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Fiction by Filipinos in America: Us Edition
Edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, the book, Fiction by Filipinos in America , is a collection of short stories that includes writings by Philippine and Philippine American writers Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, Carlos Bulosan, Luis Cabalquinto, Virgina R. Cerenio, Juan C. Dionisio, Alberto S. Florentino, Ligaya Victorio Fruto, Jean Vengua Gier, N.V.M. Gonzalez, Erlinda Villamor Kravetz, Paulino Lim, Jr. Manuel R. Olimpo, Julia L. Palarca, Oscar Peñaranda, Bienvenido N. Santos, Nadine Sarreal, Michelle Cruz Skinner, Samuel Tagatac, Linda Ty-Casper, Nenutzka Villamar, Marianne Villanueva, and Manuel A. Viray.
First published in the Philippines in 1993, this 2020 US edition hopes to accommodate librarians, professors, teachers, and students interested in Philippine American literature, books which are still scarce in the US. This collection, which has been used by educators and cited as a valuable resource includes classic stories such as "A Scent of Apples" by Bienvenido N. Santos and "The Romance of Magno Rubio" by Carlos Bulosan.
Writing for World Literature Today , Professor Al Camus Palomar, praises the book "(Editor) Manguerra Brainard’s selection is a delight. Some of the stories are masterly, especially those written by such reliables as Carlos Bulosan, Linda Ty-Casper, N.V.M. Gonzalez, and Alberto S. Florentino. None is less than highly competent, and all are worth reading. Manguerra Brainard has done an excellent job of mixing critical judgement and personal taste.”
Isagani R. Cruz wrote in Philippines Star : "Definitely one of the most outstanding anthologies published [in 1993], this collection of stories by 23 Filipino writers who work or used to work in the United States is a must-read for all students of Philippine Literature.”
The stories convey the history of Filipinos in America via fiction and the book is acknowledged an important addition to Philippine, Philippine-American, as well as Asian-American literature.
First published in the Philippines in 1993, this 2020 US edition hopes to accommodate librarians, professors, teachers, and students interested in Philippine American literature, books which are still scarce in the US. This collection, which has been used by educators and cited as a valuable resource includes classic stories such as "A Scent of Apples" by Bienvenido N. Santos and "The Romance of Magno Rubio" by Carlos Bulosan.
Writing for World Literature Today , Professor Al Camus Palomar, praises the book "(Editor) Manguerra Brainard’s selection is a delight. Some of the stories are masterly, especially those written by such reliables as Carlos Bulosan, Linda Ty-Casper, N.V.M. Gonzalez, and Alberto S. Florentino. None is less than highly competent, and all are worth reading. Manguerra Brainard has done an excellent job of mixing critical judgement and personal taste.”
Isagani R. Cruz wrote in Philippines Star : "Definitely one of the most outstanding anthologies published [in 1993], this collection of stories by 23 Filipino writers who work or used to work in the United States is a must-read for all students of Philippine Literature.”
The stories convey the history of Filipinos in America via fiction and the book is acknowledged an important addition to Philippine, Philippine-American, as well as Asian-American literature.
- GenresFiction
264 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
71 people want to read
About the author
Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
38 books46 followersCecilia Manguerra Brainard is an award-winning author and editor of over twenty books. She has written three novels: WHEN THE RAINBOW GODDESS WEPT, MAGDALENA, and THE NEWSPAPER WIDOW. Her SELECTED SHORT STORIES BY CECILIA MANGUERRA BRAINARD won the 40th National Book Award and the Cirilo F. Bautista Prize.
She has taught at UCLA, USC, the California State Summer School for the Arts, and the Writers Program at USCL Extension. She has served as an Executive Board Member and Officer of PEN, PAAWWW (Pacific Asian American Women Writers West), Arts & Letters at the Cal State University LA, PAWWA (Philippine American Writers and Artists), among others.
She also founded Philippine American Literary House.
(Source Wikipedia)
She has taught at UCLA, USC, the California State Summer School for the Arts, and the Writers Program at USCL Extension. She has served as an Executive Board Member and Officer of PEN, PAAWWW (Pacific Asian American Women Writers West), Arts & Letters at the Cal State University LA, PAWWA (Philippine American Writers and Artists), among others.
She also founded Philippine American Literary House.
(Source Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
December 19, 2010
World Literature Today, Autumn 1994 v68 n4 p894(1)
Fiction by Filipinos in America. (book reviews) Al Camus Palomar.
Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1994 University of Oklahoma
The stories in Fiction by Filipinos in America, as editor Cecilia Manguerra Brainard puts it, "deal with oppression, flight, dislocation, unrequited love, longing for an idealized home; these are stories of humans dominated by values that run deep, of fierce loyalty for family and friends, and always that Filipino tenacity to deal with life's hardships and remain undefeated. Together these stories paint a gigantic picture of the Filipino, whether in the Philippines or in America, and it is a wonderful picture, this of a person who struggles, fails at times, but keeps on, a most resilient human being." Resilience is a quality long associated with Filipinos. As a poet once said," A Filipino is pliant like a bamboo." Neither typhoons nor monsoons could break the Filipino spirit; like the bamboo, it sways and bends with nature's relentless onslaughts, but it refuses to yield or die.
Manguerra Brainard's selection is a delight. Some of the stories are masterly, especially those written by such old reliables as Carlos Bulosan, Linda Ty-Casper, N. V. M. Gonzales, Bienvenido N. Santos, and Alberto S. Florentino. None is less than highly competent, and all are worth reading. Manguerra Brainard has done an excellent job of mixing critical judgment with personal taste. What her choices prove is that most Filipinos who write competently in English have either lived in America for a long time or were actually born, raised, and educated here. These are writers to whom English is almost a first language. It would surprise no one if these writers' command of Pilipino is inferior to their command of English.
Bulosan is at his most poignant in "The Romance of Magno Rubio," a tale of love and romance that subtly condemns those who take advantage of the good-hearted, the poor, and the ignorant. "A Warm Hand" by N. V. M. Gonzales superbly displays the innocence of the Filipino; it is not the story itself that impresses, however, but the writer's mastery of the short story, his stunning perfection of form. And who else but Bienvenido N. Santos can portray an expatriate's yearning for his idealized native land? In "Scent of Apples" Santos brilliantly delineates the touching tale of a Filipino farmer in America nostalgic for home and his own people; it is undoubtedly one of the most moving short stories in contemporary literature. Like Somerset Maugham, Santos seems to have an extraordinary sense of the hidden loneliness in others.
The excerpts from novels--Manguerra Brainard's own "Doc's Crucifixion" (from Song of Yvonne) and "The President's Wife Has a Dream" by Jessica Hagedorn (from Dog-eaters)--make one want to read the authors' books. Hagedorn's brave defiance of conventional rules of writing is both refreshing and startling. The not-so-well-known other writers in the collection are all promising, and given the time, they could surprise us with their talent. They all tell a quintessentially Filipino story and a story for our day and age.
The last entry, the shortest item in the lot (forty-one lines), is a surrealist dream, "Phalaenopsis," the tale of an expatriate Filipino who ties himself to an oak tree, slowly loses his human form, and becomes a full-grown orchid. The story is a fitting finale to a most thorough and compelling account of the Filipino culture and soul, for the Filipino is an enigma, a true child of the earth with an artist's sensibility. Manguerra Brainard's collection is a book that pulls the reader along inexorably. Each of the stories in this volume makes it impossible for the reader to stop reading,
Al Camus Palomar University of Oklahoma
Review Grade: A
Fiction by Filipinos in America. (book reviews) Al Camus Palomar.
Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1994 University of Oklahoma
The stories in Fiction by Filipinos in America, as editor Cecilia Manguerra Brainard puts it, "deal with oppression, flight, dislocation, unrequited love, longing for an idealized home; these are stories of humans dominated by values that run deep, of fierce loyalty for family and friends, and always that Filipino tenacity to deal with life's hardships and remain undefeated. Together these stories paint a gigantic picture of the Filipino, whether in the Philippines or in America, and it is a wonderful picture, this of a person who struggles, fails at times, but keeps on, a most resilient human being." Resilience is a quality long associated with Filipinos. As a poet once said," A Filipino is pliant like a bamboo." Neither typhoons nor monsoons could break the Filipino spirit; like the bamboo, it sways and bends with nature's relentless onslaughts, but it refuses to yield or die.
Manguerra Brainard's selection is a delight. Some of the stories are masterly, especially those written by such old reliables as Carlos Bulosan, Linda Ty-Casper, N. V. M. Gonzales, Bienvenido N. Santos, and Alberto S. Florentino. None is less than highly competent, and all are worth reading. Manguerra Brainard has done an excellent job of mixing critical judgment with personal taste. What her choices prove is that most Filipinos who write competently in English have either lived in America for a long time or were actually born, raised, and educated here. These are writers to whom English is almost a first language. It would surprise no one if these writers' command of Pilipino is inferior to their command of English.
Bulosan is at his most poignant in "The Romance of Magno Rubio," a tale of love and romance that subtly condemns those who take advantage of the good-hearted, the poor, and the ignorant. "A Warm Hand" by N. V. M. Gonzales superbly displays the innocence of the Filipino; it is not the story itself that impresses, however, but the writer's mastery of the short story, his stunning perfection of form. And who else but Bienvenido N. Santos can portray an expatriate's yearning for his idealized native land? In "Scent of Apples" Santos brilliantly delineates the touching tale of a Filipino farmer in America nostalgic for home and his own people; it is undoubtedly one of the most moving short stories in contemporary literature. Like Somerset Maugham, Santos seems to have an extraordinary sense of the hidden loneliness in others.
The excerpts from novels--Manguerra Brainard's own "Doc's Crucifixion" (from Song of Yvonne) and "The President's Wife Has a Dream" by Jessica Hagedorn (from Dog-eaters)--make one want to read the authors' books. Hagedorn's brave defiance of conventional rules of writing is both refreshing and startling. The not-so-well-known other writers in the collection are all promising, and given the time, they could surprise us with their talent. They all tell a quintessentially Filipino story and a story for our day and age.
The last entry, the shortest item in the lot (forty-one lines), is a surrealist dream, "Phalaenopsis," the tale of an expatriate Filipino who ties himself to an oak tree, slowly loses his human form, and becomes a full-grown orchid. The story is a fitting finale to a most thorough and compelling account of the Filipino culture and soul, for the Filipino is an enigma, a true child of the earth with an artist's sensibility. Manguerra Brainard's collection is a book that pulls the reader along inexorably. Each of the stories in this volume makes it impossible for the reader to stop reading,
Al Camus Palomar University of Oklahoma
Review Grade: A
October 22, 2020
This 2020 US Edition of Fiction by Filipinos in America is a welcome addition to Philippine and Philippine American literature! I've read the first edition before and loved the stories, especially "A Scent of Apples" by Bienvenido N. Santos and "The Romance of Magno Rubio" by Carlos Bulosan.
Edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, the book, Fiction by Filipinos in America, is a collection of short stories that includes writings by Philippine and Philippine American writers Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, Carlos Bulosan, Luis Cabalquinto, Virgina R. Cerenio, Juan C. Dionisio, Alberto S. Florentino, Ligaya Victorio Fruto, Jean Vengua Gier, N.V.M. Gonzalez, Erlinda Villamor Kravetz, Paulino Lim, Jr. Manuel R. Olimpo, Julia L. Palarca, Oscar Peñaranda, Bienvenido N. Santos, Nadine Sarreal, Michelle Cruz Skinner, Samuel Tagatac, Linda Ty-Casper, Nenutzka Villamar, Marianne Villanueva, and Manuel A. Viray.
First published in the Philippines in 1993, this 2020 US edition hopes to accommodate librarians, professors, teachers, and students interested in Philippine American literature, books which are still scarce in the US.
The stories convey the history of Filipinos in America via fiction and the book is acknowledged an important addition to Philippine, Philippine-American, as well as Asian-American literature.
Edited by Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, the book, Fiction by Filipinos in America, is a collection of short stories that includes writings by Philippine and Philippine American writers Cecilia Manguerra Brainard, Carlos Bulosan, Luis Cabalquinto, Virgina R. Cerenio, Juan C. Dionisio, Alberto S. Florentino, Ligaya Victorio Fruto, Jean Vengua Gier, N.V.M. Gonzalez, Erlinda Villamor Kravetz, Paulino Lim, Jr. Manuel R. Olimpo, Julia L. Palarca, Oscar Peñaranda, Bienvenido N. Santos, Nadine Sarreal, Michelle Cruz Skinner, Samuel Tagatac, Linda Ty-Casper, Nenutzka Villamar, Marianne Villanueva, and Manuel A. Viray.
First published in the Philippines in 1993, this 2020 US edition hopes to accommodate librarians, professors, teachers, and students interested in Philippine American literature, books which are still scarce in the US.
The stories convey the history of Filipinos in America via fiction and the book is acknowledged an important addition to Philippine, Philippine-American, as well as Asian-American literature.
November 26, 2012
Definitely one of the most outstanding anthologies published [in 1993], this collection of stories by 23 Filipino writers who work or used to work in the United Staes is a must-read for all students of Philippine Literature." (Isagani R. Cruz, foremost Manila critic, Philippine Star
March 7, 2015
An excellent collection of short stories by various Filipino authors. There is a pleasing amount of variety in subject, style and tone. Most of the stories were easy to settle into and enjoy, only a couple were so-so. It's been a long while since I've liked a collection so consistently.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews