Complete Name: Jose Maria Dominique G. Coronel Address: 395-A L. Gonzales Ext.

Bunducan, Bocaue, Bulacan Contact Details: 0927-650-6510 (Globe) Email Address: jmdgc.2013x@gmail.com Age: 19 Theme of the Month: Greatest Lesson I Learned from Rizal Title of the Essay: Rizal, the Subversive Aesthete

Rizal, the Subversive Aesthete

by Joma Coronel

My interest in literature led me back to reading Rizals Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo in college. I noticed how Rizal paid special attention to character and metaphor. He had a very positive and hopeful tone set in the Noli, then it became nihilist and anarchic in the Fili. In both of his novels Rizal proved one thing: art is the most sublime form of subversion.

His works Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo are, by strict literary standards, arent as impressive or as remarkable. However, they transcended from just being a creative art form. It paved the way to the consciousness of the few who mattered; like fire to a gunpowder trail leading to barrels of nitroglycerine. Rizal certainly did not write for the masses, as he wrote them in Spanish. Considering how few native intellectuals there really was that time, Rizal may have hoped that it would pass through intellectuals or businessmen who could support the cause.

Revolution by Art

Rizal dealt with reason and intellect. He thought that an armed revolution would not get the natives anywhere. So he turned to the intellect. He spent almost his entire life writing on it, approaching the extremities of overflowing support and despair such as

what he wrote in his journal. Yes, he tried to burn the Fili. It was one time in Germany. Right then he couldve ended it all. Nobody practically commissioned him to write the novels. However, he saw it as his obligation to continue on the novel.

Rizal had his ups and downs when he was creating the novel. The making of the novel was his sort of writers baptism by trials. He was seeing through its very end, writing even with very limited budget. He had to scavenge for food, but he has never forgotten his aesthetes; he saved for and attended operas in Europe. When his novels finally saw the way out of the press, the aftermath was the real test.

The effects of the novels were very widespread and profound. The Noli was the first to be released in 1887 while the sequel Fili was released in 1891. The Katipunan revered him as an honorary president, and made his surname a password for the higher levels in the organization. People who had copies lent it to others, and even less-learned people strived with their scant street Spanish to understand what fire is contained in those novels.

Rizal knew exactly what to create. He painted an intimate portrait of the Philippine experience in his time. There were the purportedly abusive friars who used their power and influence to convince people of their interests; of foreign aristocrats who brazenly lorded lands they never tilled; of a government that does not have any integrity; and of perennially abused natives who never knew they can change it all, except for the few in Fili who could no longer bear the nonsense.

It was too relevant for Filipinos. Its not that they werent aware of these situations. They knew it was all real. They were all just waiting for somebody to make the first move. Filipinos always play it safe. Art saved them by being redundant. It was a tainted mirror thats placed infront of them, only to be bashed and crushed into pieces at their faces in the end.

Implications to Rizals Heroism

In the end, included in the charges that were filed against Rizal were the effects that Noli and Fili created. He was seen as a revolutionary preacher because of his radical ideas. By himself he made his own concrete steps to fulfill his dreams of a better life for his fellow Filipinos. However, it wont be as recognized without his two novels. It was the last two barrels of nitroglycerine he had to blow up. The novels were full of anti-cleric sentiments that the friars excommunicated him. However, there came along the Retraction papers where he allegedly retracted his works and asked forgiveness to the Church. Its a very sensitive issue in the study of Rizal, whether he did the retraction or not. By doing so he negates everything; even his very life. He preached reforms, implemented them partially and even suffered to print them as novels. Retracting shows cowardice from someone people revere to as a hero.

Its one issue why many people frown on the idea of him being the widely revered national hero. He was not as brazen as Bonifacio or that he had intellectual peers like

Jacinto and Mabini. Casting more doubts is General William Howard Tafts endorsement of Rizals heroism to Filipinos during the American occupation.

Rizal never advocated an armed revolution. He first sought that the natives have a representation to the Spanish corts. He even allegedly retracted to marry Josephine Bracken. Nothing spoke of an independent Filipino state.

Many people are missing the point.

Without Rizals works, nobody would see that somebody has started the fire, or that there is fire. He made them all aware. Its more like a chain reaction, what he did. People were just waiting for a signal to start. He gave the signal with the novels. After then, and most especially after his death, it was the natives turn. They set their own fires with stolen rifles, bolos, and bamboo spears. Rizal was a gifted intellectual and artist. He set everything in motion with two harmless novels. If anything, Rizal wasnt even afraid of how the novels implicated him. At the first place, he also established a clandestinely separatist group with the La Liga Filipina. It would have made a more concrete legal argument against him. Why would anybody even be afraid with an idea? A weak government would.

A government would ultimately destroy an intelligent idea from art. If they cant, they would turn to the artist. Seeing no prosecution, the artist would most certainly face exile. While Rizal has faced death, it was his persecutors that ensured his demise. Whether

exile or death, the damage has been done. The idea seeped through those who mattered. The storm would have to come soon. The government loses; the writer wins.