World literature

Put simply, world literature is the “leak” of national literature. One thing is always true in the study of
literature: one cannot satisfactorily define national literature. As soon as we think we have a binding
definition something happens and the definition is shown to be incomplete. World Literature, in the
modern sense, refers to literary works that are translated into multiple languages and circulated to an
audience outside their country of origin. World literature is not a new concept, but as new media
technologies explode, so do new ways of disseminating books across national boundaries.

Ilustrado

By: Miguel Syjuco

Miguel Syjuco is a Filipino writer from Manila and the grand prize winner of the 2008 Man Asian Literary
Prize for his first novel Ilustrado. To call Him 'notorious' among Filipinos would only touch the tip of the
iceberg. A journalist, novelist and activist, his unique story has challenged the Filipino state of mind in a
daring effort to emerge more progressive and globally minded. He was born and raised in Manila. A
novelist, journalist, and teacher, he is a contributing opinion writer for the International New York
Times. His debut novel Ilustrado was an NY Times Notable Book of 2010, as well as the winner of the
Man Asian Literary Prize, the Hugh MacLennan Prize, the Palanca Award, and the Filipino Readers'
Choice Award.

Ilustrado, winner of the 2008 Man Asian Literary Prize and the debut novel by a young Filipino writer,
Miguel Syjuco, begins with that most familiar of plot devices: a body in a river. In this case, the corpse is
that of Crispin Salvador, a once-celebrated novelist in his native Philippines, who meets his end in the
Hudson in New York. His death is most keenly felt by his student, enigmatically also called Miguel Syjuco,
who returns to Manila to investigate the cause of Salvador’s death and find his teacher’s missing
manuscript, which he hopes will restore Salvador’s reputation.

Despite the premise, Ilustrado is not a literary thriller. Instead, it has wider pretensions in both form and
content. Through the narrative of Miguel’s journey home, Syjuco has attempted to write an all-
encompassing state-of-the-nation novel. Thus, the travails of the Philippines’ young democracy and its
grasping political class form a noisy background to Miguel’s quest. Syjuco’s Philippines is a thrusting,
vibrant, and populous place, ‘tangled with good intentions and a tyrannical will to live’. It is also one of
vast inequality, a country that in living memory has seen both dictatorship and popular revolution, and is
struggling with the value that democracy puts on collective, rather than individual, benefit.

Through a lens of half-autobiography and half-cultural criticism, Miguel Syjuco’s award-winning novel
makes a genuine attempt to appreciate the diversity and eccentricities of modern Manila and the fabric
of the contemporary Philippines. The story itself—with its light shading of New York noir and American
thriller—tells the story of a young writer’s apprentice tasked with the self-appointed mission of writing
an account of his deceased master’s life. The action that follows takes readers on a journey of meta-
criticism, which does well to entertain while asking some serious questions about the state of Filipino
literature as a whole.