AMID the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), fellows of the third UST National Writing Fellowship were urged to draw from memory and melancholia during the weeklong workshop held in Tagaytay.
Fictionist Charlson Ong said AI lacks the capacity to translate human emotions such as grief and pain into literature.
“Only humans can suffer in the act of writing. Writing fiction is a moral act, but remembering is a political act,” Ong said during his June 19 lecture.
Building on Ong’s remarks, renowned writer and guest mentor Beverly Siy said creative nonfiction offers writers an opportunity to reflect on their lived experiences.
“I realized that ever since I became a creative non-fiction writer, I became conscious of the meaning of my life. Because creative non-fiction is based on your life, it is based on what you do and on your decisions,” she said during her craft lecture on sanaysay.
For fellow Hannah Leceña, a creative writing teacher at the Philippine High School for the Arts, the discussion underscored the importance of imagination and intellectual rigor in producing creative works.
“Sa panahon ng artificial intelligence o ChatGPT, sobrang importante na may substance ’yong ating sinasabi,” Leceña told the Varsitarian.
(At a time of artificial intelligence or ChatGPT, it is very important that what we say has substance.)
The June 17 to 23 workshop focused on one-on-one manuscript consultations and mentorship sessions, allowing fellows to apply the lessons from the lectures to their own manuscripts.
For first-time fellows Jorisse Gumanay-Nasol, a teacher at the University of the Philippines Cebu, and Noji Bajet, a communication master’s student at the UST Graduate School, the mentorship format offered a more intimate, personalized experience.
“It’s not a panel of critics that can put a lot of pressure, especially on young writers,” Nasol said.
Bajet said, “That kind of set-up is very nurturing if there is this writing coach by your side.”
The fellowship also featured lectures by literature professor John Jack Wigley on the subjectivity of memory and by creative writing instructor Mark Angeles on literature as a form of societal evaluation.
The workshop director, Varsitarian adviser Joselito Zulueta, said the fellowship fostered a shared creative space among participants.
“True fellowship is not merely sharing a geographic space. It is the profound, vulnerable act of sharing an artistic sanctuary,” Zulueta said.
The third edition of the fellowship focused on fiction and creative nonfiction. Last year’s installment tackled poetry, drama, and screenwriting.
Ten writing fellows were accepted, with their revised works slated for review and possible publication in Tomás, the official literary journal of the UST Center for Creative Writing and Literary Studies (CCWLS).
The National Writing Fellowship was established by the CCWLS in 2024 to replace the National Writers’ Workshop, founded in 1999. John Kobe S. Balod
