03/10/2026
Did you know that some of our National Artists fought the Marcos Sr. dictatorship, even at the risk of going to jail?
Bienvenido Lumbera was one of them.
But before he was accorded the National Artist for Literature award, Ka Bien Lumbera was — first and foremost — a nationalist and progressive intellectual, honed by the radical fervor enveloping the Philippines in the 1960s.
While the country was beset with a growing sense of nationalism, primarily because of the writings and ideas of Claro M. Recto, Renato Constantino, Lorenzo Tañada, and other bigwigs of the Second Propaganda Movement era, Lumbera was in the United States, swept into the allure and might of the Civil Rights Movement. He would later credit that for his nationalist awakening.
When he returned to Manila, it was already the stage of radicalization and nationalist sentiment. He taught in Ateneo de Manila University at a time of increasing militant action. Activism was at its peak. Students went to the streets in droves, demanding social change.
He became more involved, first with the Filipinization campaign inside and outside of Ateneo. He had also decided to participate in teach-in discussions in the University of the Philippines (UP), listening among fellow radical thinkers and students who discussed the country's social iniquities. He had clear sympathies to members of Kabataang Makabayan (KM) in clashes with school administrations, and he began to keep in touch with them.
In 1971, he became the chairperson of Panulat para sa Kaunlaran ng Sambayanan (PAKSA), a group of revolutionary writers and cultural workers whose membership included the late Jose Maria Sison and his fellow National Artist (for Film and Broadcast Arts), Ricardo "Ricky" Lee.
Along with Panday Sining, Gintong Silahis, and Nagkakaisang Progresibong Artista-Arkitekto (NPAA), PAKSA participated in spreading ideas about the national democratic struggle.
During this time, especially after the explosion of First Quarter Storm protests in 1970, artists became committed members of the political battlefield, fighting the budding dictatorship of Marcos Sr. while envisioning a more radical future. Lumbera, too, was swept into this.
In fact, Lumbera himself was — gradually — attracted to the Maoist classic "Talks at the Yenan Forum," in which Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong clearly defined the relationship of artistic production and political struggle.
When Marcos Sr. imposed Martial Law in September 1972, Lumbera eluded arrest even though he expected it. He decided to join the underground resistance. From there, he edited Ulos, a revolutionary publication from the underground that was eventually produced by the National Democratic Front (NDF).
Martial Law, for him, was a ripe time for what he called literature of exposition and opposition — “panitikan ng pagsisiwalat at pagtutol.” In their writings and other cultural work, their main target was the Marcos dictatorship.
By January 1974, his illusion of safety from detention under Martial Law was shattered when a sudden wave of arrests against dissenters and suspected subversives had emerged. He decided to pay Ricky Lee, his fellow PAKSA member, a visit at his house along España Boulevard, in Manila, to warn him. But when he arrived, the dictator's soldiers were already there. He ran away, but the military chased him down until they caught him at the corner of Quezon Avenue and Banawe Street, in Quezon City.
He spent almost a year of imprisonment in Fort Bonifacio, where Lee, Roland Simbulan, writer Rogelio Mangahas, and other so-called "political offenders" were also jailed. (Among the other notable political detainees from Fort Bonifacio were senators Benigno Aquino Jr. and Jose W. Diokno, Prof. Judy Taguiwalo, Ma. Lorena Barros, writer and editor Jo-Ann Maglipon, and Benito and Wilma Tiamzon.)
One of his former Ateneo students, Cynthia Nograles, wrote to Gen. Fidel V. Ramos and demanded his release. By December 1974, he was out of prison, and Bien and Cynthia would marry a few months after.
Life was never "back to normal" after his brief time in Bonifacio, but Lumbera persisted in his political involvement and committed writing. In 1976, he began to teach at the Departamento ng Filipino at Panitikan ng Pilipinas (DFPP), under the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) in UP Diliman. In 1977, former CAS Dean Francisco "Dodong" Nemenzo Jr. invited him to write for Diliman Review. Lumbera took up other creative projects while Martial Law was at its zenith.
In 1986, he received the news of the downfall of the Marcos Sr. dictatorship in Japan, where he served as a visiting professor of Philippine Studies at the Osaka University of Foreign Studies from 1985 to 1988. In that same year, the Ateneo University Press published his magna opus, “Tagalog Poetry, 1570-1898: Tradition and Influences in Its Development.” To this day, students of Filipino literature and creative writing continue to read and discuss this book.
After 1986, Lumbera wrote several musical dramas, anthologies, or textbooks, including Noli Me Tángere; Hibik at Himagsik nina Victoria Laktaw; Philippine Literature: A History and Anthology (Anvil); Rediscovery: Essays in Philippine Life and Culture; Filipinos Writing: Philippine Literature from the Regions; and Paano Magbasa ng Panitikang Filipino: Mga Babasahing Pangkolehiyo (UP Press).
In 2004, Sa Sariling Bayan: Apat na Dulang May Musika was published. It was an anthology of Lumbera's musical dramas.
His excellent work also won him several citations. He won a Palanca Award for Literature in 1975. In 1996, ten years after the EDSA People Power uprising, Lumbera was conferred with the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature, and Creative Communication Arts. He also received the 1998 Philippine Centennial Literary Prize for Drama, as well as the 1999 Cultural Center of the Philippines Centennial Honors for the Arts.
In 2006, ten years after he became a Ramon Magsaysay Awardee, he was officially named a National Artist for Literature.
Bienvenido Lumbera passed away on September 28, 2021, or five years ago, leaving behind an abundant legacy of radical politics, activist scholarship, committed writing, and resistance to the Marcos Sr. dictatorship.
*📸: Lucan-Tonio L. Villanueva
