This story originally appeared in the Philippine Daily Inquirer on December 9, 1999.
”How long should a story be?” That was the question I asked NVM Gonzalez long ago in a private moment during the 1993 writers’ workshop in Baguio. His instant answer was: ”As long as it needs to be.” I was younger then, and writing. I had submitted a story titled ”Rally,” and it made such an impact on NVM that he allowed me the opportunity to feel how great it was to be a writer. Perhaps NVM was naturally kind to young writers but I felt so much flattered then because he stood up (something he could manage only with great difficulty even at that time) while the story was being dissected by all the writers present and inquired who wrote it. I didn’t answer immediately, and instead just waited nervously for what he was going to say.
It was the first story I ever wrote and there was NVM, a literary giant, commenting on it. From the simple story I wrote, he drew out symbolisms, metaphors and details that the BS Biology student that I was then never quite understood. He asked again who wrote the story, but I held back from making a confession, afraid that he would stop if he learned it was just me. Then he was even nicer, defending the author against those who criticized the story and inviting them to marvel at it. ”How did he do this?” NVM wondered. ”The only explanation I have here is genius.” Toward the end of the morning session, I could no longer hold back. I raised my hand to signify that the story was mine. NVM walked toward me beaming and offered his hand. ”That was a gem,” he said. ”It’s a rarity.” It was probably the happiest day of my life so far. Later that day, while I remained in a daze over what I seemed to have accidentally accomplished, NVM invited me for a chat. To an aspiring writer, that was a rare privilege. Even if at that time he still had not yet been proclaimed a National Artist, NVM was to me an icon. He was no longer just a name on the cover of a book. He was flesh and blood, and he wanted to talk to me alone.
”So how did you write that story?” he asked. I wanted to sound intelligent. I wanted to explain in some detail: ”See, there is this metaphor here, and the device here, and a foreshadowing here, a symbolic gesture here . . .” I wanted to say the things I heard in the earlier sessions of the workshop but I couldn’t. I figured that with a man who had spent almost all of his 80 years in writing, pretense wouldn’t get me far. I couldn’t answer immediately, afraid that he would know that I hadn’t consciously designed all the metaphors and symbolisms, and whatever else he had dug out of my story. Still when an icon asks a question, answers need to be made. ”I just thought of a nerdy girl who was crying in the midst of a rally, and not really because of it,” I started to explain. ”Ha! I read that,” he interjected, as he raised his index finger to drive the point. ”I meant, how did you gather all the elements together and arrive at it.” This one, I couldn’t answer. ”I don’t know,” I humbly answered. I wasn’t really much of what he expected, and I was ready to accept it. But then he exclaimed, ”Marvelous!” I wanted to tell him much more but I couldn’t tell him anything. But noting my vain attempts at an explanation, he interrupted: ”Someday just write about how you wrote it, and give it to me.”
That was the day NVM became my second father. He wanted me to translate the story into English. He said he was planning to do a collection of stories of Filipino authors in English. He wanted mine among those written by the likes of Nick Joaquin and Butch Dalisay. For a beginning writer, that was like traversing constellations. I couldn’t believe it, but Roger Sikat, a master of Filipino literature, urged me to do what NVM suggested and offered to help by editing it. After the workshop, NVM and I exchanged letters, mostly about when I would give him the translation. But I couldn’t do it. For the first time I realized that translation is an art itself. I was the author of the story, I might be good in English, but that didn’t mean I could translate a story. I failed. I was afraid to admit this, because I didn’t want to disappoint NVM.
I got caught up in life’s preoccupations that I forgot his advice: ”First, write every day.” Later, I did something that didn’t leave room for creativity: I took up medicine. And between medical school, my search for a new girlfriend, procrastination and my fear of disappointing him, I lost contact with NVM. I was mortified when I took up medicine. Despite so much greatness ascribed to doctors when I was in medical school, I realized how doctors die figurative deaths. They suffer so much pain just to heal, but in the end they die unknown, literally. In contrast, writers literally suffer so much when they practice their craft. I have this ”P500 challenge” that I pose to my most educated non-medical friends. I tell them that I’d give them P500 if they could name five great doctors. Then I add: ”I’d even give you a bonus: Dr. Jose Rizal. But mind you, Rizal didn’t get famous because he was a doctor, it was because he wrote.” I have never been able to make any of my friends, even the most erudite among them, P500 richer. I would never dare to issue the same challenge with regard to writers even if the number is to be raised to 20.
Writers kasi don’t die. Homer had long been dead but his creative mind is made alive for us as we read ”The Odyssey.” The only writers who die are those who stop writing early. They are the ones who cease to heed their muse. They are doomed to die. Even if they have their kidneys, lungs and hearts intact, and they graduate as doctors. When I heard of NVM’s death, I wept. I realized how much opportunity I allowed to slip away by not pursuing his instructions for me to write and write. Among the many writers at his wake, I was an unknown. The only one who knew me was there all right but he was silent. Right after going to the wake, I began to write. The non-writer wouldn’t understand, but again there was this glow. There was so much of it but it remained intangible. NVM knew all about this, and he tirelessly shared his drive with younger writers. It’s probably similar to what God must have felt when He was shaping the Earth and man. Death serves its greatest purposes for the living. I began to write again and after a long time, I felt most alive again. Truly as Christ taught us, it is in death that we find our resurrection.
After NVM’s funeral, we stayed long after the cement was set over his grave. It was hard for people who loved NVM to leave. Narita extended her thanks to everyone, and she even told stories about NVM’s final days. She was thanking us, but silently we were thanking her allowing us to stay awhile longer to enjoy NVM for the last time. She encouraged writers to keep on writing by saying: ”NVM would always say, ‘A book is never finished unless it is read.’ ” No words can ease the pain of losing a man such as NVM. And there were legions who shared the loss she felt. But for Filipino writers, death has lost again its sting. For even as he has gone to the afterlife, we can still see NVM. I bet he is now into another project, ready to explain and involve us in it when we are ready. NVM will outlive his own death. With us will always remain the memory of that familiar resonant voice, a voice that never failed to instruct us, move us, inspire us. He will always be near whenever we encounter his stories. He never grew tired of teaching us, and up to this moment we are learning from him. To me, he will always remain my teacher.
