On August 17, 2012 at the Ateneo de Manila University, Hiligaynon and non-Hiligaynon readers can already read Margosatubig, the masterpiece of Hiligaynon novelist Ramon L. Muzones, in English translation by the full professor of University of St. La Salle-Bacolod Ma. Cecilia Locsin-Nava, author of History and Society in the Novels of Ramon Muzones, winner of the 2002 National Book Award for Literary Studies for the Ateneo de Manila University Press.
“A master novelist claims his place in national literature,” National Artist for Literature Bienvenido Lumbera says in his blurb, as this novel, serialized in 1946 in the pages of the popular magazine Yuhum and rendered in 30 installments that made the weekly circulation jump from 2500 to 37,000, is a story of precolonial lore, fantasy, romance, adventure, and eroticism of the hero-heir Salagunting.
Lumbera describes the translation as “a wonder-work” and “literate and literary, a rare, readable English version of a regional literary treasure.”
The Foreword is by another National Artist for Literature – Virgilio S. Almario.
Here’s the complete front and back covers:
Margosatubig: The Story of Salagunting_pdf
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I have read this novel in the classic Hiligaynon language, and remember being awed by it. Excited.
Balay Sugidanun 