RABAJA, Kristine Beatriz M.

Eng 11
2016-01183 October 08, 2018

First Long Exam

1. Choose one of the poems or stories we took up in class and discuss its use of English.

Margaret Atwood’s “Happy Endings” is one of my favorite stories we took up in class not just
because it’s so unique--being “metafiction”--but also because of its precise use of English. At
first glance, the words are all pretty easy to understand, but as one dissects the story there are
actually many underlying meanings and connotations as well as manipulation of language.

In part A of the story, the sentences are short, succinct, simple, and most of all vague. There is
a drastic change in part B when the speaker begins to elaborate and the point of view changes
as well from an omniscient narrator to the perspective of Mary. Then, in part C, the point of view
switches once again and we read from the perspective of John, plus the short, succinct, vague
lines from part A are now present again. Part D is the shortest and is reminiscent of part A in
that there is a “charming house”, only this time the characters are Fred and Madge, not John
and Mary, and the charming house is by the seashore. Additionally, instead of the real estate
going up, it goes down, and there is a tidal wave involved that the pair survives and their life
carries on as it did for John and Mary in part A. In part E, however, the story diverges again and
the couple is kind and understanding as Fred dies of a bad heart, then Madge devotes the rest
of her life to charity work. What’s unique about this part, though, is that the last line gives the
reader choices: one can replace “Fred” with “Madge”, replace “bad heart” with “cancer”, replace
“kind and understanding” with “guilty and confused”, and replace “charity” with “bird watching”.

Finally, in the last part, we see just how deliberate this use of language is in that no matter how
stories go or are told, they all end the same way: the characters die. We now see that all of
these were just commentary on literature itself and society’s expectations of happy endings, and
how we should learn to be more concerned about the “hows” and “whys” of the plots rather than
the what and what and what.

2. Do a close reading of R. Zamora Linmark’s “Pilifino Efitaps”.

The subject of Zamora’s poem is, first and foremost, the Filipino people, particularly those who
have already died. Popular names include late President Ferdinand Marcos, his wife Imelda
Marcos, and Manong Artemio Cruz, right-hand man to General Douglas MacArthur. All of the
lines of the poem are epitaphs, or dedications to the dead. Despite the overall focus of the
poem, however, the tone of the speaker seems to lack remorse or sorrow, even sounding
mocking at times. Even the poem’s title itself, “Pilifino Efitaps”, seems mocking of the Filipino
accent whether it was intended or not. This begs the question: are these really epitaphs? Or are
they more commentary on our poor, third-world country that has been colonized and become
victim of graft and corruption again and again? Some lines that point to our countrymen’s
struggles are those like line 7 that speak of poverty and misfortune: “Here lies Bonifacio Cruz,
65. Born cutting sugarcane in Waipahu. Died folding hotel linens in Hilton. Collapsed between
swing-shifts”; and lines 25-26 and line 29 that talk about the deaths of OFWs or immigrants
Felipe Alcantara, Nicolas Santos, and Octavio Sison. The mentions of “Imelda’s three thousand
pairs of shoes” and President Ferdinand Marcos, of course, allude to the pair’s corruption, and I
am assuming the many mentions of Hawaii are significant in that the late President was exiled
there after the first People Power Revolution.

However, not all of the lines pertain to the death of a person. Some indicate Bible scriptures
such as Ecclesiastes 7:1, John 10:10, and Corinthians 15:51. The supposed “death” of these
could indicate the Filipinos who have gone against these scriptures in the past such as Imelda
Marcos putting materialism over having “a good name”, “thieves” like women marrying for
money and men engaging in cockfights, and a female impersonator possibly taking the term
“sex changed” too literally.

To me, all of these, especially the last line “And here lie the ghosts of your former loves,
present-day dreams, and eternal disappointments” point to the tragedy of the Filipinos and the
values we have forgotten. Even the diction of the text--the brief, quick names and statements
the speaker bombards us with but practically glances over as if they were unimportant--
symbolizes that we have become so desensitized to tragedy that we no longer linger or ponder
over them when they do, in fact, deserve to be lingered and pondered on. May the speaker is
not mourning over these people or Bible verses or items in particular, but rather the death of the
Filipino spirit. Perhaps this is what “Pilipifino Efitaps” is truly dedicated to.

3. What do you think of Philippine Bible Society’s recent translation of the New Testament into
Taglish?

I was, of course, shocked upon reading about the “New Testament: Pinoy Version”. As
someone who went to a Catholic school for 13 years, was raised in a Catholic household, and
has read portions of both the English and Filipino Bibles, I was a bit insulted at first because the
Taglish version seemed disrespectful. However, I think my initial reaction is due to the societal
norms that have been ingrained in me, particularly that Taglish is informal and even
inappropriate in certain contexts. For example, in my private Catholic school, speaking in
Taglish was highly discouraged. Even in some classes in college today, students are required to
speak and write in either straight English or straight Filipino because this is what we were taught
as formal, grammatically correct, and appropriate in the academic setting. Studying the Bible
and religion can be considered a form of academe as well (thus the existence of CLE and
Theology subjects), and so I had the same notions about having to read the scriptures in either
pure English or Filipino.

Furthermore, after years of experience reading religious texts, scientific textbooks, and journal
articles, it has also been ingrained in me that academic texts are complicated and full of jargon
and are thus hard to understand. English is the language I am most comfortable with, and yet
even reading the scriptures in English confuses me sometimes because of the old language.
With all of these preconceived notions on what the Bible and academic or religious texts in
general should be like, I thought of the “New Testament: Pinoy Version” as unnatural because it
was so casual. Reading this version of the Bible felt as if I were just listening to someone my
age in real life, and I could actually easily understand everything.

This brings me to my last point about my initial reaction: the voice of the speaker. Like I said, it
felt as though I were listening to a fellow Filipino youth and not a disciple or the voice of God,
which is what reading the English or Filipino Bibles normally feels like. Again, this is why the
Pinoy Version felt unnatural and even insulting--how dare people disrespect the word of God?
After reading through the rest of the article and rethinking, however, I realized that the Philippine
Bible Society meant no disrespect. They only meant to bring the Bible (and by extension, God)
closer to the youth in a way that people my age can easily understand and relate to. I realize
now that this is actually a good thing so that more people are encouraged to actually read the
Bible, because I know for myself that the pure English or Filipino versions are definitely
intimidating and discouraging. It may take some getting used to, but if PBS really did consult a
linguist and adhere to the rules set by the Vatican and the United Bible Societies, and if this
results in more people reading and learning the Bible, then maybe there really is nothing wrong
with this translation. Perhaps I, along with other netizens, are too quick to judge. After all, the
Bible has already gone through many revisions and translations--what’s the harm in another one
especially if it was made with good intentions? As society evolves, language and literature
evolves along with it, and so I think the “New Testament: Pinoy Version” is simply the next step
among many in this evolution.

4. Translate Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18 into whatever language or mode you prefer.

It is the beginning of May. Amidst the blooming sunflowers, the sun is beating down on us this
summer’s day. The heat is harsh and unforgiving, and I am thankful for the crawling clouds that
dim the gold for the meantime. But, like clockwork, the seasons change and flowers wither, and
I realize I will regret this sentiment when the skies darken and pour once again. Instead I bask in
the glow of the light, and the lovelier, gentler glow that is you. Not even the stormy forces of
nature, the invisible forces of the universe, the finality of Death--can take away your light and
the life you’ve breathed into me, and the eternal life these lines will give to you. The world may
move on and forget, but as the world spins on, so will my words orbit around you.

5. Discuss your process of translation/transformation/adaptation.

Though Sonnet 18 isn’t a very difficult read (at least not as difficult as other poems we’ve
encountered in class), I still had to reread it many times in order to truly get the feel of it and
understand it deeper. I applied close reading and then read Richard Price’s “Translating
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18”.

In my close reading, I identified the subject as the speaker’s lover. The sonnet was made up of
14 lines using iambic pentameter and an “abab cdcd efef gg” rhyming pattern. The word choices
I highlighted were “summer’s day”, “more lovely and more temperate”, “Nor shall Death brag”,
and “this gives life to thee”. According to the speaker, summer can be too hot, its brightness can
be dimmed, and the season eventually comes to an end. This led me to the question: why
compare his lover to something he has so many complaints about? With the words “more lovely
and more temperate”, however, the speaker sees the lover as beyond just a simple summer’s
day, having eternal summer and beauty. The speaker also goes on to say that so long as
people live, so will the poem, thus immortalizing the lover within the speaker’s lines. At first
glance, these all point to the theme of love and a commentary of poetry itself, pertaining to its
ability to immortalize its subjects with the use of words. The lines “Nor shall Death brag” as well
as “And this gives life to thee”, however, sounded a bit arrogant to me and made me wonder:
could the poem be less about the speaker’s lover, and more about the immortality and power of
his work?

With these and Price’s modern translation in mind, I wanted to transform the sonnet into
something that put more focus on both the lover and the temporariness of the seasons, beauty,
and life itself. I also put a personal touch to it by using prose, my preferred mode of writing, and
by adding in sunflowers as a nod to the sunflowers that bloom along University Ave before
graduation season. The withering of these flowers when May ends also further emphasized the
temporariness of beauty. I tried to keep certain lines as well like “summer’s day” and its similar
descriptions like “the sun is beating down”, “the heat is harsh and unforgiving”, and the
occasional dimming of the “gold”. I also used the words “lovelier, gentler” as variations of “more
lovely and more temperate”, and then kept the word “eternal” to describe the lines.

Lastly, I still loved the idea that words can immortalize their subjects, so I wanted to stay true to
this theme as well but without seeming as arrogant. In the original poem from lines 7 to 10, the
speaker talks about how summer and all beauty eventually fades either naturally or by chance,
but his lover’s does not. Then in lines 11-12, the speaker boasts that not even Death can claim
his lover either. I condensed all these lines into one sentence: “Not even the stormy forces of
nature, the invisible forces of the universe (aka “chance”), the finality of Death--can take away
your light and the life you’ve breathed into me, and the eternal life these lines will give to you.”
The lines “the life you’ve breathed into me” as well as the final sentence about the speaker’s
words orbiting the lover (much like the world or Earth orbits the sun) is the romantic touch I
decided to put to emphasize the immortality and devotion (rather than the power) of the
speaker’s words.

References:

Atwood, Margaret. “Happy Endings.” Napa Valley College, 2012, http://www.napavalley.edu/

people/LYanover/Documents/English%20123/English%20123%20Margaret%20Atwood
%27s%20HappyEndings.pdf. Accessed 6 October 2018.

Hernaez, Jeffrey. “TINGNAN: Ilang Berso Mula sa 'New Testament: Pinoy Version.’” ABS-CBN
News, ABS-CBN Corporation, 25 September 2018, https://news.abs-cbn.com/life/
09/25/18/tingnan-ilang-berso-mula-sa-new-testament-pinoy-version. Accessed 6
October 2018.
Linmark, R. Zamora. “Pilifino Efitaps.” World Literature Today, March 2018,
https://www.worldliteraturetoday.org/2018/march/pilifino-efitaps-r-zamora-linmark.
Accessed 6 October 2018.

Price, Richard. “Translating Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18.” British Library, 7 April 2017,
https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/translating-shakespeares-sonnet-18. Accessed 6
October 2018.