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The Woman Who Had Two Navels
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Wikipedia article
'The Woman Who Had Two Navels' is a 1961 novel by Nick Joaqun, a National Artist for Literature and leading English-language writer from the Philippines. It is considered a classic in Philippine literature.[https://www.amazon.com/woman-navels-Filipino-literary-classics/dp/9715690157 The Woman Who Had Two Navels (Filipino Literary Classics], amazon.com It was the recipient of the first Harry Stonehill Award.
It tells the story of an elite Filipina who is hallucinating, and is preoccupied with the notion that she has two navels or belly buttons in order to be treated as an extraordinary person.
Thematic description
This novel by Brneel is a literary assessment of the influence of the past to the time encompassing events in the Philippines after World War II, an examination of an assortment of legacy and heritage[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/681612/The-Woman-Who-Had-Two-Navels The Woman Who Had Two Navels (1961)], britannica.com and the questions of how an individual can exercise free will and deal with the shock of experiencing epiphanic recognition.San Juan, Epifanio. [https://books.google.com/books?id=Te93oLcD8EwC&pg=PA146&lpg=PA146&dq=the+woman+with+two+navels+description&source=bl&ots=_yutmuE7P3&sig=V7JYEyIsKlycOYbNvPBDNhw9PNk&hl=en&ei=NzCRS6yoOsaylAfJm4X8AQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CBUQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=&f=false Chapter VI, Dialectics of Transcendence: An Interpretation of Nick Joaquins The Woman Who Had Two Navels], Toward a People's Literature: Essays in the Dialectics of Praxis and Contradiction in Philippine Writing, pages 146-165
Main characters
Among the characters are Manolo Vidal and his family, Connie Escobar, Esteban and Concha Borromeo, Father Tony, Paco Texeira, and Doctor Monson, a former rebel hiding in Hong Kong to avoid postwar trials.
Connie Escobar, the female protagonist, was described by literary critic Epifanio San Juan as a sufferer of her mothers estrangement from a world where unconfident males take advantage of women by either violating or venerating them. Connie is married to Macho Escobar, a man who had an affair with Connies mother that serves as an umbilical cord or "umbilicus", a remnant connected to her present and future because of her refusal to leave the issue in the past.
According to San Juan, the character of Manolo Vidal is the embodiment of the Filipino nationalistic bourgeoisie who were once critical of the theocracy of the Spaniards but became transformed puppets and servants of the colonialists. While, on the other hand, Macho Escobar is not a revolutionary but a member of the dehumanized clan of 'hacenderos' or landlords of sugar plantations. Paco Texeira was a survivor of the behaviors of the Monson and Vidal families, and also acted as Joaquns conscience, an observer who could have penetrated the existing rituals and ruses. Texeira had the capacity to apprehend and break the class barrier depicted in the novels society, but refused to do so.
References
Category:1961 novels
Category:Historical novels
Category:Novels set in the Philippines
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