of the contemporary scene. Like frightened children they are overcome by fear of the dark and seek refuge in some untroubled Shangri-la of art.

To the challenge that they become socially conscious and that they take part in the political struggle, they answer: “The world is too much with us; we will have nothing to do with struggle. We conceive of art as an escape from the ugliness we see around us; we will henceforth consecrate ourselves to the expression of beautiful thoughts and the creation of beautiful things. Life is ugly enough as it is; therefore, we propose to make it more beautiful with the products of our imagination. Man being what he is, to attempt to change him or the world he lives in is bound to be a futile enterprise. Art is a method of escape; it is an end in itself, never a means to an end. The pen was made for purposes utterly different from the sword; we refuse to be artists in uniform.” The argument will seem sound until we reflect that the highest form of art is that which springs from the wells of man’s deepest urges and longings―his love of his own kind and his longing to be free. Divest man of these interests, and he ceases to be what he is; the richest subject for observation, portrayal and study that the artist can have before him.

The opinion is still widely held that the artist and the man of letters should leave social agitation alone and stick to art, that it is not their business to help advance social justice and to defend democracy, but exclusively to paint a landscape, compose a song or write a sonnet.

Despite the fact that events in the modern world have made it increasingly difficult for artists to do their work, there are still those who fondly cling to the delusion that there is an Ivory Tower to which the worshipers of Beauty can retire from the madding crowd. Of course, there is no such tower, never has been. Those who imagine that they dwell in one are self-deceived, for deliberate isolation from the rest of the world and complete indifference to the fortunes of mankind on their part can only mean one thing: that they are incapable of profound thought and deep feeling and are therefore, to that extent, incapable also of great art.

Only greatness of heart and mind and soul can produce great art. But the development of man’s emotional, intellectual and spiritual qualities is impossible save his heart, mind and soul are enriched by fruitful contact with others. A man can know himself only through knowing others. To be self-centered is to be small in heart, narrow of mind, mean of soul.

Selfishness is the natural effect of a cynical and barren solitude, and the absolute divorcement of the artist from the world which alone can provide a large background for his work must result in mediocre or inferior achievement.

Nothing more thoroughly disproves the contention of the Art-for-Art-sakers than the facts of everyday life.

When artists and writers meet, do they talk of art and literature? Outsiders who attend their gatherings and listen to their conversation will be appalled to discover that for hours, they will talk of everything under the sun save only art and literature. These two things they will dismiss after one or two remarks on the latest books and an unusually good story that appeared the previous day. Then, inevitably it seems, the talk will veer to the arrant stupidities of public officials, the latest statement of President Quezon on social justice, national defense, the war, the coming elections, and even perhaps the LITERATURE AND SOCIETY, p. 13

FORUM July-August 2011 11

An ordinary man who lived an extraordinary life

By Celeste Ann Castillo Llaneta

G

reat moments, goes a historian’s maxim, call forth great leaders…UP’s embroilment in the 1930s independence bill debates…brought forth a Palma who proved himself a match for President Quezon. In the 1940s, the war-torn University summoned a Gonzalez…

And in the 1970s, under a repressive regime and amidst the unprecedented campus unrest that convulsed the University, rose Salvador Ponce Lopez…”

So goes the introductory paragraph to the essay on UP President Salvador P. Lopez, “The Conscientious Social Democrat,” in the book At the Helm of UP: Presidential Accents, edited by Dr. Helen E. Lopez, published by the Office of the Secretary of the University in 1999. Most people recall the greatness of SP Lopez in the context of his achievements, the challenges he had conquered and the mark he has left in the histories of both UP and the country. But to those who had known him, had worked with him and had spent part of their lives with him, SP Lopez’s greatness shines all the more because he was, before anything else, an ordinary human being who had chosen to live in an extraordinary way.

As “Editor” of the UP Newsletter Dr. Rosalinda Ofreneo, dean of the UP College of Social Work and Community Development, recalled her first job in UP: staff writer for the UP Information Office during the term of President SP Lopez. In fact, it was during his term that the UP Newsletter, the UP Systemwide campus news bulletin, was first published. Which was really no surprise, considering that “SP Lopez was a believer in community journalism, and how it can strengthen a c o m m u n i t y, ” UP President SP Lopez eating Ofreneo said, Lopez’s birth centennial. remembering the hectic days of newspaper printing using linotype instead of computers and modern-day printing presses, of spending nights at the printers overseeing the printing of the newsletters, of watching messengers from the UP Manila and UP Los Baños campuses stream into their office on the 4th floor of Quezon Hall to pick up bundles of the UP Newsletter to deliver to their home units. She also remembered how SP monitored UP publications for quality control—“he was very hands-on,” she said.

He would carefully read through the pages, praising the “good articles,” while the not-so-good ones or obvious journalistic mistakes would earn an arch remark of “¿Que pasa?”

“He was a writer first and foremost,” Ofreneo said, recalling how SP Lopez helped revive the UP Writers Club, whose membership consisted of the “elite” among the UP writers; when he left the UP presidency, the Club seemed to have lost its vitality as well. He also had a “cutting sense of humor.” Once, after perusing a souvenir program that featured black Grecian pillars as page borders, he commented dryly on how funereal it looked.

His skills in diplomacy were not limited only to ambassadorial functions and the halls of the United Nations. “He had a warmth about him, and he didn’t stand on formality. [When introduced to him] he’d shake your hand and make small talk” until you became comfortable around him, Ofreneo said. She recalled visiting his house,

along with other UP staff, and how they had spent time admiring the souvenirs and bric-a-brac he had collected from his travels abroad. “His house was like a museum.

He had collected a lot but his souvenirs were not tacky.

They were works of art,” she said.

“He loved beauty and the arts, and he was charming to the ladies, a true bon vivant.” Ofreneo also recalled SP Lopez’s fondness for all things French—the food, culture, music and sophistication. “I could see why his favorite song was ‘La Vie En Rose.’ And ‘Climb Every Mountain’ [from The Sound of Music], this song is also very SP. [It brings to mind] his climbing up from his very lowly background, as well as all the challenges he faced.”

He was also deeply courteous of others, regardless of rank, and was known for treating his staff equally and with respect. “He had his feet on the ground, even though he was one of the [so-called] elite,” she said. SP Lopez was a child of his generation, his consciousness shaped by his earliest experiences, from his humble beginnings which included having to walk barefoot to school to the turbulent struggle for Philippine independence and social justice during the 1930s. His hero was UP President

memories of SP Lopez go beyond that of boss and employee. In fact, when not in the office, Mang Miro ceased to address SP as “Sir,” and called him “Uncle” or “Tanda”—Elder—instead. “SP Lopez is my uncle.

My father is his first cousin,” Mang Miro said. “He is the eldest among us [in the clan].”

Mang Miro had worked for SP Lopez as a trusted member of the staff since Lopez’s days at the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA). When Lopez and his first wife, Maria Luna Lopez—or Auntie Maria to Mang Miro, his brother Pedro (who works for the UP Office of Alumni Relations), and their families—went to the US to serve as permanent representative of the Philippines to the UN and Philippine ambassador to the US, Mang Miro and his wife became caretakers of their residence. Mang Miro later worked as a civilian employee for the Philippine Navy; it was while he was working onboard a ship that time that he received a phone call from his uncle, then the new President of UP, inviting Mang Miro to come to UP and work for him again. And there in the OP Mang Miro stayed, with his wife as a staff member of the Executive House, serving eight UP presidents until his retirement during D r. E m e r l i n d a Roman’s term.

It is no surprise that one of Mang Miro’s earliest and sharpest memories of UP were of the student protests, the First Quarter Storm and the Diliman Commune—of the wave of angry students, led by Ericson Baculinao and others, barging into the president’s office, ripping the large oil portraits of the UP presidents off the wall and hurling these out of the second-storey window. “It was chaos back then,” with students at a cafeteria. Photo taken from the UP Vargas exhibit commemorating SP he recalled. “The students were so Rafael Palma who fought then Philippine President furious and so fearless.”

Standing in the middle of it all, like a lighthouse in Manuel Quezon in order to preserve the University’s a storm, was SP Lopez. In due time, Lopez managed academic freedom and institutional integrity. He would often write essays about how freedom can never be to earn the respect of most of the members of the UP sacrificed for development, and he would refer to Rafael community. “They supported SP Lopez because he in Palma as a roundabout way of underscoring the need turn would support them. When the call to rally went to challenge martial law during the Marcos period. SP out, he would rally with them. He would lead the way, he Lopez’s essays can still be found in the old issues of the would speak with the [police], he would join the students, the faculty, the administrative staff, marching all the way UP Newsletter.

He also genuinely cared for the welfare of the UP to Malacañang, along with his executive staff.” Mang students, and despite the chaos of the time, understood Miro credited SP Lopez’s experience as a soldier during where they were coming from. Indeed, he is most clearly World War II for his courage—first as 1st lieutenant on remembered as a president who kept the University the staff of General Douglas McArthur, then as executive together and stood firmly on the side of UP’s freedom and officer of the press relations section under Major Kenneth autonomy when these were most threatened by martial Saur, and as an active member of Marking’s Guerrillas. law, thus earning the respect of the studentry. Ofreneo “He was a soldier, so when he needed to fight, he fought. recalled seeing an old issue of the Philippine Collegian He would call them to rally, and rally they did. He earned with a caricature of SP Lopez posing a la the Oblation, the people’s affection that way; there were times when with head held up and arms outstretched, clothed in an after he spoke, they would applaud him.”

Mang Miro also remembered Lopez’s term as official-looking barong. But underneath the barong, he one where the salaries of the UP staff and faculty were wore the humble, rolled-up pants of a Filipino farmer. “I significantly improved. “He would ask his budget officer, think that’s how the students saw him,” she said, “as a ‘Do we have the money?’ If we did, he would grant the high academic official with his feet on the ground.” increase. That’s why people loved him; you can ask any As Clan Elder and Boss employee who remembers SP’s time.”

SP Lopez’s work habits were as simple and For Ramiro Ponce, retired staff member of the elegant as his tastes. He would go straight to the office, Office of the President (OP)—or Mang Miro, as he is AN ORDINARY MAN, p. 12 still known around the administrative offices of UP—his

12

FORUM July-August 2011

AN ORDINARY MAN, from p. 11 hold meetings, sign paper after paper, and tackle the myriad problems of the university with determined efficiency—all sans coffee break, as Mang Miro did not recall him drinking coffee at the office. When it came to solving problems, “he would try to solve these to the best of his ability. And if there is no solution, he will tell you straight. But he would do all that he could to solve them.” As to his detractors—and no UP president is without these—Lopez would make good use of his skills in diplomacy. “A little bit of flattery, trying to understand their point of view—you know how he was, the consummate diplomat.”

At home, Lopez would putter about in his garden— he took special pride in his fruit trees. Or he would listen to his LP collection of classical music, or read in his vast basement library. He also liked watching orchestra performances at the Philam auditorium, enjoyed his pinakbet as a genuine Ilocano would, and tended to save his wine collection for his visitors.

Mang Miro remembered the rules Lopez, the clan elder, set down: “When we’re at the office, never call me ‘Uncle’; address me as ‘Sir.’” And, “Love your work. When you are given a job to do, do it with love.”

And, “Trabaho Trabaho lang lang”—keep it professional. And finally, ““Huwag kang gagawa ng kalokohan, at huwag mong gagamitin ang pangalan ko.” These rules Mang Miro and his family have faithfully lived by. “He gave me my job. Because of him, we have a home here [in UP]. We wouldn’t be here without him. We owe him so much.”

As Suitor and Husband Mrs. Adelaida Escobar-Lopez, SP Lopez’s second wife with whom he shared his golden years, remembered meeting SP during the height of the student protests, with her as UP Education graduate student council president leading the charge against then Dean Felixberto Sta. Maria. One of the first things he said to her then was, “Madam President, I don’t like disruption of lives, disruption of classes and destruction of the physical structures.” “Sir, don’t worry, because we are mature and responsible student leaders,” she reassured him.

The escalating turmoil that turned the campus into a war zone neither stopped tender feelings from developing nor a poet/writer-turned-soldier-turned-

diplomat-turned-embattled university president from wooing a beautiful lady after the death of his wife. He knew her by her nickname, “Del of the UP College of Education,” which was enough to serve as a password for students to gain audience with the President. He wooed her with wining and dining, with dancing on rooftops, with gifts of perfume, and with sweet words and sonnets and tales of legendary lovers Heloise and Abelard—although Mrs. Lopez confessed to being puzzled by his behavior at the time. It was during a luncheon date that he said to her: “When I became a widower, I went abroad to find the golden egg, only to find it here.”

“Isn’t that lovely? So poetic. And all I could say was, ‘Talaga, Sir?’” Mrs. Lopez said. She admitted to calling him by the respectful “Sir” up until the moment they were wed.

Later, while sitting on opposite ends of the couch at his house, he finally popped the question. Mrs. Lopez recalled responding with “Are you sure, Sir?” and again, “Are you sure?”

“He was older than I, a man of stature and consequence while I was an ordinary businesswoman (in her fifties),” she said. “I told him, ‘If this relationship will push through, I want it to be based on understanding, fidelity and cooperation.’”

“Of course!” he said. To which she gave him her answer: “Sir, may I use your bathroom?”

And later still, when he surprised her with a kiss, she exclaimed, “Sir, wait! Why?!” “No, Del,” he replied cheekily. “You should have said, ‘Sir! Why wait?’”

That whirlwind courtship resulted in a simple, private wedding ceremony officiated by none other than the late Jaime Cardinal Sin himself. Mrs. Lopez’s daughter from her first husband, Eternity, perhaps gave the best blessing of all when she said to SP: “If you love my mom so much, then it’s okay for you to marry her].” Years later, after SP Lopez’s death, Eternity would extract a promise from her mother to never remarry and to remain instead Mrs. SP Lopez, a promise Mrs. Lopez has kept.

She told stories about the many little things about SP Lopez: How he loved chocolate, ice cream, and Digman Halo-halo. How he adhered and made everyone else adhere to proper diplomatic etiquette even at home, such as instituting the rule of no sando during meals. How he preferred his meals with at least two viands and two choices of fruit, otherwise he would thump the table with his cutlery to protest the lack of “substantial food.” How during get-togethers he and his fraternity brothers would talk as if Upsilon Sigma Phi was the only fraternity existing in UP. How he would disdain the

first drafts of speeches written by Upsilonian brod and then Vice-President Salvador Laurel, which he would edit, as “freshman English again.” How he would respond to his wife’s occasional indulgences in hyperbole with a muttered ““Ay ay ay,” and to statements that miff him with “Crazy.” And how he never went anywhere without his Del. “I believe that our getting married was God’s plan for SP and me,” Mrs. Lopez said, As the years passed, SP Lopez would find a renewed devotion to the church and the Virgin Mary, something that gave joy to his wife. In turn, Mrs. Lopez admitted to the mellowing of her own “satanic temper and acid tongue.” True to Cardinal Sin’s prediction when he insisted on officiating their wedding, theirs was a marriage that lasted. “And on my last birthday he spent with me, he said, ‘Darling, I will love you beyond the grave.’”

SP Lopez: One good man If there’s one thing the youth of today can learn from SP Lopez, Ofreneo said it is his “love for the life of the mind. You can really see that he was a very educated man, highly cultured, and always interested in what was going on around him. That kind of academic curiosity and genuine interest…made him a true humanist. He had a broad appreciation for life, for the sensual and for what is beautiful.

And in terms of writing, (he had) passion for quality and excellence, and for really propagating what he believed in—liberal education, tolerance, and in making sure that the university is free to explore all possibilities and all universities to really be free to speak their minds.”

Despite the trouble that fell upon his lap before he had barely warmed the UP president’s chair, SP Lopez never expressed any regret in taking on what some have described as one of the most difficult positions in the country, especially coming from the peaceful and relatively cushy job of Philippine representative to the UN and ambassador to the US. Quite the opposite, in fact. “He accepted the position because he considered it an honor,” Mang Miro said. “He used to say, ‘Back in the day I was a student of UP. Now I’m the president. As an alumnus of UP, it is an honor to serve [as president].’ He did it for love of UP.” “He was a good and honest man. A man of integrity,” Mrs. Lopez said. The stories of SP Lopez— how he refused to artificially lower the price range of a piece of land he was selling because he “wanted to pay the proper taxes to the government,” how he turned down the luxury car given to ambassadors because he did not want to be beholden to anyone, how he prized honesty, honor and integrity in all his dealings—these are the stories that resonate as one mentions the name SP Lopez.

As part of his last wishes, she said that he wanted his epitaph to read: “Here lies a man who did not dirty his name with a dirty cent.”

These words might well be the highest tribute any person can hope to live for.

----------------Email the author at forum@up.edu.ph,

Left: Mrs. Adelaida Escobar-Lopez beside the portrait of SP Lopez. Middle photo: Mang Miro and his wife, Pacita. Right: UP CSWCD Dean Rosalinda Ofreneo.

FORUM July-August 2011 13 ROUNDTABLE, from p. 3 these unconventional classroom methods to prosper. In fact, under the leadership of UP President SP Lopez, faculty members and students were inspired and encouraged to critically question the Marcos regime. Unlike today, there was no rift between the administration, the faculty and the students of UP then. They were united in the struggle against everything unjust that the Marcos regime represented.

Coming from an exclusive Catholic girls’ school, I found all of that shocking, although nonetheless stimulating. In an effort to belong, I had cautiously joined in a handful of protests and rallies then, hiding these extracurricular activities from my parents. But alas, given their

ability to spy on their own children, my parents had to take extreme measures to ensure that I was home when I had no classes.

In less than three months in my first year in college, martial law was declared on September 21, 1972.

The more vocal faculty members and student activists were arrested without warrant and covertly tortured, or went underground, or disappeared. The Marcos regime instilled a culture of fear in the campus. Classes for the rest of the semester were therefore suspended. Faculty members were instructed to give “S” or “U” final grades, instead of numerical final grades, for that semester. By the start of the second semester in 1972, a semblance of fragile normalcy that further underscored terror ensued.

LITERATURE AND SOCIETY, from p. 10 latest piece of scandal.

Go through the history of literature and you will find that the greatest writers are ever those whose feet were planted solidly on the earth regardless of how high up in the clouds their heads might have been. This is not to say, however, that great writing must pertain to some department of propaganda. Propaganda is written with the definite object of influencing people to believe or to do something. While there are a few books which have survived the immediate motive of propaganda that inspired them, yet one can say truly that the bulk of literary works of permanent value consists of those that are neither pure propaganda nor pure art but which are in some way deeply rooted in the earth of human experience.

If somebody should point to Shakespeare as an example of the pure artist, it would only be necessary to show that Shakespeare was neither an aesthete shrinking in a corner nor a self-satisfied person too complacent to bother about the problems of his time. The period in which he lived was one of the most active that mankind has seen. Exploration and discovery, science and invention, art and letters―all these activities were being carried on at a high pitch.

The pall of the Dark Ages had just been lifted, and the minds of men were once again free and venture-some.

Since Shakespeare had one of the keenest minds of his time and was a contemporary of Francis Bacon, it is impossible for a man of his deep and sensitive nature not to have been stirred by the ideas and movements of the age.

The life of Emile Zola is the perfect refutation of the belief that the great artist is a gaunt, solitary being forever immersed in visions of deathless beauty, untouched by questions of pain, poverty, injustice, and oppression. In the beginning, you have a young sensitive artist, quick to anger against social injustice and political corruption. A time comes when his books bring him wealth and fame, and he forgets his antecedents, saying to justify himself: Well, I have fought my battles. I don’t see why I should not enjoy my life as it is. As for those who are condemned to live in the gutter, there is nothing anybody can do about them anyway.

Then, suddenly, in the midst of this smugness, the Dreyfus case bursts upon France, and Zola is drawn into it. The old fire in his heart burns again, and he fights as he never fought before. When the battle is won and a great wrong has been righted, he has learned to say: The individual does not matter; only society does. I thought that my work was done; now I know that it has only started. The world must be made over for the humble and the wretched.

The choice for the writers of the Philippines is clear. Will they spin tales and string verses in an Ivory Tower? Will they fiddle while Rome burns? Will they dwell in a vacuum? Or will they, without forgetting that art must make its appeal to man through beauty and power, rather do their work in the world of men,

And so began the double-edged life of UP—aboveground silence and underground protests.

The 39 th anniversary of the declaration of martial law will be remembered this year. Upon reflection, while I never met SP Lopez, this UP president was apparently a true freedom fighter. In fact, he passionately espoused freedom of expression, perhaps brought about by his being a creative writer. SP Lopez did not merely fight for the abstract concept of freedom; he saw it to its actual and concrete fruition. He was the symbol of academic freedom and its attendant responsibilities, as stated in the country’s Constitution. SP Lopez was the UP student’s model of independent and critical thinking, bywords of the martial law days.

breathing the air we breathe, thinking of the problems that puzzle us, lending the vision and genius with which they are dowered to their ultimate solution?

---------Poetry is probably the oldest form of literature.

On the one hand, it is akin to song on which form primitive man sought to preserve the remembrance of his heroic past. On the one hand, it is akin to magic by means of which he sought to preserve himself from evil spirits through incantation and to win the favor of the beneficent deities through praise and prayer.

Thus primitive man may be said to have stumbled upon literature, if he did not purposely fashion it as an instrument primarily functional in character. It may be stretching the point too far to say that with him art was a purely utilitarian device, but it seems logical to suppose that the natural economy of his life was such that it did not easily encourage indulgence in activities of an artificial, superfluous or useless character.

When he fashioned a stone ax, it was to facilitate the securing of his daily food, and when he sang, danced, or chanted poetry it was not merely to fill an idle hour with pleasurable excitement but to invoke the favors of his gods.

As it was with primitive man, so it is with him who has not fallen into the error of regarding civilization as a process of enfeeblement and deterioration. Indeed, the dogma of Art for Art’s sake is the mark of a decadent generation, advanced and defended most stoutly by those who have irretrievably lost something of the vitality of nature through vicious self-indulgence or by those who have been tainted in the blood by some inherent vice.

Undoubtedly, there are men in every generation who will create for their own sake beautiful things which is our duty to treasure. But these artists represent an aberration from the normal course of nature, and if we confer upon them the name of genius, it is genius of a decidedly inferior category. Thus Shakespeare is a greater artist than Christopher Marlowe, Shelly then Keats, Walt Whitman than Edgar Allan Poe. Shakespeare, Shelley and Whitman achieved more than mere beauty in their works; they were, in a fashion that is not to be confused with crude instruction, teachers of men.

If poetry originated as a functional activity, prose as such is even more frankly utilitarian in character.

Prose is of the world; it is too early to serve as a vehicle of pure fancy. And the greatest masters of prose are those who have employed it in the service principally of reason and secondarily only of the imagination, those who have used it for what Matthew Arnold has called the “criticism of life.” Thus the man who wrote Job was a greater artist than he who wrote the Song of Songs, and the author of Ecclesiastes than he who wrote the Psalms. So, too, Swift is the greater master of prose than Charles Lamb, Thomas Huxley than Stevenson, and in our own day, Bertrand Russell than Christopher Morley, Theodore Dreiser than Branch Cabell. The former are smiths of ideas as the latter are smiths of language; as the latter have the talent

Unusual in a culture of parochialism, SP Lopez defied his fellow Ilokano, then Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, and refused to kowtow to the dictatorial edicts and orders of the latter, particularly those that suppressed academic freedom.

In the same manner that he inspired and encouraged the UP constituency to protect the autonomy of the university from the unjust restrictions of martial law, he as UP president instituted the autonomy of campuses that now compose the UP System.

I am not too certain about the idea of continuing the legacy of SP Lopez in UP. I think that the confluence of historical and current events have in fact already assured the legacy of this great Filipino.

to fashion the perfect phrase, so have the former the power to impart the stirring thought. Language with the latter seems almost to be an end in itself, a device of pleasure; with the former it is a means to an end, an instrument of ideas.

In the end, what really interests the writer, granting that he recognizes the value of social content in literature, is some sort of assurance that his writing will result in something that he can lay his hands on as good and useful. For certainly he has a right to expect that, having acceded to the demands of society upon his talent, certain measurable benefits will flow from his work wholly distinct from the purely subjective satisfaction that is his birthright as an artist and which comes naturally with the act of creative expression.

The question is easily answered. The writer who has once admitted to himself that the problems of society are his proper meat and drink has come to a point where merely technical problems have become of small account compared to the ultimate problem which he presumed to have already answered for himself; namely, whether there is such a thing as progress, and whether it is within the capacity of man ever to achieve progress.

Now, a writer either believes in progress or he does not. He either believes that man is improvable because he has the innate capacity to correct his errors or he is convinced that man is eternally damned beyond any possibility of redemption. All that we have said about writers is meant only for those who believe in progress, not that we would withhold from the others the name of writer, but that these have excluded themselves by nature or by choice from a calling which is essentially an endeavor of hope.

Progress, then, is the first article in the creed of the writer of whom we have been speaking. He believes that civilization, despite evident reverses, is forever picking up and moving forward. He believes, finally, that he has a place in this scheme of universal progress and that whatever he can do to help is a worthy contribution to the upward movement of life.

We are not forgetting, despite the emphasis on “social content,” that we are speaking of literature and not propaganda. The challenge which we ask the intelligent writer to meet is not a challenge to beat the drums and to blow the trumpet for progress. We are only reminding him that of all the ends to which he may dedicate his talents, none is more worthy than the improvement of the condition of man and the defense of his freedom.

Nor need the writer feel that he is being compelled to become a social reformer rather than an artist.

Whatever the writer’s conception of his craft may be, he can safely cling to the principle that literature is the imaginative representation of life and nature, and upon this principle honestly build his achievement. If he is sincere and if he has the ability, he need have no fear that he will become a purveyor of propaganda and lose caste as a creative artist.

14

FORUM July-August 2011

SP Lopez and the Mentoring of Tom Inglis Moore*

By Jose Wendell P. Capili

T

he development of creative writing1 as an academic discipline at the University of Iowa had its effects on the emergence of Filipino writers from English like former University of the Philippines (UP) President Salvador P. Lopez.2 In 1927, Sydney and Oxfordeducated Australian poet and critic Tom Inglis Moore accepted an instructorship in English at Iowa when professional writers also began coming to campus through writer-in-residence programs.3 Moore’s experience at Iowa served him well by the time he handled creative writing and literature courses at UP.

UP and University of Iowa The University of Iowa conducted the first-ever complete course in creative writing in 1897. During that time, a course in verse making included “practice in metrical composition in the fixed forms of verse such as the heroic couplet, Spenserian stanza, ode, rondeau, sonnet, ballad and song…analysis of the best examples of these forms in Left: SP Lopez. Right: Tom Inglis Moore as UP Associate Professor (1928). He later taught the very first class in Australian Literature at the Canberra University College in 1954. 32 English poetry…informal discussions of artistic questions.” In 1922, Iowa profession. When I came to UP, my first intention began accepting creative works for advanced degrees.4 about these is that Moore’s former UP students became had been to take up medicine. Later, I was attracted Three years later (1925), Iowa’s teaching staff coined the pioneering figures in the development of creative writing to philosophy and the sciences. It was Moore who phrase “creative writing.”5 Since then, the term has been and literary/cultural studies in the Philippines.13 These sharpened my love for English.20 picked up by many English and Literature departments students included the highly acclaimed writer Jose Garcia Other former students of Moore in UP were in the United States and elsewhere. Moore must have Villa and SP Lopez who became president of UP from Bienvenido Gonzalez, UP President from 1939 to 1943 been influenced by Edwin Ford Piper, professor of poetry 1969 to 1975.

Lopez enjoyed an illustrious career as a journalist, and 1945 to 1951; Arturo Tolentino, the former senator at Iowa from 1905 to 1939, when the latter espoused an aesthetic that embraced a “commitment to regional creative writer, war veteran, diplomat and university who became Ferdinand Marcos’ running mate for vicethemes that could stimulate pride in the region and administrator. After earning his Bachelor of Arts (BA) president prior to the People Power Revolt in 1986; empower its citizens.”6 For his workshops at Iowa, Piper and Master of Arts (MA) degrees at the University of fictionist and medical doctor Arturo Rotor; Jose M. also popularized a type of informal atmosphere William the Philippines, Lopez immediately became a journalist. Hernandez who was later educated at Notre Dame and Herbet Carruth recommended in his book Verse Writing: He was associate editor of The Leader, managing editor became a professor of literature and head of the English A Practical Handbook for College Classes and Private of Commonwealth Advocate, writer of Herald Midweek Department of the University of Santo Tomas (UST) in Guidance where “attendance is optional…read the Magazine and editorial writer of the Herald.14 As Manila before World War II; Loreto Paras-Sulit; Paz stories and poems and essays…written for the comments vice-president of the Philippine Writers League, Lopez Latorena who pioneered the teaching of creative writing of one another and of our leader…something to praise, co-organized the first Filipino Writers Conference in UST; Angela Manalang Gloria; Fernando Leaňo; something to blame.“7 When Moore became an associate on February 26, 1940 where he provoked the first Casiano Calalang; Jose Lansang Sr.; Federico Mangahas; professor at the UP English Department from 1928 to great literary debate in the Philippines by privileging Conrado Pedroche; Hilarion Vibal; Maria Luna-Lopez; 1931, he conducted creative writing classes using the proletarian literature (along with fictionist Arturo Rotor) Juan Cabreros Laya; Roberto Regala who later became over “art for art’s sake.”15 Shortly before the bombing ambassador to Australia; Adeudato Agbayani who later system Piper had developed.8 Moore introduced the largely student-centered of Pearl Harbor, Lopez bagged the First Commonwealth became press attache at the Philippine Embassy in creative writing workshop method popularized by Literary Awards Grand Prize for his essay “Literature and Canbera; Manuel Arguilla who was arguably the most the professors at Iowa. Former Senator Maria Kalaw Society” in 1940.16 Soon after, he became first lieutenant highly regarded Filipino fictionist before World War Katigbak who was a student of Moore remembered how on the staff of General Douglas MacArthur as copy and II until he joined the underground movement and was he gathered students under pine trees and read poetry.9 scriptwriter for MacArthur’s public relations section executed by the Japanese Imperial Army; and Stanfordeducated Amador T. Daguio who dedicated The Flaming Literary historians Josephine Bass Serrano and Trinidad during World War II. As a diplomat immediately after the war, Lopez Lyre, his first collection of poems, to Moore.21 Ames observed that Moore poured “tone and spirit in Though he was never given the opportunity to study Philippine letters” and “a strong wave of liberal ideas became chair of the UN Commission on Human Rights; (that) took possession of the writers’ ideas”. As reflected Philippine ambassador to France, Belgium, Netherlands under Moore, Leopoldo Yabes who went on to become in “Typhoons and April Showers,”10 Moore urged and Switzerland (1955-1962); Philippine secretary a groundbreaking Philippine Studies scholar and chair Filipinos writing in English to “learn not only to write of Foreign Affairs (1963-1964) and, interestingly, of the English, Filipino and Humanities departments with English but also to write against it…fight against co-architect of Maphilindo.17 He was then appointed at the UP, remembered how Inglis Moore was highly the meanings of which are not applicable here…write university professor of English and the 11th UP president regarded by his former students many years after he left English without becoming an Englishman or American. from 1969 to 1975 during the most tumultuous period the Philippines in 1931. Moore stayed in the Philippines In adopting the Anglo-Saxon language, (the Filipino of student activism and dictatorship under Philippine for two weeks upon his return in February 1948 where he writer)…has to guard against adopting Anglo-Saxon President Ferdinand Marcos.18 After Marcos was met his former students like Federico Mangahas (private ideas, feelings and customs which are not true for the overthrown in 1986, President Corazon Aquino appointed secretary and speechwriter of Vice-President and, later, Lopez to be Philippine permanent representative to the President Elpidio Quirino) and Bienvenido Gonzalez Philippines or for himself.”11 United Nations in New York from 1986 to 1988.

(UP president ) as well as younger generations of Filipino SP Lopez and Moore In an interview with Doreen G. Fernandez and writers like Yabes.22 In Manila, Moore also met Jose P. Moore’s vision partly directed the course of Edilberto N. Alegre on November 24, 1981, Lopez Laurel (president of the Japanese-sponsored Philippine Philippine writing in English before World War II. As said that he shifted from medicine to philosophy and Republic during World War II) and Emilio Aguinaldo adviser of the UP Writers’ Club with Robert J. Conklin, humanities upon the advice of Moore. Aside from (president of the First Philippine Republic in 1898).Later, Moore encouraged “daily informal affairs at the office creative writing courses, Moore also taught the young UP officials hosted a lunch in Moore’s honor. Toward of the Philippine Collegian where the members swap Lopez advanced literature courses “from Chaucer to the tail-end of his Philippine sojourn, Moore delivered views about style and technique and the new things in Kipling….Elizabethan literature….Romantic literature a well-attended lecture on Australian literature before literature, and criticize mercilessly each other’s works… and Victorian literature.”19 Lopez said: members of the UP Literature Society and The Philippine The Literary Apprentice, now on its fourth volume has I had an Australian professor of English, Tom Women’s Writers’ Association.23 Moore’s Manila visit always aimed at quality from whatever source—from Inglis Moore, who died recently in Canberra. was covered prominently by the national media. In one the professional or student staff.”12 What is significant To him, I owe my detour to an English-based TOM INGLIS MOORE, p. 19

FORUM July-August 2011 15

Honoring SP Lopez in 2011

By Judy M. Taguiwalo (Editor’s note: This article is based on Dr. Taguiwalo’s welcome remarks at the SP Lopez Birth Centennial Program and Photo Exhibit last May 27 at the Vargas Museum, UP Diliman. Taguiwalo is chair of the SP Lopez Birth Centennial Committee formed

by UP President Alfredo Pascual.)

May 27 marks the birth centennial of Salvador Ponce Lopez, 11th President of the University of the Philippines. One hundred years after his birth, over 35 years after the end of his term as UP President and 18 years after his death, it is fitting to pay tribute to him and to the continuing relevance of his institutional innovations in our enduring quest for a university whose excellence is in the service of the Filipino people.

UP previously honored President Lopez with a testimonial program on November 22, 1990 under then UP President Jose Abueva and with the necrological services on October 20, 1993 under then UP President Emil Javier. The testimonials and eulogies on his life and work given in these occasions have been preserved in official publications of the university.

Lopez’s accomplishments as writer, journalist, diplomat are varied and outstanding. UP’s commemoration of his birth centennial takes these into account. But the main focus of the celebration is on Lopez’s contribution to the strengthening of the university as the premier institution of higher learning in the country at a period of intense social awakening and social conflicts. The SP Lopez presidency is so well characterized as “a presidency responsive not only of the demands of its constituents but also to the aspirations of the Filipino people, most of all, their assertion of freedom. Thus, though encompassing the most turbulent years in the history of the university his administration would nonetheless emerge as one of the most democratic and relevant presidency.”

The centennial commemoration of SP Lopez’s birth acknowledges the democratic thrust of his presidency by the fact that the commemoration would involve faculty, students, administrative staff and REPS who are all represented in the centennial committee created

by UP’s 20th President, Alfredo Pascual.

I was an undergraduate student when SP Lopez

became UP president and my undergraduate diploma bears his signature. I was in the midst of some of the major historic events that confronted SP when he became President. Barely into his first month in office, SP was faced with a general strike on February 4, 1969 when students, faculty and staff presented him with 77 demands. The First Quarter Storm of 1970 occurred during the first anniversary of his Presidency and he did not hesitate to lead the UP faculty in a march to Malacañan Palace to protest the violence inflicted on the students. At the historic Diliman Commune from February 2 to 9, 1971 he stood with the UP community in defending the university from military incursions.

Now reading his writings and writings on him, I realize once again how committed he was to protecting the integrity of the university; how well he understood the wellspring of student activism; how hard he worked for ensuring democratic governance of the university and how desirous he was of linking the university’s academic mandate with service to the people.

Let us honor SP Lopez by being faithful to his vision of a university in the service of the Filipino people.

TOM INGLIS MOORE, p. 18 news article, The Manila Times (Manila’s first English language daily) described Moore to unfamiliar readers as an “old timer” and a prominent member of Manila’s Pre-World War II intellectual community.24 During his interview with Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU) Prof. Doreen Gamboa-Fernandez and former UP Prof.

Edilberto Alegre, Yabes summed up what many people thought of Moore right after his post-World War II Manila visit: “And there was a very interesting Australian teacher who had graduated from Oxford—Tom Inglis Moore.”25 By the time Moore left Manila in 1931 to look after his ailing father in Ellensville, New South Wales, his former students became luminaries in various disciplines as well as recipients of scholarships and fellowships from the 1930s to the 1980s as students or panelists in Philippine and international writers workshops hosted by universities in Manila and Dumaguete in the Philippines and Iowa, Washington, Michigan, Massachusetts, California and Kansas, among other places in the United States.26 Manila became a frequent Asian hub and a popular venue for meetings of Southeast Asian artists, writers and scholars.27 F. Sionil Jose recalled how Manila was Southeast Asia’s most modern, most progressive city from the 1900s until the 1970s. Students from the region flocked to many of the city’s schools and universities.28 Wang Gungwu (who authored Pulse, the very first

published collection of poetry in English in Malaysia and Singapore in 1950 long before he became an eminent historian) visited Manila in 1950 to attend a creative writing conference-workshop conducted by Filipino novelist NVM Gonzalez.29 Wang Gungwu recalled his contemporaries, notably the prize-winning Filipino poet and dramatist Virginia Moreno who benefited from the legacy of UP teachers who studied under Moore.30 Wang Gungwu also recalled that with funding and support from American companies and institutions, many Filipino writers were more fortunate to gain access to creative writing and literature programs in American universities.

Many of these writers, some turned out to be former students of Moore, returned to the Philippines to develop or produce what became groundbreaking achievements in creative writing, literary, social and cultural studies, very much like SP Lopez.31 ----------------Email the author at jwpcapili@gmail.com.

11 Tom Inglis Moore, “Typhoons and April Showers,” 707.

12 Philippinesian (Annual Publication of the University of the Philippines) (1931).

13 Philippinesian, 1931 ; Gemino H. Abad and Edna Z. Manlapaz, eds., Man of Earth:An Anthology of Filipino Poetry and Verse from English 1905 to the Mid-50s (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1989). Leopoldo Yabes, “Jose Garcia Villa’s Signifi cance in Philippine Poetry” in Contemporary Poets of the English Language, ed. Rosalie Murphy (London: St. James, 1970;1985).

14 National Historical Institute, Filipinos in History (Manila: National Historical Institute 1994), Vol. IV, 192-194.

15 Gemino H. Abad and Edna Z. Manlapaz, Man of Earth: An Anthology of Filipino Poetry and Verse from English 1905 to the mid-50s (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1989), 388. Doreen G. Fernandez and Edilberto N. Alegre, The Writer and His Milieu (Manila: De La Salle University Press, 1984), 154-178.

16 Gemino H. Abad and Edna Z. Manlapaz, Man of Earth, 1989:388.

17 Confederation of Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia (1963).

18 National Historical Institute, Filipinos in History (Manila: National Historical Institute 1994), Vol. IV, 192-194.

19 Doreen G. Fernandez and Edilberto N. Alegre, The Writer and His Milieu (Manila: De La Salle University Press, 1984), 159.

20 Fernandez and Alegre, The Writer and His Milieu, 158.

21 Amador Daguio, The Flaming Lyre (Manila: Craftsman House, 1959). Gemino H. Abad and Edna Z. Manlapaz, Man of Earth (1989), 368.

22 “Bristling Bankrupt”, Time Magazine, November 6, 1950.

23 Pacita Alexander and Elizabeth Perkins, A Love Affair with Australian Literature: The Story of Tom Inglis Moore (Charnwood, A.C.T.: Lake Ginninderra Press, 2004), 130131.

24 The Manila Times, February 24, 1948. Raul Pertierra, Eduardo F. Ugarte, Alicia Pingol, Joel Hernandez and Nikos Lexis Dacanay, Txt-ing Selves: Cellphones and Philippine Modernity (Manila: De La Salle University Press, 2002).

25 Doreen G. Fernandez and Edilberto N. Alegre, The Writer and His Milieu: An Oral History of First Generation Writers in English (Manila: De La Salle University Press, 1984), 313.

26 See Fernandez and Alegre, The Writer and His Milieu (1984). Gemino H. Abad and Edna Z. Manlapaz, eds., Man of Earth: An Anthology of Filipino Poetry and Verse from English 1905 to the Mid-50s (1989). Interview with Wang Gungwu at The East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore, July 12, 2005.

27 Interview with Wang Gungwu at The East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore, July 12, 2005.

28 Interview with Philippine National Artist F. Sionil Jose at Solidaridad Bookshop, Ermita, Manila, June 21, 2004.

Interview with Wang Gungwu at The East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore, July 12, 2005.

29 Gonzalez taught at the University of the Philippines, University of Santo Tomas, Philippine Women’s University (PWU), University of Washington, University of California, Berkeley, University of California, Los Angeles and California State University-Hayward, where he was Emeritus Professor.

30 Interview with Wang Gungwu, July 12, 2005. Wang Gungwu, “Ethnic Chinese: The Past in their Future” in Diasporic Chinese Ventures: The Life and Work of Wang Gungwu, eds. Gregor Benton and Hong Liu (London and New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2004), 190.

31 http://vibalpublishing.com/new_004.html#beginnings.

Gemino H. Abad and Edna Z. Manlapaz, Man of Earth (Quezon City: ADMU Press, 1989), 380.

32 Pacita Alexander and Elizabeth Perkins, A Love Affair with Australian Literature: The Story of Tom Inglis Moore (Charnwood, A.C.T.: Lake Ginninderra Press, 2004).

Dr. Jose Wendell Capili

NOTES:

*

Many of the ideas in this article were developed during the Manila leg (15-30 June 15-30, 2005) and Singapore leg (30 June 30 to 15 July 15, 2005) of my archival and field research as a PhD scholar at the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University (2004-2007).

1 Katherine H. Adams, Progressive Politics and the Training of America’s Persuaders (Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1999), 80-93.

2 University of Iowa Catalogue 1895-96, 38. Interview with Rowena Torrevillas, Montemar, Sibulan, Negros Oriental, Philippines, May 27 , 2005.

3 Pacita Alexander and Elizabeth Perkins, A Love Affair with Australian Literature: The Story of Tom Inglis Moore (Charnwood, ACT: Ginninderra Press, 2004), 58-60.

4 David Galef, “Words, Words. Words,” in Day Late, Dollar Short: The Next Generation and the New Academy, ed.

Peter Herman (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000), 169.

5 David Gershom Myers, The Elephants Teach: Creative Writing Since 1880 (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1996).

6 Katherine H. Adams, Progressive Politics and the Training of America’s Persuaders, 80-93.

7 William Herbert Carruth, Verse Writing: A Practical Handbook for College Classes and Private Guidance (New York: Macmillan, 1917).

8 See Edilberto Alegre and Doreen Fernandez’s The Writer and His Milieu: An Oral History of First Generation Writers in English (Manila: De la Salle University Press, 1984) and Writers and Their Milieu: An Oral History of Second Generation Writers in English (Manila: De la Salle University Press, 1987). Also Josephine Bass Serrano and Trinidad M. Ames (eds.), A Survey of Filipino Literature in English (From Apprenticeship to Contemporary (Manila: University of Santo Tomas Printing Office, 1980), 19. John Frederick, “A Maker of Songs” in American Prefaces 2 (Summer 1937), 83-84.

9 Pacita Alexander and Elizabeth Perkins, A Love Affair with Australian Literature: The Story of Tom Inglis Moore (Charnwood, A.C.T.: Lake Ginninderra Press, 2004), 63.

After reading English at UP, Kalaw Katigbak completed her Master of Arts degree in English as a Barbour Scholar at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

10 Tom Inglis Moore, “Typhoons and April Showers,” in Philippine Magazine, April 1930, Vol.XXVI, 707.

16

FORUM July-August 2011

The Legacy of SP Lopez as UP President

By Alfredo E. Pascual administration. These four principles (Editor’s note: This article is based ushered in an atmosphere of participatory on UP President Alfredo Pascual’s democracy, student representation speech at the SP Lopez Birth Centennial and democratic consultation. His Program and Photo Exhibit last May 27 commitment to transparency is at the Vargas Museum, UP Diliman.) manifested by his creation of the UP ast May 27, UP celebrated the birth Information Office, now the UP System centennial of a man to whom the Information Office which publishes the university owes much of its identity, as Forum and the UP Newsletter. well as many of its traditions.

Lopez also adopted bilingualism I got to know SP Lopez in my by creating the Department of Filipino senior year in college in 1969, the year and Philippine Languages, motivating he assumed the UP Presidency. I had the Philippine Collegian to publish the privilege of having the signature articles in Filipino and inspiring the of SP Lopez on my undergraduate and adoption of a Filipino translation of graduate diplomas from UP. the university hymn: the UP Beloved Many know SP Lopez from his during my student days, now sang as actions during the early 1970s – one of UP Naming Mahal. the most turbulent periods not only in Such was the commitment of the university, but more importantly in SP Lopez to creating a university the country. Lopez came at a time when which was not only an institution of the flower of youth activism, the seed of UP President Alfredo Pascual during the May 27 commemoration of SP Lopez's higher learning but also a community which had been planted in the university birth centennial where democratic principles, academic by earlier presidents, came into full bloom. Students no longer confined themselves to the separate unit. The Department of Agriculture and the freedom and social commitment became part of the classrooms and their books. SP Lopez met with them, Department of Education then had recommended to character of every administrative employee, research the Marcos administration that the Los Baños campus and extension personnel, faculty and student. stood by them and marched among them.

As we move into another century of the At the height of the First Quarter Storm and the be made independent of the university. Lopez instead university’s service to the country, it is important to Diliman Commune, SP Lopez led the members of the kept the campus by creating the UP System.

Out of the system he created, the University of bear in mind the presidency of SP Lopez and how university administration and faculty in joining the the Philippines has grown to become a university with he created a system which promotes not only honor students’ call for a more responsive and transparent government. Many can still recall some of the words seven constituent universities and an autonomous and excellence but also relevance and service to the he shared at the Palma Hall, or what was then known college spread over a dozen campuses. Had SP Lopez people. been alive today, he would have been delighted to see Bearing in mind the legacy of SP Lopez, as the AS steps. how the university he cared for and loved so much we will continue his vision that the University But SP Lopez was more than just the activist and has become the country’s premier university, with the of the Philippines should be “more hospitable UP community leader. He was also a visionary.

The University of the Philippines System was possibility, in his words, “to make its presence felt in to the positive idealism of our youth and more relevant to the true priorities of our national life, his brainchild. SP Lopez created the UP System to various regions of the country.”

In an effort to strengthen the university and the an instrument more responsive to the irrepressible keep UP Los Baños, or what was then the College of Agriculture, from separating from the University system, Lopez adopted accessibility, democratization, clamor of our people for the rapid transformation of the Philippines community and becoming a relevance and autonomy as the foundations of his of our society.”

L

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES

FORUM Danilo Araña Arao Editor-in-Chief Flor Cabangis Managing Editor Luis V. Teodoro Consulting Editor Celeste Ann Castillo Llaneta Writer Celeste Ann Castillo Llaneta Layout Artist KIM Quilinguing Webmaster: Forum Online Sol Barcebal Researcher Bong Arboleda Misael Bacani Jun Madrid Photographers

The UP FORUM University of the Philippines Diliman, Quezon City, Philippines, 1101 APPROVED PERMIT NUMBER/INDICIA Business Mail Permit No. 2ND-07-010-NCR Entered as Second Class Mail at the U.P.P.O. Valid until December 31, 2011 Subject to Postal Inspection (for printed matter only)

Cristy Salvador Obet Eugenio Alice Abear Tom Maglaya Victor Imbuido Administrative Staff

UP System Information Office Mezzanine Floor Quezon Hall UP Diliman, Quezon City 926-1572, 981-8500 loc. 2552, 2549 e-mail: forum@up.edu.ph