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4.03 AVERAGE
4.03 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
What a convoluted trip into the makings of a failed revolutionary in 19th-century Philippines. It reminds me simultaneously of 100 Years of Solitude (without the playful magic) and Of Human Bondage (though not as grim). I learned a lot about the Philippines -- in the intro, especially, the translator talked about the "friarocracy" and the stranglehold Catholic friars held over the country, insomuch that there was a group of friars that ordered the assassination of Fernando Bustamante, the Spanish governor of the Philippines, in 1719. (Though, this takes place in the 1880s/1890s.)
At times terribly boring, at times exciting (like the courting young folks' boat ride that ended with the death of the crocodile), at times viscerally awful as they torture and kill revolutionaries without any semblance of justice, it waxes satirical and philosophical and polemical. (Old Tasio was among the best parts of this book.) There was no end to how much it harped on the injustices church and government heaped upon common folks. What an odd novel. Apparently, Rizal is some sort of phantom invoked as a national hero/bogeyman/Santa Claus in the Philippines.
Yikes, child physical abuse that ends in the child's disappearance. It gives me sadness to think that this is a story that has happened over and over and over throughout the world. Those mass graves of children next to old schools in Canada...
What an appropriate novel for 2021, as the world is still dealing with the effects of colonialism.
Oddly enough, I'd be interested in a tv miniseries about Noli Me T'angere.
Special thanks to TheStoryGraph's Literature-in-Translation challenge. I would've passed over this book otherwise.
A few good quotes:
"The furniture is elegant, if uncomfortable and not suited to the climate; the owner of the house would never put his guests' health before luxury. 'Dysentery is terrible, but you are sitting in European chairs, which you don't get to so every day!' he would tell them." (p 7)
"The rich and affluent have fulfilled the duties that come with having a fortune. The following day they will hear the three masses every priest will celebrate, give two pesos for another, and purchase a bull for the dead, full of indulgences. In faith, divine justice is nowhere near as demanding as human justice."
At times terribly boring, at times exciting (like the courting young folks' boat ride that ended with the death of the crocodile), at times viscerally awful as they torture and kill revolutionaries without any semblance of justice, it waxes satirical and philosophical and polemical. (Old Tasio was among the best parts of this book.) There was no end to how much it harped on the injustices church and government heaped upon common folks. What an odd novel. Apparently, Rizal is some sort of phantom invoked as a national hero/bogeyman/Santa Claus in the Philippines.
Yikes, child physical abuse that ends in the child's disappearance. It gives me sadness to think that this is a story that has happened over and over and over throughout the world. Those mass graves of children next to old schools in Canada...
What an appropriate novel for 2021, as the world is still dealing with the effects of colonialism.
Oddly enough, I'd be interested in a tv miniseries about Noli Me T'angere.
Special thanks to TheStoryGraph's Literature-in-Translation challenge. I would've passed over this book otherwise.
A few good quotes:
"The furniture is elegant, if uncomfortable and not suited to the climate; the owner of the house would never put his guests' health before luxury. 'Dysentery is terrible, but you are sitting in European chairs, which you don't get to so every day!' he would tell them." (p 7)
"The rich and affluent have fulfilled the duties that come with having a fortune. The following day they will hear the three masses every priest will celebrate, give two pesos for another, and purchase a bull for the dead, full of indulgences. In faith, divine justice is nowhere near as demanding as human justice."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Colonisation
Moderate: Physical abuse, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Violence, Death of parent
adventurous
challenging
emotional
reflective
tense
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Though this book is a beautiful yet harrowing image of the Philippines in the past, the social issues are still blatant in modern day society, making Noli a good novel for those beginning their education on social injustice. However, it des upset me that despite the fact that this book receives a lot of praise, it falls into the traps of stereotypical Filipino story telling.
Few books can claim to have changed the fate of a nation. Noli Me Tangere is one of those few. I believe it is the only fictional text that has changed the course of history for a whole country, its effect on the Philippines is no different to Karl Marx's influence on Russia (and he wasn't even Russian). They call it the book that launched a revolution and while that may be a slight exaggeration, the place this book has in Filipino culture is undeniable. Let me address why it's so important and then I'll address why it's a great read.
- It is the first text published in the Philippines that manages to be both literary and critical of the Spanish government.
- It took the horrible collective experiences of a whole nation and condensed them into a beautiful singular narrative, a pearl of wisdom. While the nuances of the book may not have been understood by all and probably still aren't, the truth is there for those who want to find it.
- In doing the above it gave people oppressed for centuries a voice. Their trials are manifest in the struggles of Sisa, Elias and even Ibarra.
- It created an icon out of Rizal, an intellectual giant to which the Filipino people could look to as both a role model and a perfect citizen. In many ways he represents the best of the Philippines. He loves his country not just for all the hidden beauty and the people struggling day by day but for what it could be.
-It documents and crystallises Philippine history in a memorable way that wouldn't have been possible with non-fiction. It's like a time capsule for the modern day Filipino.
As for why it's a good read.
-I read it in english so much credit must go to the translator but the book is beautifully written.
- The characters leap off the page. Pilosopo Tacio, Elias, Sisa, Dona Victorina, Padre Bernardo Salví are so vivid. You may recognise people from your life in the characters or at least stereotypes which you have experienced from people in similar roles.
- The plot is excellent. The pieces are set early on and the game is fierce. We see a strong noble character swallowed and consumed by the evil that resists his good deeds. We then see some of these weak willed and evil characters receive their comeuppance towards the end.
- Rizal manages to weave in so many historical facts and indicators of his deep education without letting it ruin the narrative in any way. You almost feel like he's making you smarter while entertaining you.
- It is the first text published in the Philippines that manages to be both literary and critical of the Spanish government.
- It took the horrible collective experiences of a whole nation and condensed them into a beautiful singular narrative, a pearl of wisdom. While the nuances of the book may not have been understood by all and probably still aren't, the truth is there for those who want to find it.
- In doing the above it gave people oppressed for centuries a voice. Their trials are manifest in the struggles of Sisa, Elias and even Ibarra.
- It created an icon out of Rizal, an intellectual giant to which the Filipino people could look to as both a role model and a perfect citizen. In many ways he represents the best of the Philippines. He loves his country not just for all the hidden beauty and the people struggling day by day but for what it could be.
-It documents and crystallises Philippine history in a memorable way that wouldn't have been possible with non-fiction. It's like a time capsule for the modern day Filipino.
As for why it's a good read.
-I read it in english so much credit must go to the translator but the book is beautifully written.
- The characters leap off the page. Pilosopo Tacio, Elias, Sisa, Dona Victorina, Padre Bernardo Salví are so vivid. You may recognise people from your life in the characters or at least stereotypes which you have experienced from people in similar roles.
- The plot is excellent. The pieces are set early on and the game is fierce. We see a strong noble character swallowed and consumed by the evil that resists his good deeds. We then see some of these weak willed and evil characters receive their comeuppance towards the end.
- Rizal manages to weave in so many historical facts and indicators of his deep education without letting it ruin the narrative in any way. You almost feel like he's making you smarter while entertaining you.
Noli Me Tangere, along with the sequel El Filibusterismo, are the national books of the Philippines; required reading in high schools across the country. Written by martyred revolutionary Joze Rizal and published in Europe, Noli Me Tangere is a cutting anti-clerical satire, a rich depiction of life in the colonial Philippines, and a clarion call to action and reform. It's also flawed as a novel, and while this may be the fault of my 1922 translation, I think the issues are structural, in the characters and plot rather than the language.
The plot, for all its circumlocutions, is simple. Ibarra is a good and ambitious young man, recently returned from seven years in Europe, to find that his father has died alone and disgraced in jail due to his independent mind and feud with the Catholic church. Ibarra continues his engagement with his childhood love, and embarks on a peaceful plan of reform through education, which runs afoul of the Church and the cabal of wealthy and corrupt landowners who control his home town of San Diego. He narrowly evades an assassination attempt, but is unable to stop his enemies from tying his name to an attempted revolution. Ibarra is exiled, his fiance Maria Clara enters a nunnery, and even his enemies wind up destroying their reputations and lives. In the end, it all comes to naught, and Ibarra is a mostly reactive protagonist, who only lets his ideals and passions drive the plot in a few instances.
The major questions that Rizal opens and does not adequately disclose, and "who pays for the sins of our ancestors?", and the relationship between the Philippines and the modern world. Ibarra and his young friends are pawns in a game played by their fathers and grandfathers, seemingly all the way back to Magellan. The question is-what separates these young nationalist revolutionaries from the sins of their fathers? How might their ideals be better from the Catholic ideals that made the nation? Rizal is relentless is criticizing Catholicism as the source of all evils in the Philippines, the greed and the hypocrisy of the priests, and the indolence and arrogance of the colonial authorities, the hopeless lives of the peasants. And while I will not defend the Church, modernity is no better master.
Noli Me Tangere is a novel obsessed with patrimony, giving fathers due respect, with finding the necessary independence from your own father, with correcting the sins and errors of the past. As with all such matters of the soul, and answers that it provides are partial and obscured. And at the distance of 130 years, a history of colonization by Spain, America, and Japan, of exploitation by the Marcos family, and now with Duarte, it seems that the issue of national fatherhood is still unresolved.
The plot, for all its circumlocutions, is simple. Ibarra is a good and ambitious young man, recently returned from seven years in Europe, to find that his father has died alone and disgraced in jail due to his independent mind and feud with the Catholic church. Ibarra continues his engagement with his childhood love, and embarks on a peaceful plan of reform through education, which runs afoul of the Church and the cabal of wealthy and corrupt landowners who control his home town of San Diego. He narrowly evades an assassination attempt, but is unable to stop his enemies from tying his name to an attempted revolution. Ibarra is exiled, his fiance Maria Clara enters a nunnery, and even his enemies wind up destroying their reputations and lives. In the end, it all comes to naught, and Ibarra is a mostly reactive protagonist, who only lets his ideals and passions drive the plot in a few instances.
The major questions that Rizal opens and does not adequately disclose, and "who pays for the sins of our ancestors?", and the relationship between the Philippines and the modern world. Ibarra and his young friends are pawns in a game played by their fathers and grandfathers, seemingly all the way back to Magellan. The question is-what separates these young nationalist revolutionaries from the sins of their fathers? How might their ideals be better from the Catholic ideals that made the nation? Rizal is relentless is criticizing Catholicism as the source of all evils in the Philippines, the greed and the hypocrisy of the priests, and the indolence and arrogance of the colonial authorities, the hopeless lives of the peasants. And while I will not defend the Church, modernity is no better master.
Noli Me Tangere is a novel obsessed with patrimony, giving fathers due respect, with finding the necessary independence from your own father, with correcting the sins and errors of the past. As with all such matters of the soul, and answers that it provides are partial and obscured. And at the distance of 130 years, a history of colonization by Spain, America, and Japan, of exploitation by the Marcos family, and now with Duarte, it seems that the issue of national fatherhood is still unresolved.
challenging
dark
informative
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
dark
reflective
slow-paced
More than a century since its first publication, this remains the most important and deep-impacting book of the Philippines to this day. This is a re-read for me since it was part a required reading back in secondary. As expected, there's a glaring difference when experiencing an important text out of personal wanting, as compared to compulsory reading.
The intent of colonizing a country, whether it be by the expansion of territory or spread of religion, does not always translate goodness to the people who are bound by virtues and rules foreign to them. History teaches us that there is always an agonizing side in being the captive nation, especially when the colonizers cloak it as good intentions but act with deference to the people they ar supposed to be reaching out to.
The intent of colonizing a country, whether it be by the expansion of territory or spread of religion, does not always translate goodness to the people who are bound by virtues and rules foreign to them. History teaches us that there is always an agonizing side in being the captive nation, especially when the colonizers cloak it as good intentions but act with deference to the people they ar supposed to be reaching out to.
Wow, I can definitely see why this book is an incredibly important piece of Filipino history (why it's one of their national books), why the catholic church banned it and burnt copies of it at the time, why it sparked a revolution and why the author eventually became a martyr. In case anyone is wondering, Noli Me Tangere means "touch me not".
This may be fictional in terms of the characters and their individual story lines but it reads like non fiction because it was written as a political commentary on the Philippines in the 1800's and based on a lot of examples of true experiences at the time (although the story dulls them down a bit which is downright shocking to think about because things are already pretty bad in here). This is at its' core, a love story that paints a strong picture of what Spanish colonization was like for the Philippines even after hundreds of years because of its' isolation from the world at the time. It delves deep into how the catholic church and its' agents were corrupt, how they increasingly manipulated and exerted control over not only communities and local governments but also individuals and how they really had some negative impacts in a variety of ways.
This is very much a classic (inaccessible language and all) and a translated one at that so even reading it physically alongside the audio I still had a hard time grasping the nuances of everything until I read a chapter summary and analysis for every chapter which is why this was only a 3 star read for me. I highly recommend checking out the Litcharts info on this if you plan on reading it to really get the most out of your experience.
This may be fictional in terms of the characters and their individual story lines but it reads like non fiction because it was written as a political commentary on the Philippines in the 1800's and based on a lot of examples of true experiences at the time (although the story dulls them down a bit which is downright shocking to think about because things are already pretty bad in here). This is at its' core, a love story that paints a strong picture of what Spanish colonization was like for the Philippines even after hundreds of years because of its' isolation from the world at the time. It delves deep into how the catholic church and its' agents were corrupt, how they increasingly manipulated and exerted control over not only communities and local governments but also individuals and how they really had some negative impacts in a variety of ways.
This is very much a classic (inaccessible language and all) and a translated one at that so even reading it physically alongside the audio I still had a hard time grasping the nuances of everything until I read a chapter summary and analysis for every chapter which is why this was only a 3 star read for me. I highly recommend checking out the Litcharts info on this if you plan on reading it to really get the most out of your experience.
This is one of my favorite books. I have read this in Filipino and then in English and can I just say? Elias always, always makes me emotional.