The Photographs

INTRODUCTIONThe writer or these stories was in a class of mine in Philippine literature in English at the University of the Philippines about sixteen years ago: that's almost a generation: how was I to know then that in time she would be contributing to the subject matter of that course? Eight years after she was in my class, she published her first short story. Her most recent story in this book was published eight years after that.The tile story of this collection of eight stories is the best of the lot. It is also the most famous: it won the Focus first prize in fiction awards in 1977. And its title can serve as the title of the whole book for these stories, all eight of them, are, in a very real sense, photographs.And engaging photographs: you can't begin to read any of these stories without being caught up with them and held in a certain thrall.All eight stories are first-person narratives but in all but one the first person is not the subject of the photographs. Of course these first-person stories are self-portraits too but only in the sense that photographs are as much portraits of their subjects as they are portraits of the photographer - the man, in this case the woman, behind the camera.All the stories are rather simply told but, as I have already said, always engaging.Almost artless.But in one of the eight stories she has begun to show interest in the art, the possibility of telling a story, if not the best possible way, at least differently. To tell a story differently is almost always a way of telling it well.Strange that recently, during the Third National Writers Conference of the Philippine PEN, first Estrella D. Alfon and then Gilda Cordero-Fernando should have spoken to me about the writer of these stories: indeed, Geraldine C. Maayo is to them a sister under the skin. But then it is the skin that limns the form of an object.FRANCISCO ARCELLANAUPFC 10747 January 1981+ + + + + + + + + + + The Author A winner of the National Focus Literary Awards (1st prize Fiction Category, and Special Award for the Essay), GERALDINE C. MAAYO has produced four collections of fiction: The Photographs and Other Stories, A Quality of Sadness, both published by New Day Publishers, The Boys in the Boarding House, published by Central Book Supply, Inc., and The Sorrows of Rowena, published by Pantas Publishing. A story from the first collection was included in a German anthology titled "Women from the Philippines." First published in the Philippines Free Press, most of her stories appeared in national magazines like Midweek, Fina, Mr. and Ms., and Expressweek. She attended the Silliman Writers' Summer Workshop, and is an active member of the Philippine PEN. A holder of a Bachelor's degree, major in English and Comparative Literature, from the University of the Philippines, she obtained her Masters in Public Administration, major in Organization and Management, and her Doctorate in Public Administration from the UP College of Public Administration. She spent most of her working life in the academe teaching graduate courses in Organization and Management, Organizational Behavior, Organization and Human Resource Development. She also conducted seminars (public and in-house) on leadership, problem solving and decision making, and supervisory skills development. She recently retired as Associate Professor in Industrial Relations from the University of the Philippines after 34 years, having started with Masters in Management program in UP Baguio. She also taught graduate school courses in UP Clark Air Base, UP Pampanga, and UP Olongapo Extension Program. Outside the University, she taught HRD in the Doctoral Program of the De La Salle University's Graduate School of Business and Economics, as well as the Doctor of Management Program of the General Staff College in Fort Bonifacio in consortium with the Philippine Christian University. + + + + + +