EVERY artist, in whatever medium of devotion, dreams and aspires of the top and most prestigious award – the National Artist of the Philippines Award.
On Oct. 24, 2018, in conferment rites at Malacañang by President Rodrigo Duterte, Atty. RAMON L. MUZONES, a native of Lambunao, Iloilo and Iloilo City, was conferred the National Artist of the Philippines Award for Literature.
Posthumous though the honor, it was a source of great joy and pride for all Ilonggos, as the literary works of Muzones were written in the native tongue, Hiligaynon. The sheer volume of 61 novels in the Ilonggo dialect pulled him through the tough and meticulous vetting by the committee on the selection of National Artists of the Philippines.
For our awardee, the early beginnings were dire and uncertain. His father was a kutsero, horse rig driver; the mother, totally blind, and there were 10 children in the family. Born on March 20, 1913 in Lambunao, Iloilo, Atty. Ramon L. Muzones was the eldest; Anita; Angelica; Lourdes; Manuel; Dionisio; Maria, a retired public school superintendent, became an American citizen; Atty. Angel, retired director of the defunct Bureau of Supplies, became an American citizen for being a World War II Veteran; Raymundo, a retired NISA Intelligence Officer, also became an American citizen for being likewise a World War II veteran; and the youngest and surviving sibling is Santiago Muzones Jr., one of Manila’s finest detectives who migrated to the United States, also became an American citizen; he retired from the US Federal Postal Service and is likewise a Malacañang awardee for Exemplary Community Service to the country having established the Iloilo Society of America that sponsored scholarships for many poor but deserving Ilonggo students; and a Human Rights Commissioner of Jersey City.
Atty. Ramon L. Muzones was a lawyer by profession, a newspaper man and was elected to public office as councilor of Iloilo City from 1963 to 1971. But it was writing in the vernacular that he excelled most. He first wrote “The Ten Bornean Datus” which was published in the Philippine Free Press when he was 19 years old.
He was well-established and respected among his peers, having founded in 1948 Sumakwelan (Guild of Ilonggo Writers) which still subsists to date with retired MTC Judge Nilo Pamonag as its present head. The select group has membership from all Ilonggo-speaking regions, Negros, Cebu, Mindanao, and will be celebrating its 70th Foundation Day this December.
A man of letters, the awardee was editor of Shin Bun, a Japanese newspaper during the war; and immediately after the war when the Iloilo Provincial High School opened for enrollment, he was the first editor of its school organ and later on editor of the popular weekly Hiligaynon and Yuhum magazines. He had also served as head of the United States Information Service (U.S.I.S.).
His novels written in pure Ilonggo attracted national acclaim and he was cited as an Outstanding Awardee of the Writers’ Union of the Philippines and received its Literary Achievement Award in 1988.
He received the Cultural Artist of the Philippines Award in 1989 and chosen as a Gawad Bonifacio – Centennial Artist of the Philippines in 1997 in the company of illustrious regional writers as Amado Hernandez, Tagalog; Iluminado Lucente, Waray; Mariano Perfecto, Bicolano; Leon Pechay, Ilocano and Vicente Sotto, Cebuano.
He was a consultant of public schools in the vernacular; authored an Ilonggo-English dictionary; and compiled a collection of Ilonggo proverbs; short stories; poems and proclamation speeches, driven by a passion to preserve the purity of the Ilonggo dialect.
He was hailed as the greatest Ilonggo Writer of the Century and upon his death on Aug. 17, 1992, after having been elected as an Outstanding Ilonggo, the Sangguniang Panlungsod of Iloilo, thru its Ordinance No. 00-121 enacted on Sept. 6, 2000, renamed in his honor what was formerly General Hughes Street, Iloilo City as Ramon L. Muzones Street.
It bears special mention that in regard the coveted award, as much praise and accolade is due Dr. Ma. Cecilia Locsin-Nava, retired De La Salle University professor of Literature who, launched the quest in the 1970s when she chose as her thesis the novels of Atty. Ramon L. Muzones for her masteral degree at the University of the Philippines. She believed in his works and translated the epic “Margosatubig” and “Shri-Bishaya” into English; persisting thru the years for its inclusion in the National Artists list. It appears with the awarding of the National Artist of the Philippine Award upon her subject that she is a good judge of literary works of quality.
Leoncio Deriada, professor emeritus, University of the Philippines in the Visayas, should also be mentioned in the same breath as Muzones. He vouched for him as “the greatest Hiligaynon writer and his competence as a writer of epic proportions.”
Atty. Ramon L. Muzones is married to Adelaida de la Cruz from Kabankalan, Negros Occidental, with whom he had seven children namely: Atty. Rex, married to Gloria Petinglay, St. Paul’s Nurse from San Remigio, Antique, retired DAR Records Officer; Rafael (deceased) married to Teresita Hernandez; Raquel, a retired BIR employee, married To JOHN CHAVEZ; Rene, married to Emma Jimenez; Ruy (deceased) married to Kim Valera; Rita, Canadian Nutritionist; and Ramon Jr. (deceased).
Writers, like all artists, travel on a different lane. They live in a world of their own and in writing, are often lost, in it. Their only consolation and legacy is that the index of their mind having been etched in the printed word lives after them. And quoting from the Prologue of one of his novels, “This honor is yours and mine…all of us Bisayans, who were born and nurtured in the love of that which we call our own.”
Panginbulahan, agalon! Malmalan nga payhod sa kaugalingon nga pulong! (muzones_law_office@yahoo.com/PN)
