The Significant Persons for the development of Philippine Literature in English

F. Sionil José or in full Francisco Sionil José (born December 3, 1924) is one of the most widely-read Filipino writers in the English language. His novels and short stories depict the social underpinnings of class struggles and colonialism in Filipino society. José's works - written in English - have been translated into 22 languages, including Korean, Indonesian, Russian, Latvaian, Ukrainian, Dutch.

José attended the University of Santo Tomas after World War II, but dropped out and plunged into writing and journalism in Manila. In subsequent years, he edited various literary and journalistic publications, started a publishing house, and founded the Philippine branch of PEN, an international organization for writers. José received numerous awards for his work. The Pretenders is his most popular novel, which is the story of one man's alienation from his poor background and the decadence of his wife's wealthy family.

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Bienvenido N. Santos (1911-1996) is a Filipino-American fictionist, poet and nonfiction writer. He was born and raised in Tondo, Manila. His family roots are originally from Lubao, Pampanga, Philippines. He lived in the United States for many years where he is widely credited as a pioneering Asian-American writer.

He received a Rockefeller fellowship at the Writers Workshop of the University of Iowa where he later taught as a Fulbright exchange professor. Santos has also received a Guggenheim Foundation fellowship, a Republic Cultural Heritage Award in Literature as well as several Palanca Awards for his short stories. Scent of Apples, his only book to be published in the United States, won an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation in 1980.

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Please check out:
(Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Web. 25th of June 2009.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bienvenido_Santos
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._Sionil_Jose

LITERATURE: what it is, and why is it important?

For me, literature is a way of expressing oneself and communicating to others. It could be a way of sending a message or giving a lesson to the reader/s. It's a language that has been here for ages; from oral literature, in the old times, even to written literature. A literature, for me, could be: a song, poem, a novel, a story and many more that are considered as one, as long as it give off a great message to the reader/s of it. Literature is important because, without it, first and foremost, we wouldn't have the stories that have been told to us by our parents that could came from our ancestors and the most important one, Philippine Literature wouldn't be around today. Literature is a way of communicating. Let's not put into waste what our Filipino Authors have contributed to our own literature. Live. Laugh. Love our Literature!

Image source: http://www.lcsc.edu/library/ILI/Classes/j0309615.jpg/