The Palanca Awards confers the Hall of Fame Award to 4 creative writers in 2024

The Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature — the country’s most prestigious literary competition — late last week conferred four creative writers the Hall of Fame (HoF) award for year 2024: Miguel Antonio Alfredo V. Luarca, Joshua Lim So, Mikael de Lara Co, and Eros Sanchez Atalia. The awards were presented by Criselda Cecilio-Palanca, and Carlos Palanca IV, representatives of the Palanca clan. 

The Palanca Awards was established in 1950 “to commemorate the memory of Carlos Palanca, Sr…. to promote education and culture in the country.” The Palanca Hall of Fame was established in 1995, and is presented to those who have won five first prizes in the regular categories of the literary contest. It now has a total of 30 Hall of Fame awardees, since the awards were first given in 1995. 

It is the first time that four individuals were awarded on the same year, though the record for most awarded was on the recognition’s inaugural year with seven creative writers getting the prize.

The youngest writer ever to have received the HoF is Roberto T. Anonuevo who was 32 when he received it in year 2000. The others were Eugene Y. Evasco, 33 in 2009; Rodolfo R. Lana, Jr., 34 in 2006, and Luisa Igloria, 35 in 1996. 

Guelan Luarca

The youngest in this year’s crop of Hall of Famers is Luarca. Corridors, his full-length play in English won first place this year. But two other plays of his also won second prizes this year: The Impossible Dream, a one-act play in English; and Ardor, a full-length play in Filipino. 

Just last year, he won in the full-length play categories both in Filipino (Necropolis) and English (Dogsblood). Prior to that, he won first prizes in one-act plays in Filipino in 2016 (Bait) and 2013 (Mga Kuneho). 

“No one ever expects a Palanca. There’s no way of knowing or guessing [if your] entries [will work]. So, it’s more of a surprise. It feels good to win alongside very good friends,” Luarca said, referring to So.

Luarca is back for good after being away for graduate studies at Hunter College in the US for two years.

“I just finished my MFA in Playwriting. I arrived last June in time to direct Sintang Dalisay (for Tanghalan Ateneo). It was supposed to be directed by Dr. Ricky Abad who passed away last year, so I had to replace him as the director.” Luarca is the artistic director of the Loyola-based award-winning Filipino theater company. He is also getting married in April next year, at around the time he’s turning 34. 

His graduate studies helped him “tremendously,” said Luarca.

“All my entries since last year until this year were written while I was in the program. So, I really benefitted from the workshops from my masters, and (for) working with my former classmates. My professors are all celebrated, award-winning playwrights in the US.”

He added that the program is so good that “It made me the best person [I could be]. Instead of me aping American writing, my two years in the US led me to a deeper knowledge and understanding of who I am,” and helped him find “a deeper relationship with my Filipino-ness.” 

The press kit of Palanca states that “[Luarca] creates plays about dystopias, alternate histories, and nightmares to make sense of this benighted nation.”

Joshua Lim So

So teaches Film and works with the theater department at De La Salle University-College of Saint Benilde. He was also recently granted an Asian Cultural Council (ACC) New York Fellowship.

This year, he won in the one-act play Pagkapit sa Hangin. Two years ago, for full-length play Mga Silid ng Unos: Tomo Uno; full-length play Tungkol kay Angela in 2014; and one-act play Joe Cool: Aplikante in 2012. All of these were in Filipino. His first Palanca was via the full-length play in English, A Return Home in 2011. 

He actually started as a playwright in English, when he was barely 16 (more than half my life!) until he was egged on by fellow — and presumably, more “seasoned” playwrights — to write in Filipino. Interestingly, Filipino is his fourth language. The Davao-born-and-bred playwright’s first three languages are Hookien, Bisaya, and English. 

“I took up that challenge and read books in Filipino,” he told Rappler.

The first book in Filipino that he read was Luna Sicat-Cleto’s Makinilyang Altar.

So doesn’t think that age matters as far as having become a HoF is concerned. “It doesn’t matter if you’re younger or older. Wala naman siguro sa edad. Kasi there are writers who start late, pero grabe ang works nila, like Chari Lucero.”

“I don’t think about being a Hall of Famer. It’s really nice. But at the end of the day, the characters or stories that I write are not concerned about those things. I give the certificates or awards to my mom. Parang it messes with my head [if] you keep thinking, ‘O, nanalo ako ng award.’ I don’t want to write coming from that place,” So said. 

So encourages everyone to support Philippine literature and the arts. 

Mikael de Lara Co

“Hall of Fame is an achievement. I did work for it. (But) I don’t feel any different. The person who submitted those entries [is] equally committed to [my] writing and [my] values, regardless of whether I have this award or not,” Mikael de Lara Co said during an interview at the Philippine International Convention Center, where this year’s Palanca Awards were held. 

Co won first prize in Poetry in Filipino category this year for Panayam sa Abo. Last year, he won for Epistolaryo ng Bagamundo at ang Tugon ng Multo. A decade prior to that, he won for Pastoral and other Poems; Iba’t Ibang Ngalan ng Hangin in 2008; and Hands for a Fistful of Sand in 2007, all for his work of poetry. 

The Cagayan de Oro-based poet is the head of the copy division of an advertising agency in Pasig. He shuttles back and forth Mindanao and Metro Manila. He has many translation projects in the pipeline, from English to Filipino, and from Filipino to English. 

“I am curating my next book of poetry,” worth 10 years of output. “Hopefully, next year will be a year of productivity for me,” he said.

“How do I feel? It’s still the same. Good. Very good,” he wrote in a post on social media.

“I’m happy. It’s always good that new voices are being recognized. It speaks of the openness — I suppose — of the process Palanca [has that] the judges and the entire thrust of the institution that [it is not] gatekeeping. The idea is when they see an affective voice, they let it emerge,” he said. 

Eros Atallia

Covid survivor Eros Sanchez Atalia is the most “mature” or “seasoned” among this batch of newly-minted Palanca HoFs. 

His novel Thirty Virgins — which he wrote during the pandemic — won in the Novel in Filipino category this year. His short fiction Si Etot won in 2019, and Si Intoy Syokoy ng Kalye Marino in 2006. His novels in Filipino won in 2017 (Ang Ikatlong Antikristo) and in 2013 (Tatlong Gabi, Tatlong Araw). 

Atalia was hospitalized for six weeks after contracting the dreaded COVID-19.  Recovery took many months. But he started writing again and wrote poems for children for his son — now 6 years old — because he wanted him to read his poems when he is in grade school. Atalia won third prize for Add to Cart at Iba Pang Mga Tula in the Poetry in Filipino category.

Atalia said that he is happy about having been conferred the Hall of Fame Award by the Palanca family, that they are recognizing his work 

In an interview via FB Messenger, he said, 

“I am very thankful to [the Palanca Awards] for developing such projects. Writers are motivated to write and contribute in any way to Philippine Literature.” 

In Filipino, he said, it was his dream that literature wouldn’t be confined to the academia and contests, and that “Literature would jump over the fences of schools, cross busy streets, hang out in stores, sleep in houses, stay in common people’s houses. After all, literature [should be about] the lives of common folk who actually make up a large part of the population of the country.” 

Atalia was “regarded” an Honorary Fellow by the University of Iowa during the International Writing Program in 2016. 

The Palanca has 17 regular categories in Filipino and English, and has special categories such as the Kabataan Essay, and short stories in Cebuano, Hiligaynon and Ilokano. It was established in 1950. – Rappler.com