CANONICAL AUTHORS &

WORKS OF PHILIPPINE
NATIONAL ARTISTS

PREPARED BY: TINTIN ARCALAS

 What does “canonical” mean?
 The definition of the canon is simply the works of literature
representative of a genre or time period.
 In literature, it conforms to orthodox or well-established rules
or patterns, as of procedure
 For canonical authors, writers don't just write from their lives,
they write about it, and the work can't escape its biographical
influences.
TINTIN ARCALAS
Canonical Authors and their works:
Francisco “Franz” Arcellana For Arcellana, the pride of
opines that “it is always of the fiction is “that it is able to
highest skill and quality”. He render truth, that is able to
pioneered the development of present reality”.
the short story as a lyrical
prose-poetic form.
■ The Flowers of
■ Death in a Factory

TINTIN ARCALAS
■ Divided by Two
Canonical Authors and their works:
Virgilio S. Almario, also known as
Rio Alma, is a poet, literary
historian and critic, who has
revived and reinvented
traditional Filipino poetic forms,
even as he championed
modernist poetics.
■ Ang Makata sa Panahon ng
Makina
■ Balagtasismo Versus
Modernisismo
■ Walong Dekada ng
Makabagong Tulang Pilipino

TINTIN ARCALAS
Canonical Authors and their works:
Cirilo F. Bautista is a poet, He’s a teacher of Literature
fictionist and essayist with and realized that classroom is
exceptional achievements and an important training ground
significant contributions to the for Filipino writers
development of the country’s
literary arts. He is
acknowledged by peers and
critics, and the nation at large
as the foremost writer of his
generation.

TINTIN ARCALAS
■ Summer Suns
■ Words and Battlefields
■ The House of True Desire
Canonical Authors and their works:
Carlos P. Romulo’s multifaceted He was the only Asian to win
career spanned 50 years of America’s coveted Pulitzer Prize in
public service as educator, Journalism for a series of articles
predicting the outbreak of World
soldier, university president,
War II
journalist and diplomat. Romulo
was very much into writing: he
was a reporter at 16, a
newspaper editor by the age of
20, and a publisher at 32.

TINTIN ARCALAS
■ Mother America
■ The United
■ I Walked With Heroes
Canonical Authors and their works:
Jose Garcia Villa is considered He used Doveglion (Dove,
as one of the finest Eagle, Lion) as penname, the
contemporary poets regardless very characters he attributed to
of race or language. himself. Villa is also known for
He introduced the reversed the tartness of his tongue.
consonance rime scheme,
including the comma poems
that made full use of the
punctuation mark in an

TINTIN ARCALAS
innovative, poetic way.
■ Have Come, Am Here
Canonical Authors and their works:
Edith L. Tiempo, she is a poet, As fictionist, Tiempo is as morally
fictionist, teacher and literary critic. profound. Her language has been
She is one of the finest Filipino marked as “descriptive but
writers in English whose works are unburdened by scrupulous
characterized by a remarkable detailing.”
fusion of style and substance, of
craftsmanship and insight.
 The Little Marmoset
 Bonsai

TINTIN ARCALAS
Canonical Authors and their works:
Amado V. Hernandez, a poet, His works talked about the
playwright, and novelist, is among struggles of Filipino laborers.
the Filipino writers who practiced
“committed art”. In his view, the
function of the writer is to act as
the conscience of society and to
affirm the greatness of the human
spirit in the face of inequity and
oppression.
 Bayang Malaya

TINTIN ARCALAS
 Isang Dipang Langit
 Luha ng Buwaya
 Mga Ibong Mandaragit
Canonical Authors and their works:
Nick Joaquin, is regarded by many
as the most distinguished Filipino
writer in English writing so well about
so many aspects of the Filipino. He
has written plays, novels, poems,
short stories and essays including
reportage and journalism.
 Manila
 The Woman Who had Two Navels
He has also enriched the English
language with critics coining
“Joaquinesque” to describe his
baroque Spanish-flavored English
or his reinventions of English based
on Filipinisms.

TINTIN ARCALAS
 Rizal in Saga
 Almanac for Manileños
Canonical Authors and their works:
Lazaro A. Francisco, prize-winning Francisco gained prominence as a
writer, developed the social realist writer not only for his social
tradition in Philippine fiction. His conscience but also for his
eleven novels, now acknowledged “masterful handling of the Tagalog
classics of Philippine literature, language” and “supple prose style”.
embodies the author’s commitment
to nationalism. Master of Tagalog
Novel.
 Singsing na Pangkasal

TINTIN ARCALAS
 Bayang Nagpatiwakal
 Sa Paanan ng Krus
 Ilaw sa Hilaga
 Binhi at Bunga