The Historian As Inventor

Review Essay The Historian as Inventor Milagros C. Guerrero and Ramon N. Villegas Inventing a Hero: The Posthumous Re third, by the historiographic works of creation ofAndres Bonifacio. BY Manuel Artigas y Cuerva, Epifanio de los GLENN MAY. Quezon City: New Santos and his son Jose Santos, Teodoro Day Press, 1997. Agoncillo, and Rafael Ileto. May declares that these "mythmakers" have bent the canons of historical disciplines in their he Philippine edition (New desire to make Bonifacio the national Day) of Inventing a Hero: The hero of the Philippines. He states that: Posthumous Re-creation of Andres Bonifacio by Glenn In addition to being historical T studies, and contributions to an May was launched this year at the Far Eastern University. The American edi ongoing nationalist discourse, tion, published by the University of [their narratives] are, at their Wisconsin's Center for Southeast Asian core, modern-day Philippine Studies, was released earlier, in 1996. In varieties of 'hero myths'- stories this book, May's thesis is that the in the tradition of Greek tales national hero, Andres Bonifacio, "is about Theseus and Herakles mostly an illusion, the product of and Indian ones about Krishna undocumented statements, unreliable, and Kama .... the exposure of doctored, or otherwise spurious sources, hero myths invariably cause and the collective imagination of several pain, since all of us, regardless of historians and a memoirist." our nationality, have a deeply felt According to May, our knowledge of need for heroes. Doubtless Bonifacio was shaped by, first, question admirers of the mythical able works and spurious documents pur Bonifacio will find it difficult to portedly written by Bonifacio; second, by accept the notion that he was the memoirs of Artemio Ricarte; and probably not the humble pie- PUBLIC POLICY October I December 1997 137 Mi!agros C. Guetrero and Ramon N Vi!!egas beian, the literary master, and Bonifacio. These personalities were the super patriot he has long quite vociferous when they disagreed been thought to be. with "facts" published by writers in the early decades of this century. ORAL HISTORY Glenn May deplores the biographical AUTHENTICATION OF SOURCES material of Bonifacio by de los Santos, May also attacks the two sets of primary Artigas, Kalaw and others of their gener sources used by Filipino historians. One ation, who did not provide footnotes and set consists of the literary and political citations. But while they are called the works that, according to him, have been "pioneer historians," the early writers attributed to Bonifacio without conclu were actually not trained in historiogra sive proof. The other set consists of actu phy. In writing their kasaysayan (story/ al documents, particularly letters, which history), the marunong or may pinag he finds unacceptable on the following aralan - such as Mabini, Isabelo de los counts: first, provenance; second, lan Reyes, Sofronio Calderon, and others - guage; and third, penmanship. sought to give an overview of the events That most of Bonifacio's literary and (salaysay) and their interpretation (saysay) political works are not physically present from the standpoint of personal authority and that we know of them only through rather than academic expertise. Their attribution "without conclusive proof' are oral history was not footnoted while their tha main points raised by May. He cites, interviews were not structured and spec for example, Ang Dapat Mabatid ng mga ified. As Bonifacio's contemporaries, Tagalog, which appeared in the Katipunan Artigas, de los Santos, Cecilia Apostol, newspaper Kalayaan. It was transcribed the brothers Leon and Fernando and attributed to Bonifacio by Wenceslao Guerrero, Clemente Jose Zulueta, and Retana and also referred to by Manuel Rafael Palma were also writing as partici Artigas y Cuerva and others. But no copy pants and witnesses of the Revolution. of the original publication has been locat In seeking to transfer information from ed while the National Library copy is the realm of remembrance to the perma presumed to have been destroyed during nence of documentation, they were rac World War II. For May, a historian must ing against failure of memory. himself be able to examine the evidence, Furthermore, the readers knew that not the reportage of previous historians, Artigas, de los Santos and other writers none of whom are reliable. Thus, had access to Espiridiona Bonifacio because no manuscript or printed copy of Distrito, Andres' sister who died in the Bonifacio's works can be physically exam late 1950s, and Gregoria de Jesus, ined, May casts doubt on their having Bonifacio's wife who later married Julio been authored by Bonifacio himself. N akpil, head of the office of the supremo However, the Tagalog language of in late 1896. There were also Ladislao that time lived largely through its oral tra Diwa, an original founder of the dition. In fact Apolinario Mabini had in Katipunan; Briccio Pantas, cabinet mem his head (cabezado or isinaulo) the whole ber in the Balintawak government; Pio Florante at Laura which he transcribed. Valenzuela, Aurelio Tolentino, Guillermo As participants in that culture, those who Masangkay and other intimates of had the language also knew who was the 138 PUBLIC POLICY Volume 1 No.1 The Historian as Inventor author of which work. It was not even Library. From the beginning, Epifanio de necessary for the printed version to have los Santos recognized the importance of the author's byline. Indeed, in the case the Bonifacio letters to Filipino history, of revolutionary propaganda, it would and believed that the best way to safe have been folly for the author to affix his guard them was to keep them himself. real name to any work that was intended What is incomprehensible is that to rouse political unrest. May did not even physically examine the Glenn May even finds unacceptable Bonifacio-Jacinta correspondence. The the documents that are physically pre authors of this article introduced May to sent. He attacks, in particular, the set of the present custodian of the letters, letters Bonifacio sent to Emilio Jacinto. Emmanuel Encarnacion, who was very These were kept by Jacinto whose heirs willing to show them to him. May said, sold them to Epifanio de los Santos early however, that he had no time and that, in this century. They were then passed anyway, he had photocopies of them. In on to Epifanio's son, Jose Santos, and the book, May himself asserts that "after then to his granddaughter, Teresita examining the photocopies ... [he con Santos Pangan. In the early 1980s, cluded] ... that the famous Bonifacio let Pangan offered to sell them to the gov ters were, in all likelihood, forgeries." ernment. Serafin Quiason, then the Having passed such kind of judg Director of the National Historical ment on the provenance of the Bonifacio Institute, told her they had no money documents, May then takes a shot at lin and referred her instead to his friend, the guistic analysis. In this, May is merely antique dealer Severina de Asis. In the taking his cue from his colleague, early 1990s, two private collectors, Jorge Ambeth Ocampo, who was the first to de los Santos (no relation to Epifanio) point out the discrepancies between the and Emmanuel Encarnacion, purchased language of the actual documents now in part of the lot from de Asis. the Encarnacion collection and the May wonders: "Given the central Agoncillo transcriptions appended to place occupied by Bonifacio in Phil Revolt ofthe Masses ( 1956 ). To this puzzle, ippine history, the limited number of sur May adds another: the transcriptions viving sources concerning his life, and the which he attributes (mistakenly) to Jose widely recognized historical value of the Santos (1948) also differ from the lan Bonifacio-Jacinta correspondence, one guage of the actual documents. May might expect that the four letters are speculates that Santos "had doubts about safely preserved behind bullet-proof glass their authenticity." He also declares that or inside a theft-proofvault in one of the Santos, having come to the conclusion Philippine Republic's official manuscript that the Bonifacio letters in the family's repositories. But they are not. Nor have possession are fakes, had published they ever been." Nevertheless, what is so rewritten versions of the forgeries which strange to May is very comprehensible to are themselves flawed because their lan Filipinos. Countless documents, includ guage is not of the nineteenth century. ing the transcripts of Bonifacio's trial (At this point, shouldn't Santos have (later returned through the efforts of destroyed these documents and perpetu Encarnacion), have been pilfered from ated only his own transcriptions?) the National Archives and the National May then goes into an elaborate dis- PUBLIC POLICY October I December 1997 139 Milagros C. Guetrero and Ramon N. Villegas cussion of "goal-focus" versus "actor the millenarian tradition developed focus" verbs. He alleges that the 1948 through peasant uprisings and articulated "Santos" transcriptions were an attempt in a language based on the pasyon, the to bring the language closer to the Christian religious epic chanted during "authentic" language of Bonifacio's time, Lenten rituals. May claims that "there which "tended to be more actor are major flaws in Ileto's discussion .... focused." Virgilio Almario, Director of the No reliable evidence links the Katipunan UP Sentro ng Wika, dismisses May's argu [and] Bonifacio to the pasyon and the ments: the shift of focus from goal to Philippine millenarian tradition .... " actor is integral to the language, and is Among these "major flaws" is Ileto's not specific to any historical period. translation into English of Ang Dapat May also tries his hand at graphology. Mabatid ng mga Tagalog from what May He recounts how one of the authors of assumes to be Jose Santos' re-translation this critique "was taken aback and hesitat into Tagalog of Retana's Spanish transla ed to concede" that one of the letters was tion from the original Kalayaan article.

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