Speculating about Filipino speculative fiction

Kenneth has the relevant posts linked here. I wasn’t going to comment but then Kyu emailed me. So here’s my very cranky ten cents (I’ve been through a very tough week):

I agree with Bhex’s post. As a friend (who I’m sure will share her thoughts in due time) notes, her take on the matter isn’t as ‘extreme’ as Charles Tan puts it. Of course I’m reading my own nuances into what Bhex is saying (or what I believe Bhex is saying), so feel free to rebut me as you will.

For me this is what Bhex’s entry amounts to: Filipino speculative fiction writers should be responsible for what we write, or at least we should start thinking very hard about our agenda, whether it’s about interstellar hermeneutics or folk tale retellings. Say what you will about those goddamn social realists, I appreciate the time and effort they have taken in crafting a discourse–wrong-headed or not–with the society they live in.

Speculative fiction writers–and I’m speaking in the abstract here–can’t go around asking for the same sort of legitimacy that is vested in recognized ‘mainstream’ fiction in a place like the Philippines without taking on its responsibilities as well. And if you come up and tell me, “Whyyy should I have to be ‘responsible?’ Can’t I just write about my hopefully soon-to-be-internationally-recognized story about gay elves?” I’ll punch you in the face.

Elves are fine and dandy. I have no problem with elves! But as Bhex is saying, if you’re one of those writers who claim to be serious about advancing speculative fiction as a valid genre of Filipino literature, which is to say literature that is representative of the Filipino experience, which speaks first and foremost to the Filipino reader, then you had better consider your position very carefully. Again, says Bhex, you’re a spokesperson. Be conscionable! O kahit conscientious man lang.

But, you counter, fantasy is supposed to be escapist! And stuffs! And if the Japanese can write about kawaii British librarians, why can’t I? Well, sure, go ahead. Write your own story about kawaii British librarians. I’ll be over here writing about hentai French priests. I have my own literary fetishes as well. But then again, if we descend into particularities, we’ll have to resort to overwrought diagrams, as Kyu did in order to demonstrate the ridiculous extremes to which this line of reasoning can be taken. What if a Filipino moved to Azerbaijan and wrote about Azerbaijani harpies getting it on? What sort of speculative fiction writer is he? Answer: A crack-filled one, obviously, and more power to him. Must be the water in the Caucasus.

I think it’s counter-productive, in the same way that defending the right of English-speaking Filipino writers to write in English is kind of, I dunno, stupid and beside the point. I had a long talk with Dean Alfar a few months ago where we discussed how Filipino fantasy fans who transition into writing fantasy fiction can’t seem to let go of elves, knights and talking swords. I’m not sure if Dean remembers this conversation, or if I’m remembering it entirely correctly, but I came away from it thinking that while there is nothing wrong or haha unpatriotic about writing about sexy elves (getting it on), surely there are other cornerstones upon which one can build a tradition or–oh dreaded word–paradigm of Filipino speculative fiction. Our mythology, for one. Our history, for another. Other established literary traditions, in particular. I asked Dean straight out: “What’s your purpose for promoting speculative fiction? Is it simply to enable an entire generation of Filipino writers to write guilt-free and occasionally perverted fiction about elves and knights and dragons or is it to utilize this literature as a powerful and imaginative way of–how did those academic critics put it?–narrating the Filipino nation?”

“Uh, yes,” said Dean.

Well, I’m doing a little imaginative retrospecting here myself. At that point we were actually talking about how Filipino academics are starting to be more conscious about the potentialities inherent in speculative fiction, and how in American and European literature the lines between literary fiction, postmodernist fiction, and speculative fiction have begun to intersect more and more often, and even occasionally to blur. In a recent lecture on contemporary Filipino novels in English, the critic Christina Pantoja-Hidalgo notes that they share a collective quality of ‘hybridity,’ and that stylistically they favor both the ‘burlesque’ and ‘carnivalesque.’ They integrate themes from popular culture and are unapologetic about their fabulist leanings. This is not surprising since when I ask writers like Charlson Ong about their literary influences, they almost always cite Vikram Seth and Salman Rushdie. Seth and Rushdie are cosmopolitan, multi-cultural writers, and Charlson Ong, who is a Filipino-Chinese writer writing in English, would naturally identify with the aesthetics and ethical themes of Rushdie’s novels. It’s a very conscious stylization, though, and not mere mimicry. You can’t transpose the contours of Rushdie’s hallucinatory Bombay into Manila’s own squirming boundaries, and Ong and Vince Groyon et al don’t try to do that. Instead they create their own specially customized hallucinations.

Filipino speculative fiction is not a precious snowflake and it’s not the sole antidote to the supposed provincialism of modern Filipino literary fiction, which seems to be doing fine detaching its head from its navel (albeit slowly) by itself, thanks very much. Having said that, I think that speculative fiction has a lot going for it, and if it is to stake its own place in the emergent landscape of Filipino literature now, then it should be very conscious of what it’s about. And writers, of course, should be even more preternaturally self-aware. Kasi kung hindi rin lang, what’s the use? Filipino fangirls–like me– would go on writing about kinky dragons and ghei elves, with or without establishment support, for years to come, but I think–from what I see of efforts by people like Dean, the Lit Critters, Kenneth, Bhex–that what we ought to strive for is not so much a peaceful co-existence with other literary forms, but a distinct–not just alternative, not just new, but distinct as in singular– canon of Filipino literature. Why not? Choconut?

And this is why I think that, extreme or not, Bhex’s entry is the most insightful yet of any discussion on Filipino speculative fiction that I’ve come across. It’s not so much what she says, but the questions she poses, implicitly or otherwise. There are no pat and facetious assumptions along the lines of “If you’re a Filipino, then whatever you write, your being Filipino would come out. ” Sorry, what? Are we supposed to rely on our telepathic connection with your subconscious to deduce what is Filipino about your story? Or: “Filipino speculative fiction is global in scope and shouldn’t restrict itself to local notions of culture and history.” See above: You are not global, least of all unique, because you write about Martians. It’s just a lot of flummery and people end up fretting over irrelevant stuff like whether or not writing about transgendered rabbits policing the solar system would disqualify them from Filipino citizenship. The permutations are endless. We can of course occupy our time coming up with an entire catalog of stories and decide on a case-to-case basis whether this story is Filipino, or not-quite Filipino, or sort-of-Filipino, or pwede-na.

Or we can go the way of Bhex, who is making some pretty hard-core claims–which we may or may not agree with–about what Filipino speculative fiction can and should do in terms of, say, articulating the concerns of Filipinos of our generation and be unapologetic about it. I don’t get why we–in the abstract!–have to be all defiantly unbending about our right to write about transgendered rabbits and pretty elves and then make endless qualifications whenever the issue of addressing our own society and what it means to be Filipino in our perspective, as fabulists, as fantasists, as fangirls (and fanboys), comes up. Taking into account Mia’s entry re: the recent LitCritters talk at the Manila Book Fair, about speculative fiction as an ‘agent for change and transformation,’ about the ‘imaginative ways’ that it can interrogate the world we live in, I think that Filipino speculative fiction writers must always keep in mind this question: “What the hell am I doing?” If your answer is “Writing about Azerbaijani harpies getting it on because I didn’t get any today” then I’m voting you out of the tribe.

Seriously, I believe that there’s no right or wrong answer, there’s only an attitude to take, and perhaps a commitment to make. I repeat: If it’s only a question of Filipinos’ right to write fantasy and science fiction, or in English or Filipino, then… there should be no question at all, actually. But if what we want is to build a presence for Filipino speculative fiction, not just internationally, but in terms of finding a significant place for it in our literature and our society, then we have to grapple with ideological issues that won’t resolve themselves into speculating about fictional scenarios involving different kinds of fiction and technical how-tos about writing dialogue etc. Bhex offers a cogent way of grappling.

More questions: How would you position yourself, as a writer of speculative fiction? What attitude do you take, as a writer, to your world in general and to your society in particular? Stop defending your right to write about spaceships, goddammit. Why are you writing the way you are?

While I don’t believe I’m cut out to be a writer (so I probably shouldn’t pontificate, but then I’m doing this upon request), I have started to think more closely about the stories that I do write. I don’t consciously cast Filipino policemen as corrupt elves–I’m not that dumb or reactionary and anyway when I write about elves I go straight to fanfiction.net and not, say, the Philippine Free Press–but I do question the choices I make in a story, specifically in light of being Filipino and living in the Philippines. People might say that making prescriptions and definitions is a critic’s job, as if writers sleepwalk their way through their stories, and as if speculative fiction writers, especially, are exempt from the responsibilities of writing literature because they claim to simply be ‘telling stories’ (excuse me).

Naku, hahaba pa ito. Awat na. *goes back to watching Russian soap operas*

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September 23, 2007 Written by: tin | Filed Under Miscellany

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2 Responses to “Speculating about Filipino speculative fiction”

Philippine Speculative Fiction » “Filipino” Speculative Fiction, Read: the Rambling of the Overly Simplistic on September 23rd, 2007 9:47 am

[…] Fiction? Banzai Cat: Of Conceits and Agendas | The Plot Thickens… Like Dinuguan Tin Mandigma: Speculating about Filipino speculative fiction] I do wonder why certain people are so eager to tell the world that their work is […]
Anton on October 3rd, 2007 5:27 am

The important thing to consider is the term “speculative.” To speculate means “to think over possibilities.” If there are no constraints to these possibilities, then speculative fiction can refer to any type of fiction. In which case, any debate on the meaning of speculative fiction is meaningless, never mind Philippine speculative fiction.

If these possibilities are constrained to historical realities that may have taken place (e.g., Britain stays on in the Philippines and the Spaniards never return) then one can call this genre “alternate history.” If one imagines ancient gods taking control of the region, then that’s fantasy. If one imagines the Philippines not giving in to IMF-WB restrictions and eventually becomes a superpower nation, and from which we develop a space age consisting of Filipino space explorers, then that’s alternate history and science fiction. If one imagines a small Filipino barrio where it rains flowers everyday, then that’s marvelous realism. In which case, given different possibilities and constraints, the term “speculative fiction” is meaningless.

What about “Philippine”? In literary studies, the label is usually applied to literary works where a Philippine local language is used or the author is generally recognized as a Filipino, whether through his citizenship or ancestry. Thus, Jessica Hagedorn’s novel is part of Philippine literature.

What, then, is Philippine speculative fiction? If there is no agreement on constraints to possibilities mentioned earlier, then it refers to any fictional work written by authors recognized as Filipinos or written in a Philippine local language.

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