Kantogirl reads

Matagal tagal ring nabakante ang blog na ito since nung umalis ang Diva. Although pinepeste niya tayo ng kanyang mga Nathanisms sa e-mail, naisip kong guluhin ulit ang blog na ito by posting about things I've been reading. (Dahil pagod na rin akong mag-isip kung ano pa nga ba ang puwedeng i-post.)

Heto na ang listahan ko, na di na sigurado kung pang-ilan sa bilang:

M. Butterfly. David Henry Wang’s reworking of Madame Butterfly is based on a real event in the 80s wherein a French diplomat was charged with treason and collaborating with the enemy when his lover turned out to be not only a spy, but also a man. The diplomat insists he was innocent on both charges, and it was just so impossible that people laughed. Wang gives this story a frightfully real postcolonial twist (and shades of Miss Saigon, of course). A very quick read, which I finished between the time I sat down to wait for my dentist and the brief trip home after another molar got pulled out. A side effect is that it makes you want to play the Miss Saigon soundtrack over and over again. I like the Bui Doi interlude.

Death of a Harvard Man. Granta’s Christmas issue wherein they investigate a prominent Yankee’s disappearance one cold November afternoon, and how his chopped remains were found in a chemistry professor’s lab. It’s the stuff of crime fiction, but given a more restrained treatment. (I’ve also been rereading several tomes on crime/nonfiction, including Capote, Lacaba’s reportage on the First Quarter Storm, Ellroy’s My Dark Places among other things, for my nonfiction class, but I did not include them in the tally anymore.)

Oldtimer. Butch Dalisay. My favorite story in this collection is “Cameo,” which can be described as a coming of age story about a boy in a looban/apartment complex in Mandaluyong who falls in love with the mysterious next door neighbor who turns out to be the mistress of a fiscal. It’s interesting to note that there seems to be a tradition in our coming of age stories that requires almost every (male) writer to write about falling rapturously in love with the kapitbahay who reveals herself to be less than the pure ideal. What comes to mind is another story by Jun Cruz Reyes wherein a young boy also falls in love with the neighbor whose benefactor was an “atorni.” What is it with atornis and kabits that fascinate our writers? Is this like the coming of age archetype of Pinoys?

Syempre huli ang pinakapaborito ko sa lahat ng nabasa, ang Manila, My Manila ni Nick Joaquin. Fascinating siya at marami naman akong nalaman tungkol sa history ng Maynila. Pero sa huli, naisip ko rin kung pareho nga ba kami ng lugar na nakita, kinalakhan, at minahal. (shyet, minahal daw. Love-hate actually, pero you only have one hometown so this is it for me.) Kahit na sabihin pang ilang Maynila na ang nabuhay, gumuho at itinayong muli, parang di man lang kami nag-intersect ni Joaquin. Iba nga yata kasi ang Maynila ko sa Maynila niya, kung puwede mang ariin ang isang syudad.