ADORACION “Doris” Trinidad-Gamalinda, a writer, poet, and former Varsitarian literary editor, passed away on Monday, Feb. 13. She was 95.
Her death was confirmed to the Varsitarian by her grandson, Jonathan.
Gamalinda graduated with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy, summa cum laude, from the University in 1949. She was the Varsitarian’s literary editor from 1947 to 1948.
The late National Artist for Literature Francisco Sionil José, who was Gamalinda’s editor in chief in the Varsitarian, described her as a poetry wunderkind when she was still a college freshman.
“I was a senior then when she was a freshman–the only freshman at the time who startled me with her poetry,” José said in his introduction for Gamalinda’s poetry book, “Now and Lifetimes Ago,” published in 2001.
“I knew even then that the poetry of Doris would grow from a rivulet and merge with the sea that surrounds us today,” he added.
Right after graduation, Gamalinda became a full-time housewife and mother to eight children but continued contributing to journals and magazines, such as the Sunday Times Magazine and the Manila Chronicle.
She took a full-time job as a writer for The Manila Times in 1968 when her youngest child turned two, and her husband, lawyer Marcial Gamalinda Jr., retired from the Development Bank of the Philippines after suffering a stroke. She became the women section editor of the paper before it closed in 1972 due to Martial Law.
Gamalinda was hired by Kerima Polotan-Tuvera as associate editor of Focus Magazine the following year.
She became the National Media Production Center’s publications department head in 1977, editor of the People’s Magazine in 1978, and editor of the Woman’s Home Companion Magazine in 1980.
Gamalinda continued writing poems, stories, and essays for over 50 years, which she said was her “expression of gratitude for her gift of writing.”
“The pieces of writing I made will definitely outlive me just like what some classic novels and literature did to their authors… In a way, I guess, my works will remain as my voice even if my lips are already sealed,” Gamalinda said in an earlier interview with the Varsitarian.
Gamalinda’s descendants excelled in literature and visual arts: prize-winning poet, playwright, fictionist, and former Varsitarian literary editor Eric Gamalinda (son); former Varsitarian literary editor Natasha Gamalinda (granddaughter); and former Varsitarian art editors Jonathan (grandson) and Carla (granddaughter).
