Children's Literature in the Philippines

Children’s literature in the Philippines traces its roots to oral tradition before Spain colonised the archipelago. Mothers sung lullabies for their babies. Each region had its own lullaby: Ili-ili Tulog Anay from the Visayas, Paghehele of the Tagalogs; and Duoay ya of the Ilocaos. Youngsters heard folktales from adults; these tales were meant to educate the young. Further, proverbs and riddles reflected the people’s philosophy and way of life. Likewise, these had morals.

Today, children’s literature range from books to multimedia materials and television shows. Children’s shows now also have print collectibles—which include activity and colouring books. Some shows, ABS-CBN’s Matanglawin, for example, put into print what has been featured in various episodes.

This paper shall discuss children’s books in the Philippines: its history, development, and the beginnings of illustrations in the books. The timeline would be from the pre-colonial era up to the present.

Lullabies were songs of assurance for the child as he slept. It could also provide a moral:

            Maturogcan ariaco, maturogcan      
                (Sleep, my child, sleep)

            Tapno inton dumakkel ka                  
            (So when you grow up)

            Maited moriton ti pacaidayawan   

            Keritan-oc kenni naman   
          (You will share your glories with your mother)

          
      Anac, patigmaannaca                        
           (My child, I advise you)

           Tapno saan ka nga pumada kadagiti riapalanguad               
       (Not to imitate those with bad manners)

                            

         Ta uray no pacanen dagiti nagannac  mo
        (Because even if you feed your parents)

         ti daculap mo                                  
    (from the palm of your hands)

        Saan to latta nga masupapacan         
      (You will never be able to repay)

        Dagiti tutuoc da kenka                        
       (all their sacrifices.) 

This lullaby of Ilocanos titled “Duoay-ya” is a piece of advice for the baby to grow up as a good child of his parents. It reflects the Filipino culture of taking care of aging parents, as a way of thanking the parents for the sacrifices they had made.

The folktales and legends tend to explain why things happen. Natural phenomena is explained in the tales of the Tinguians and the Mindanaoans: the sky and its contents, the sun and moon, calamities like floods and earthquakes. The legends show children where things originate, a name of a place, for instance (Alabado 2001, 6). Folktales deliver lessons to youngsters. In the case of the widely known “Juan Tamad,” children are taught not to be lazy fares.

Epics tell of the adventures of certain heroes. This poem is chanted by the elders of the town—or tribe—and is passed on through way of mouth. The epic is chanted during rituals like weddings or harvests. Each epic is sacred to a certain tribe or place; it talks about love, hate, praise to the higher Being, or of destiny Examples of these are: “Hudhud” of Ifugao; “Ullalim” of Kalinga; and “Hinilawod” of Panay and Negros.

Both epics and folktales involve magic and magical creatures such as kapre, tikbalang, duende, nuno, aswang, and diwata. This reflects the natives’ belief in the supernatural, and a higher being that they revered and believed to help them. This faith in such beings was being passed on to the younger generation.

The nonsense rhymes—such as “Pen Pen di Sarapen”—originated from chants in children’s games. In the early days, singing was used during older children’s re-enactment of mock battles (Alabado 2001, 14). 

The arrival of the Spanish conquistadores resulted to the burning of most of the Filipinos’ literature; the colonisers reasoning out that the literature “were of the devil,” and be an obstacle to the spread of Christianity. Other oral literature were lost due to carelessness or ignorance. Some parts of the oral tradition survived, nonetheless.

The first book for children came in 1593, Doctrina Cristiana en Lengua Tagala y Española, written by Father Domingo Nieva. It was used for religious instruction; children never actually held the book. Only adults had handled the book (Parayno 1991, 18).

The Filipino child’s first alphabets were learned from the Cartilla (Parayno 1991, 19), sometimes called Caton or Abecedario. This list of Roman alphabets and syllables replaced the native alibata (Alabado 2001, 36). Books were focused on the lives of saints, prayers and sermons. Written in the vernacular—in Roman alphabets—these were distributed throughout the archipelago.

Being in the verse form, the Pasion, Pabasa in Tagalog, was the most popular. Aside from the form, readers believed they would get indulgences from the Catholic Church for their sins. It was recited in homes and improvised chapels during the Lent; usually by solo or duet. Friends made it a point to recite the Pasion in homes where the family agreed to make the ritual a tradition. Those who could not read or write were still able to recite stanzas of the Pasion. According to historian Horacio de la Costa, SJ, Christ’s imitation in the Pasion made an indio a good Christian and good subjects of Spain in accordance to the king’s constitution (Alabado 2001, 37).

Children were later exposed to western romantic tales involving kings and knights. They found this interesting and called it their own. Examples are: El Cid of Spain and Charlemagne of France (Parayno 1991, 19).

Francisco Balagtas exposed the horrible situation of the Philippines through his Florante at Laura in 1838. Masked in a love story set in foreign Albania and Persia, Florante is commended for its artistic verse and teachings. The themes are Filipino-based (Alabado 2001, 39).

Other samples of corrido are Bernardo Carpio, a tale of a young man with great strength who ends up imprisoned between two mountains guarded by an angel; this was written by Jose de la Cruz, known as Huseng Sisiw. Another is Ibong Adarna, that tells of the search for the Adarna bird which is the only cure for the king’s malady. It is set in Berbania. These were the pass time of the people during that era. Thus, children were exposed to such works (Alabado 2001, 41).

The Filipinos failed to gain independence as new colonisers took the power from Spain—Americans.

To Filipino children the Americans introduced books that were meant for young American readers. Filipino youngsters were introduced to Mother Goose Rhymes, Alice in Wonderland (Parayno 1991, 19), Grimm’s Tales, Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and Swiss Family Robinson (Alabado 2001, 72). Since the setting and way of life presented in these stories are foreign, the result was the alienation of the Filipino child from his own culture. Adding to the burden was the American-themed literature for the Filipino children. The values, attitudes were reflected in the Filipino children, who made the values their own (Alabado 2001, 72).

Hugo Miller’s Philippine Folklore Series was one of the books written by American authors but prepared in the Philippines. Ginn and Company pioneered the publishing of books (Parayno 1991, 19). This resulted to children considering forein coloniseers as heroes and native heroes—Lapulapu for example—as mere insurgents (Alabado 2001, 73).

Later, Filipinos wrote children’s stories themselves. Camilo Osias’s Philippine Readers Books 1 to 7 were read by every Filipino child in grade school. Known as Osias Readers, the book collection contained tales, legends, myths, and creatures that were familiar to the Filipino child. The pieces were written in English. The author’s preface of Book Four added that poems and selections that light the fire of nationalism have been included (Alabado, 77).

Other writers of Philippine stories for children are: Maximo Ramos, Tales of Long Ago and Philippine Myths and Tales; Manuel and Lyd Arguilla; and I.V. Mallari (Parayno 1991, 19).  

In Philippine comics, Tony Velasquez’s Kenkoy appeared in Liwayway in 1929. The character was equivalent to “funny guy.” Kulafu a Filipino illustration of Tarzan which appeared in the Ilocano Bannawag. The illustration was made by Francisco Reyes (Alabado 2001, 94). Francisco Mabini created the jungle heroine for the Liwayway magazine. In the late 1940s, the Tarzan-based character Hagibis; the hero-based Lapu-lapu; and Dumagit. Halakhak was the first comic book in the Philippines. Other comic creators were Nestor Redondo, Darna; and Elpidio Torres, Bondying and Dyesebel. The comics were easily understood by Filipino children because the discourse of the characters were written in the local dialects (Alabado 2001, 94).

In 1945, translations of Western works appeared. Classics like The Little Prince and Omar Khayyam’s Rubaiyat were translated into Filipino. In 1946, National Bookstore started reprinting foreign books and translated fairy tales to Filipino. The Lady Bird series was also published. They also published comics in Filipino and English like Rizal’s Classic Illustrated, Filipino Heroes Stories, and Legends of the Philippines Stories (Parayno 1991, 20).

Poems for children in the 1930s to the next decade were vessels for nationalist ideals; although, they were not always accompanied with illustrations (Almario et. al. 1994, 89). This was due to the brutality of Japanese colonisers. Works such as The Battle of Mactan by Virgilio Floresca and Like the Molave by NVM Gonzales were published (Almario et. al. 1994, 89). Children’s books at this time were used as shield against Japanese censorship.

During martial law, censorship was applied. One author—Ceres Alabado—however insisted on publishing books for older children, such as I See Red in a Circle, 1973 (Almario, et. al. 1994, 94).

Today, books for children include collectibles from television shows. Books like Matanglawin put into print those that have been featured in episodes of an ABS-CBN show bearing the same title. Activity books like collectibles from Super Inggo are usually colouring books.

During the Spanish colonial years through 1950s, illustrators of books were not given due credit. What mattered was that the author was a widely known author, and that the publishing house had profits (Almario et. al. 1994, 85). Illustrations were considered space-fillers or decorations of magazines. Illustrators weren’t esteemed that time.  One of the very first illustrators of children’s stories was Jose Rizal. He translated Hans Christian Andersen’s The Monkey and the Turtle into Tagalog and supplied illustrations as well. The drawings were in black and white (Almario et. al. 1994, 85).

Fernando Amorsolo and other artists were commissioned to do drawings for the Osias Readers in 1920. Amorsolo later headed the University of the Philippines School of Fine Arts in doing illustrations. UP-SFA later expanded into offering electives in commercial arts including illustration (Almario et. al. 1994, 88). Prof. Irineo Miranda responded to the student cartoonists’ plea for more areas to harness their talents. Encouraged by Amorsolo, Miranda offered more commercially-related electives (Almario et. al. 1994, 88). President Manuel Quezon’s move to lead the country in writing textbooks in Filipino resulted to the publishing of Pepe and Pilar series for public schools.  

  

In the illustrations of Filipino life and Filipino people, there have been issues. Filipino kings and gods were portrayed horribly, while western fairies and deities were illustrated very well. Ceres Alabado’s Multimedia Multicultural Children’s Literature in the Philippines cites as example the drawing of a Filipino king. The books points out that the royal was portrayed as a male witch, while the knight Sir Galshad was illustrated correctly, complete with chain mail armour. Alabado quotes Maximo Ramos—a Filipino writer of children’s stories—thus:

           

The artist...when he had to draw humans and mythical beings, he had nothing

to go by and so he went to Boston arts museums for his deities and portrayed  dis-

reputable-looking Filipinos to represent his humans (Alabado 2001, 73).

This shows that even Filipinos embraced the notion that Westerners were the superior race.

The illustration of modern books was influenced by cartoons due to concrete lines and curves (Almario et. a. 1994, 95). From black-and-white, colours were introduced to enhance the drawings. Today, digital art is also applied for illustrations. Depictions of Filipino characters are no longer horrible and artists could draw their own interpretations of deities without imitating western gods.

Children’s books in the Philippines have greatly evolved. From Western books in the beginning, the Filipino child has found morals and entertainment in stories that are familiar to him. He is provided with materials that foster appreciation of his own culture and values, not a foreigner’s.

With respect to illustrations, Virgilio Almario points out that Filipino artists are committed to their work of illustrating for the Filipino child and improving the quality of the output. From black-and-white sketches to coloured two-dimensional drawings to digital and three-dimensional arts, it can be said that illustrations have improved a lot.

Almario again pointed out that the illustrations may not be like the Westerners’. Artists are evolving and improving; they produce quality artworks that bear the signs of Filipino life, something that Filipinos could call their own. 

References

Alabado, Ceres. 2001. Multimedia multicultural children’s literature in the Philippines,

        Philippine Edition. Quezon City: New Day Publishers.

Almario, Virgilio, Ma. Elena Paterno, Ramon Sunico, and Rene Villanueva.  eds. 1994.

        Bumasa at lumaya: a sourcebook on children’s literature in the Philippines. Pasig:

       Anvil Publishing, Inc.

Parayno, Salud. 1991. Children’s literature. Quezon City: Katha Publishing Co., Inc.