On an evening after my Saturday Philosophy classes, my girlfriend and I went to the Cultural Center of the Philippines to see a play. It was a production of Tanghalang Pilipino. I’m a subscriber of this local theatre company (the subscription courtesy of J.K.) and this is the first play of the new season. The play that evening was entitled
R’meo luvs Dew-Lhiett, and it was a jologs adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Although Shakespeare’s canonical work was originally a tragedy, this version of the play was staged as a comedy. Shakespeare’s Fair Verona was now a squatter “Barangay Verona” along with its
tambays and
tanods. The nightingale’s or the blackbird’s songs of the morning or evening were taken as the yells from the
balut (evening) and
taho (morning) vendors. We laughed our jaws out watching this play. It was also very interesting to see how a tragedy actually becomes a comedy. Even from my own humble standpoint, having read the original Romeo and Juliet, I believe that this play was loyal to Shakespeare’s text. That’s the best way to appreciate play anyway, to be like the Greeks, to read the play first before watching it.
The play was meant to be appreciated by high school students who usually have a hard time reading the Old English of their Shakespeare assignments. The venue, the Tanghalang Aurelio Tolentino, was packed with high school and college students. Since I was a subscriber, we were seated at a reserved section. The other reserved-seat row in front of us was probably meant for sponsors and their friends. Seated in this reserved section s was a woman who looked expensively and eccentrically dressed in a red, kimono-like gown. We heard her companions address her as “Tessa,” and she looked something like a rich publishing magnate or another social butterfly. With her was a well-dressed guy who was addressed by his companions as “Rajo,” and he seemed like the famous fashion designer. Tessa, Rajo, and their nice-smelling, literally bejeweled, rich-looking companions talked in a
coño brand of English that my girlfriend and I overheard. But before that, what is this talk about
coños? Elmer Ordonez writes in his Sunday column for the Manila Times (March 14, 2004) “…coños --- the term was reserved for the mestizos who studied in De La Salle and Letran.” I studied in Letran (for grade school and high school) and I studied in De La Salle (for College and currently for graduate school). Although I refuse to say I’m coño myself --- I just know a coño and their ilk when I see one. They were just like Tessa, Rajo and their friends.
The reason why I wrote this little anecdote is that it was noteworthy for me to see how coños were actually watching, and seemingly enjoying a jologs play. Moreover, the jologs and the coño were actually converged in a formerly “elite” venue, the Cultural Center of the Philippines. This was an elite venue currently staging a play meant for the appreciation of the masses. It’s also interesting how some of the jologs-looking high school students laughed like hyenas at something that Shakespeare, meant to be a tragedy. Everyone seemed happy together in this artistic engagement, which is also an intellectual enterprise with how it uses Shakespeare’s text to make us laugh at the expense of this jologs culture. At the same time, one can also see it as a criticism of what has become of our own culture, or give a new meaning (
jologs) to what our culture has become.
“Postmodern?” I teasingly asked my girlfriend after watching the play, referring to the play’s nearly-literal blurring of the distinction of high and low forms of art, and catering to both an audience of both elite and masses.
“
Pwede? [Could it be?]” She returned my question with another question.
And I thought of how Philosophy could be even more exciting, intellectually appetizing, intellectually enriching, and probably even – radical. Perhaps we can introduce Postmodernist Philosophy through a set of poems called Jolography. Perhaps we can show how this subtle literary work can demonstrate what postmodernism is. Like the play, perhaps I can have my own jologs adaptation of Postmodernism and Filipino Philosophy.
Perhaps we can also introduce something different to Filipino Philosophy. Instead of writing another thesis about scholasticism, or the exposition of another foreign philosophy, perhaps so we can explore on what kind of philosophy does our contemporary literature and our rich literary tradition exudes. We gather from the thesis-writing guideline:
“Having no philosophers in the real sense of the word does not mean that our country is devoid of any Filipino philosophical discourses and utterances.”
Indeed, we must have our philosophical discourses and utterances. We can look at the critical or political writings of Jose Rizal, Graciano Lopez Jaena, or the literary works of F. Sionil Jose or Jose Dalisay. We can probably take that further by looking at something that seems totally different:
Jolography. Let’s look at how this attempt actually gains a wider audience. Let’s look at what kind of philosophy does our stories, our history, our culture, and the little events of our lives tell us. Literature can cover anything from motherhood to assassinations. We can probably use our literature to contribute to the formation of our own Philosophy, or our way of philosophizing.
