The God Stealer

by Francisco Sionil Jose

I. Background of the Author

Francisco Sionil Jose

Francisco Sionil Jose

Born: December 3, 1924
Age: 90 years old
Birthplace: Rosales, Pangasinan
Filipino novelist, writer, journalist
Notable works: The Rosales Saga Novels
Works in English have been translated into 22

languages, including Korean, Indonesian,

Czech, Russian, Latvian, Ukrainian and Dutch.

 His novels and short stories depict the social

underpinnings of class struggles and colonialism in

Filipino society.
His notable work is the Rosales Saga.

"Authors like myself choose the city as a setting

for their fiction because the city itself illustrates

the progress or the sophistication that a
particular country has achieved. Or, on the
other hand, it might also reflect the kind of
decay, both social and perhaps moral, that has
come upon a particular people.
F. Sionil Jos, BBC.com, 30 July 2003

Personal life
Childhood spent at Barrio Cabugawan, Rosales,

Pangasinan where he learned to write.

Because of poverty, they migrated from
Pangasinan to Cagayan Valley
One of the greatest influences to Jos was his
industrious mother who went out of her way to
get him the books he loved to read, while
making sure her family did not go hungry
despite poverty and landlessness.

Jos started writing in grade school, at the same

time he started reading.

In the fifth grade, one of Joss teachers opened the

school library to her students, which is how Jos

managed to read the novels of Jos Rizal, Willa
Cathers My Antonia,Faulkner and Steinbeck.

Reading about Basilio and Crispin in Rizals Noli

Me Tangere made the young Jos cry, because

injustice was not an alien thing to him.
Jos attended the University of Santo
Tomas after World War II, but dropped out and
plunged into writing and journalism in Manila.
Founded the Philippine branch of PEN (an
international organzation for writers)

 Jos also owns Solidaridad Bookshop, which is on

Padre Faura Street in Ermita, Manila.

Awards
2004: Pablo Neruda Centennial Award
2001: The Order of Sacred Treasure (Kun

Santo Zuiho Sho)

2001: National Artist for Literature,
Philippines
2000: Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et
Lettres
1999: Cultural Center of the Philippines
Centennial Award

1989: Cultural Center of the Philippines

Award (Gawad para sa Sining) for Literature

1988: Outstanding Fulbrighters Award for
Literature
1981: First Prize, Palanca Memorial Award for
Novel in English

1980: Ramon Magsaysay Award for

Journalism, Literature and Creative

Communication Arts
1979: City of Manila Award for Literature

Works
Rosales Saga novels
A five-novel series that spans three centuries of
Philippine history, translated into 22 languages
The Pretenders (1962)
My Brother, My Executioner (1973)
Mass (December 31, 1974) I
Tree (1978

Original novels containing the Rosales Saga

Source (Po-on) (1993)
Don Vicente (1980) Tree and My Brother, My

Executioner combined in one book

The Samsons The Pretenders and Mass combined in
one book

Other novels
Gagamba (The Spider Man) (1991)
Viajero (1993)
Sin (1994)
Ben Singkol (2001)
Ermita (1988)
Vibora! (2007)
Sherds (2008)

Muse and Balikbayan: Two Plays (2008)

Short Stories (with Introduction and Teaching

Guide by Thelma B. Kintanar) (2008)

The Feet of Juan Bacnang (2011)

Novellas
Three Filipino Women (1992)
Two Filipino Women (1981)

Short story collections

The God Stealer and Other Stories (2001)
Puppy Love and Thirteen Short Stories (March 15, 1998)
Olvidon and Other Stories (1988)
Platinum: Ten Filipino Stories (1983)
Waywaya: Eleven Filipino Short Stories (1980)
Asian PEN Anthology (as editor) (1966)
Short Story International (SSI): Tales by the World's

Great Contemporary Writers

Children's books
The Molave and The Orchid (November 2004)
Verses
Questions (1988)
Essays and non-fiction
In Search of the Word (De La Salle University Press,
March 15, 1998)

We Filipinos: Our Moral Malaise, Our Heroic

Heritage
Soba, Senbei and Shibuya: A Memoir of PostWar Japan
Heroes in the Attic, Termites in the Sala: Why
We are Poor (2005)
This I Believe: Gleanings from a Life in
Literature (2006)
Literature and Liberation (co-author) (1988)

II. Times of Milieu

The background of the story was the Cordilleras

since it was least touched by colonial culture.

The story was a first prize winner during
the 1959 Palanca awards in the Philippines.

Symbols
Philip Philippines
Sam Christie Uncle of Sam of the United States

III. Analysis
Philip's act of thievery represented the Filipinos'

giving up of their past tribal origins and traditions,

only to be replaced by an "unnatural" culture
brought by colonialism. At one time in history,
colonialism brought to the Filipinos a state of
confusion, troubled emotions, helplessness, torment,
embarrassment and the inability to embrace the
past.

 Philip's repudiation of his Ifugao heritage may be

extrapolated to mean that Filipino's rejection of his

own roots and its replacement with colonial values.

Post-colonialism
It is an academic discipline featuring methods

of intellectual discourse that analyze, explain,

and respond to the cultural legacies
of colonialism and imperialism, to the human
consequences of controlling a country and
establishing settlers for the economic
exploitation of the native people and their land.

It asks the reader to analyze and explain the effects

that colonization and imperialism, or the

extension of power into other nations, have on
people and nations.
Post-colonialism asks the reader to enter a text
through the post-colonial lens, or a specific way of
reading text.

Edward Said
Father of Post-Colonialism
Said's book 'Orientalism' (1978) is considered

the foundational work on which post-colonial

theory developed.
His work, including 'Orientalism', focused on
exploring and questioning the artificial
boundaries, or the stereotypical boundaries,
that have been drawn between the East and West,
specifically as they relate to the Middle East.

How to approach a post-colonial reading of a text