THE AMERICAN

REGIME
(1900-1942 ; 1943-1946)
 Filipino resistance to American
Colonization which began in 1898
when Spain ceded the Philippines to
America, officially ended on July 4,
1902 upon President Theodore
Roosevelt’s announcement that the
war of resistance was over. Thus
 A NEW LANGUAGE

Unlike the Spaniards, the Americans

went into intensive effort to propagate their
language – American English. American
teachers were sent to the Philippines to teach
English to the Filipinos. American textbooks in
English were used in schools; English became
the sole language or medium of instruction
and the official language of government.
 AN EGALITARIAN PUBLIC
SCHOOL SYSTEM

The establishment of the public

school system, egalitarian in nature,
was an added factor that facilitated the
linguistic change –over from Spanish,
and the various vernaculars into the
new language. The schools were open
to anyone who could afford it –rich or
 AN EGALITARIAN PUBLIC
SCHOOL SYSTEM

The University of the Philippines was

established in 1908, and initially had American
Professors who turned out many of our Filipino
writers in English. In less than two decades,
Filipinos were writing or turning out literature
with Filipino content but in a foreign medium.
The Philippine Collegian, a U. P. school organ,
provided an outlet for the literature produced by
 T H E M U S H RO O M I N G O F
N E W S PA P E R S A N D P E R I O D I C A L S

The publication of a quite a

number of newspapers and
periodicals gave added impetus
to the development of Philippine
literature in English and a
 T H E M U S H RO O M I N G O F
N E W S PA P E R S A N D P E R I O D I C A L S

Among the Filipino-owned periodicals were:

The Philippine Review (1916), The Citizen (1918),
Philippine National Weekly (1917), The Rising
Philippines (1918), The Philippine Journal of
Education (1918) and the Philippine Republic
(1923).

The college Folio, published by the students of the

College of Philosophy, Science and Letters of the U.
 T H E M U S H RO O M I N G O F
N E W S PA P E R S A N D P E R I O D I C A L S

The Filipino People published by Manuel L.

Quezon resident Commissioner to the United States,
primarily an organ of information about the Filipino
people, published some poems, stories, and essays in
English by Filipino students in America.

The Filipino students Magazine, published in

Berkeley, California as organ of the Filipino students
in America, also printed the first serious attempts at
 T H E M U S H RO O M I N G O F
N E W S PA P E R S A N D P E R I O D I C A L S

The Evening Star was devoted primarily

to the development of drama, fiction and
poet.

The Philippine Free Press, in many

ways, was the most popular periodical
publication in English. It was the first
magazine that gave serious attention to the
 P E R I O D O F I M I TAT I O N, C H A N G E S
IN CONTENT AND STYLE

The early literary outputs were

characterized as parochial in content. Fiction
and drama dealt with simple conflict in one’s
self and romantic love affairs.

In the beginning, writers tried to

imitate models both from England and the
United States – Hemingway, O. Henry,
 P E R I O D O F I M I TAT I O N, C H A N G E S
IN CONTENT AND STYLE

Dr. George Pope Shannon, writing in The Literary

Apprentice of 1928 listed the “inexcusables” imputed to the
nascent Filipino literature in English as follows: slovenly
versification, bad grammar and idiom, inappropriate or
meaningless diction, vague or confused imagery. (S.P.
Lopez, “Literature and Society – A Literary Past Revisited”,
Literature and Society, 1976, p. 8.). A year later Professor
Tom Ingles Moore, in a similar article criticizing poems that
previously appeared in the Philippine Collegian, identified
 P E R I O D O F I M I TAT I O N, C H A N G E S
IN CONTENT AND STYLE

Lopez remarks, “I noted that the

criticism in both cases concerned
matters of literary technique; it had
not one word to say about the
content and direction of Filipino
writing.” (S.P. Lopez, Literature and
 A STEADY GROWTH I N FORM

“Novel writing was among the first arts to

be attempted by the Filipino writers.
“Among the early writers were: Zoilo M.
Galang – A Child of Sorrow (1931), Maximo
M. Kalaw – The Filipino Rebel (1930); Juan C.
Laya – His native Soil (1941); Steven
Javellana – Without Seeing the Dawn
 A S T E A DY G ROW T H I N F O R M

Anthologies of Filipino short stories appeared during the

1930’s. The first comprehensive anthology of Filipino
Short Stories in English were published by the Philippine
Free Press in 1929, with Jose Garcia Villa as editor. Paz
Marquez Benitez put out her Filipino Love Stories in
1927; Jorge Bocobo’s The Radiant Symbol (1925)
contained about stories and play. In 1925, Zoilo M.
Galang brought out his The Box of Ashes and other
Stories, and in 1933 Villa’s Footnote to Youth was
 A S T E A DY G ROW T H I N F O R M

Two collections of short stories were published by the

Philippine Book Guild – The Wound and the Scar by
Arturo B. Rotor, and How My Brother Leon Brought
Home a Wife by Manuel E. Arguilla.

Among the noted essayists of the period were Salvador P.

Lopez – Literature and Society (1940), I. V. Mallari – The
Birth of Discontent (1940), A. del Rosario – Fragments –
Thoughts and Short Essays (1941), F.B. Icasiano – Horizon
from My Nipa Hut (1941), Jose P. Laurel – Forces that
 A S T E A DY G ROW T H I N F O R M

In the art of drama, the following distinguished

themselves in the twenties and the thirties: Sixto
Orosa – Almost Within Grasp (1923), Juan M. delos
Reyes – The Cry of the Philippines (1923) and the
Triumph of the Students (1925), Carlos P. Romulo –
Daughters for Sale (1924), Sol H. Gwekoh – The
Voice of Freedom.

The first volume of Filipino poetry was published

 A S T E A DY G ROW T H I N F O R M

“A certain haunting melancholy pervades

all this poet’s singing, a low-voiced

melancholy in which there is much sweetness.

The words are those of a western land,

but the accent and the sentiment come to

us from the East.”

 A S T E A DY G ROW T H I N F O R M

Aurelio Alvaro’s first poetry collection

Moon Shadow on the Waters (1934) was
followed by his second volume – Nuances
(1934), R. Zulueta da Costa’s First Leaves
(1937) was notable; and his Like the
Molave (1941) won the Commonwealth
Award in 1940. Jose Garcia Villa’s Many