Award-winning novelist, screenwriter and author Lualhati Bautista died Sunday morning, February 12. She peacefully passed in her home after a valiant battle with cancer. She was 77.
Lualhati Bautista is one of our most accomplished activist writers in Pilipino. She was born on December 2, 1945 and raised in Tondo, Manila. She studied at San Jacinto Elementary School and Torres High School.
She was taking up journalism in Lyceum when her first short story was published in 1963, “Katugon ng Damdamin” in Liwayway Magazine, and that started her writing career.
She then wrote three novels that won Palanca Awards: “Gapo,” about an Amerasian in Olongapo, won in 1980; “Dekada ’70,” about the politicalization of a mother, Amanda Bartolome, during martial law, won in 1983; “Bata, Bata, Paano Ka Ginawa,” about a single mom and woman empowerment, won in 1984.
Both “Dekada” and “Bata, Bata” were adapted for the big screen by director Chito Rono starring Vilma Santos. Lualhati herself wrote their screenplays and both films won many awards. Her last books were “In Sisterhood” in 2013 and “Sixty in the City” in 2015.
She also has a book that compiled her best short stories published in 1991, “Buwan, Buwan, Hulugan Mo Ako ng Sundang and other stories.” She also became an acclaimed screenwriter. Her first screenplay was “Sakada” in 1976 about the sad plight of sugar plantation workers in Negros, directed by Behn Cervantes.
Then she wrote an adaptation of a komiks novel, “Kung Mahawi Man ang Ulap” in 1984 for director Laurice Guillen. She then wrote “Bulaklak sa City Jail” for director Mario O’Hara. It starred Nora Aunor and Gina Alajar and it won for Lualhati the best story and screenplay awards in the 1984 Metro Manila Film Festival.
Other screenplays she wrote were “Kadenang Bulaklak,” about four long-lost sisters, for Joel Lamangan; “Maricris Sioson Story,” about an OFW killed in the Middle East, for Joey Romero; “Sex Object” that launched Stella Suarez Jr., for Boots Plata; and “Gusto Ko Nang Lumigaya,” about a woman trapped in a loveless marriage, for Maryo de los Reyes.
