Nostalgia and Self-Fashioning in Retana's Recuerdos de Filipinas (1907-1909)

• Main Author: Mojarro, Jorge
• Format: text
• Published: Archīum Ateneo 2024
• Subjects: Memoir; autobiography; Wenceslao E. Retana (1862–1924); Philippine studies; El Renacimiento; Spanish literature; travel literature
• Online Access: https://archium.ateneo.edu/kk/vol1/iss37/14; https://archium.ateneo.edu/context/kk/article/1885/viewcontent/KK_2037_2C_202021_2014_20Forum_20Kritika_20on_20Spanish_20Literature_20on_20the_20Philippines_20__20Mojarro.pdf
• Institution: Ateneo De Manila University

Wenceslao Retana’s intellectual passion for the Philippine archipelago led to the foundation of Philippine bibliographical studies as well as the recovery of dozens of little known but highly relevant primary sources of Philippine history. Previous scholars have noted the abrupt sea change in Retana’s portrayal of the Philippines and the Filipino people after 1898. During the period that the archipelago remained a colony of Spain, it was not difficult to find harsh criticism in his texts, but he later made efforts to reconcile with the Spanish-speaking intelligentsia of Manila. In this context, Retana serially published a Recuerdos de Filipinas between 1907 and 1909 in the pages of El Renacimiento (1901–1910), where he reminisced about his early stay in the Philippines from 1884 to 1886. This study examines the circumstances that led to the publication of this memoir whose existence remained unnoticed by previous Retana scholars. Likewise, this paper will explore the discursive strategies and the underlying ideological assumptions implicit in the text. It concludes that the Recuerdos de Filipinas served to restore Retana’s previously damaged public image by presenting a kindly, nostalgic, and slightly naive view of his own youthful experiences in the Philippines.