Trans-Pacific book barter

Lord, am I drowning in books. Piles of the stuff just keep rising all over increasingly constricted floor space, and I mean floor space, of which the attic-library has run out of, very nearly. I have yet to find the hours to classify the piled-up books and select which ones go into glass-enclosed or open shelves. This would mean replacing quite a number already in a snug fit, and which should then go into boxes for pushing into the storage room. There they’ll join an august assembly of broken and unbroken toys, upholstery materials, Christmas décor, quaint appliances of wide-ranging vintage, other esoteric museum pieces, etc.

On the stairs leading up there, books, fat envelopes and folders keep rising as towers, too, on both ends of the rungs, so that one has to tiptoe through for any research or restacking effort. On various corners of the family room where we all work and play, the accumulation bewilders. On our bedroom floor, they spread in widening circles around my low bedside table for monthly bills and knick-knacks for the nonce.

The books are everywhere, because I’m been busy with a big project that should take another month of concentrated work. It hasn’t helped that July and August usually rain down more books on members of the Manila Critics Circle. This is the time we finalize our list of nominees for the National Book Awards, deliberate on the choices, and arrive at decisions on the annual awardees.

The winning titles from among the books published last year will be announced on Saturday, Aug. 14, and the authors and publishers feted, at 6 p.m. at the Manila International Book Fair. This year the book extravaganza migrates from SM Megamall to the World Trade Center off Roxas Blvd. There we’ll all see more books, book sellers, book traders, bookworms.

Coincidentally, I seem to have recently developed into a trader and a pusher myself. Since Water Dragon Inc. launched Espiritu Santi: The Strange Life & Even Stranger Legacy of Santiago Bose at Penguin Café a couple of weekends ago, queries and requests for copies haven’t stopped coming by e-mail, fax and text. Plus voice calls. Also taking a chunk of communication time have been similar orders for a couple of modest anthologies that bosom buddy Jimmy Abad and I co-edited: Father Poems, published by Anvil, and 100 Love Poems: Philippine Love Poetry Since 1905, published by UP Press.

Flying in from Oregon last week, to dote over a book launching, was Melissa Nolledo-Christoffels, daughter of our late lamented friend Wilfrido D. Nolledo. From her and the Nolledo family, I’ve received a grand care package that included assorted goodies (Portland chocs and coffee, artworks, etc.) and yet more books. These included a now-treasured copy of her dad’s But For The Lovers (Dalkey Archives Press, 1904), signed and dedicated by dear Blanca Datuin Nolledo. Then there was a padala box with a dozen long-awaited copies of the freshly minted Pinoy Poetics (Meritage Press, San Francisco & St. Helena), edited by Nick Carbo. Its subtitle goes: A Collection of Autobiographical and Critical Essays on Filipino and Filipino-American Poetics.

Melissa designed the book, a 396-page whopper of a landmark anthology featuring 41 Filipino poet-essayists, only six of whom are based in the homeland. The rest are spread out all over the US, including many whose poetry collections have been reviewed in this space, such as Luis Francia, Eric Gamalinda, Eugene Gloria, Luisa Igloria, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Oscar Peñaranda, Jon Pineda, Bino Realuyo, Patrick Rosal and Eileen Tabios.

Some others we here have also anthologized, their poems appearing in our conceptualized collections, such as of Eros Pinoy: An Anthology of Contemporary Erotica in Philippine Art and Poetry (Anvil, 2002). These include Michelle Macaraeg Bautista, Marlon Unas Esguerra, Vince Gotera, R. Zamora Linmark, Mike Maniquiz, Lani Montreal, Rene Navarro, Barbara J. Pulmano Reyes, Tony Robles and Joel Tan.

Eileen had asked Melissa or "Mimi" to deposit the Pinoy Poetics copies with me, for distribution to the local contributors: Jimmy Abad, Mila Aguilar, Ricky de Ungria, Ruel de Vera, Neil Garcia and myself. A couple would go to reviewers. Ricky had ordered an extra copy, while I traded for two more with a suitably worthy combination of extra copies, in turn for Eileen, of Espiritu…, Father Poems and 100 Love Poems…

A fine trade. Veritably a footnote for the greater one where Ginoong Nick Carbo furthers the trans-Pacific barter of ars poetica among kindred smugglers tipping our collective hats off to that ocean of shared destinies. As patronizing purveyors of globalization, heh-heh. To order Pinoy Poetics at $28 a copy, you may get in touch with MeritagePress@aol.com.

Surely you’d want to, after taking in this commendation from scholar-poet Vince Rafael of the University of Washington:

"Pinoy Poetics is an ambitious project for it is no less than an archaeology of the invisible. As editor Nick Carbo points out, the task of excavating the shards of Filipino poetry in English in the vast graveyard of American memory is never ending. Along with Eileen R. Tabios, he has compiled an antidote to this imperial amnesia in the form of essays by Filipino and Filipino American poets reflecting on the techniques and trajectories of their work…"

As mentioned earlier, Mimi the super courier came over for a launch. Of the posthumous book Cadena de Amor and Other Short Stories, by Wilfrido D. Nolledo (UST Press). This will be conducted tomorrow, twice over, starting at 10 a.m. at the Thomas Aquinas Research Center’s auditorium at UST, close to the Dapitan gate. Tell Mimi I sent you. Or premier poet Dr. Ophie Dimalanta. Or UST Press director Dr. Mecheline Intia Manalastas. It may result in a discount. Or they could run you out of the España gate.

Then for night owls like myself, a second launch will be held at 9 p.m. at Conspiracy Bar on Visayas Avenue, Quezon City. Joey Ayala will smile and sing pa. And a reading of excerpts will feature Pete Lacaba, for one, who remains the only colleague Ding Nolledo had of those glorious years of the Philippines Free Press of the Sixties. Well, I hope Greg Brillantes doesn’t hear that, all the way from Houston pa yata.

For the uninitiated, Ding Nolledo was/is the fabled writer of our times. No less than our Ramon Magsaysay awardee for Literature, Dr. Bienvenido Lumbera, collected and selected these stories, which a blurb for the book trumpets in this wise:

"The stories of Wilfrido D. Nolledo will remain synonymous with seduction, wizardry, intoxication.

"Eloquent and dazzling are additional lauds for his trailblazing fiction since the Sixties – those halcyon days when readers and budding writers recognized the premium in language as fresh and riveting as the substance it spun and wove. Oh how we marveled at his narratives of romance, grief, heroism, failure. Thrilled to lyrically adroit, virtuosic articulation.

"He lives on, his powerful prose lives on – to amaze more generations of writers and readers.

"Bravo Nolledo!"

Mimi says she’s considering setting up a book distribution center in the US, perhaps in partnership with Our Own Voice e-zine editor Reme Grefalda who broached the idea. Mimi’s convinced it should do well, especially after she’d seen the recent literary titles published here.

Oh, yes, all sorts of fine books are coming out of the woodwork. Last week a quartet of novels continuing what’s called the "Chick Lit series" launched by Summit Books made their way to my floor space. These are: Tough Love by Melissa Salva, Wander Girl by Tweet Sering, No Boyfriend Since Birth by Claire Betita, and Have Baby, Will Date by Andrea Pasion.

When I start to attack the clutter around me by next month, I might have something to say about these books, which really look more like novellas. They’re written by good young writers, I know that, so that very likely they’re levels higher than Sweet Valley High stuff. Check them out yourselves at the bookfair.

Then there are Feast and Famine: Stories of Negros by Rosario Lucero (UP Press, 2003, and Daisy Nueve: Stories Weird, Wonderful, Whatever by Menchu Aquino Sarmiento (Anvil, 2003), both of which I had to extract from some pile or other, and read rather rapidly so I can prepare, uhh, well, brief citations that should someday be expanded into full-blown reviews. These authors have been our most bemedalled in recent years for short fiction.

The last two arrivals have been courtesy of UP Press. A couple of "horrible crooks" have just added to their burgeoning titles. Gémino H. Abad has authored Getting Real: An Introduction to the Practice of Poetry, which every poet and poetry teacher should get. And Ricardo M. de Ungria has come out with his seventh collection, Pidgin Levitations, in hardbound edition yet – and in as concrete and graphic a manner as a poetry book can get. O, rhymes pa.

Methinks we’ll be awarding these authors same time next year. And if I were Mimi, I’d acquire a couple more balikbayan boxes for her trip back. Looks like there’s no stopping the galleon trade in Philippine books.