Poet, fictionist, essayist, biographer, playwright, and National Artist, decided to quit

after three years of secondary education at the Mapa High School. Classroom work
simply bored him. He thought his teachers didn't know enough. He discovered that he
could learn more by reading books on his own, and his father's library had many of
the books he cared to read. He read all the fiction he could lay his hands on, plus the
lives of saints, medieval and ancient history, the poems of Walter de la Mare and
Ruben Dario. He knew his Bible from Genesis to Revelations. Of him actress-
professor Sarah K. Joaquin once wrote: "Nick is so modest, so humble, so unassuming
. . .his chief fault is his rabid and insane love for books. He likes long walks and
wornout shoes. Before Intramuros was burned down, he used to make the rounds of
the churches when he did not have anything to do or any place to go. Except when his
work interferes, he receives daily communion." He doesn't like fish, sports, and
dressing up. He is a bookworm with a gift of total recall.
He was born "at about 6:00 a.m." in Paco, Manila, on 04 May 1917. The moment he
emerged from his mother's womb, the baby Nicomedes--or Onching, to his kin--made
a "big howling noise" to announce his arrival. That noise still characterizes his arrival
at literary soirees. He started writing short stories, poems, and essays in 1934. Many
of them were published in Manila magazines, and a few found their way into foreign
journals. His essay La Naval de Manila (1943) won in a contest sponsored by the
Dominicans whose university, the UST, awarded him an A.A. (Associate in Arts)
certificate on the strength of his literary talents. The Dominicans also offered him a
two-year scholarship to the Albert College in Hong Kong, and he accepted. Unable to
follow the rigid rules imposed upon those studying for the priesthood, however, he
left the seminary in 1950.

He is included in Heart of the Island (1947) and Philippine Poetry Annual: 1947 -
1949 (1950), both edited by Manuel A. Viray.

The following are Joaquin's published books:

Prose and Poems (1952)

The Woman Who Had Two Navels (1961)
Selected Stories (1962)
La Naval de Manila and Other Essays (1964)
The Portrait of the Artist as Filipino (1966)
Tropical Gothic (1972)
The Complete Poems and Plays of Jose Rizal (1976)
Reportage on Crime (1977)
Reportage on Lovers (1977)
Nora Aunor and Other Profiles (1977)
Ronnie Poe and Other Silhouettes (1977)
Amalia Fuentes and Other Etchings (1977)
Gloria Diaz and Other Delineations (1977)
Doveglion and Other Cameos (1977)
A Question of Heroes (1977)
Stories for Groovy Kids (1979)
Almanac for Manileños (1979)
Manila: Sin City and Other Chronicles (1980)
Language of the Street and Other Essays (1980)
Reportage on the Marcoses (1979, 1981)

The awards and prizes he has received include:

Republic Cultural Heritage Award (1961);

Stonehill Award for the Novel (1960);
 first prize, Philippines Free Press Short Story Contest (1949);
first prize, Palance Memorial Award (1957-58);
Jose Garcia Villa's honor roll (1940);
and the National Artist Award (1976).

From the jacket of A Question of Heroes: "Along with the author's recent 'culture as
History,' [this book is] a gentle polemical inquiry into thecharacter of the Filipinos'
national culture, these essays constitute perhaps the most coherent picture of the
revolutionary heritage most Filipinos claim for themselves today."

"Nick Joaquin is, in my opinion," wrote Jose Garcia Villa, "the only Filipino writer
with a real imagination--that imagination of power and depth and great metaphysical
seeing--and which knows how to express itself in great language, who writes poetry,
and who reveals behind his writings a genuine first-rate mind."

"Joaquin has proven the truism," said Alejandro R. Roces, "that to understand the
present, you have to first know the past. And by presenting the present as a
continuation of the future, he has traced the roots of our rotting society to our moral
confusion. He is doing for the Philippines what Faulkner has done for the [U.S.]
South."

"Nick Joaquin," said Manuel A. Viray, "a gifted stylist, has used his sensitive style
and his exciting evocations in portraying the peculiar evil, social and moral, we see
around us and in proving that passion as well as reason can never be quenched."

After the death of his father, Joaquin went to live with his brother Enrique ("Ike").
With the encouragement of his sister-in-law, Sarah, he submitted a story to the Herald
Mid-Week Magazine and it was published. He soon sent out more stories to other
magazines. In 1949 "Guardia de Honor" was declared the best story of the year in
the Philipines Free Press.

He was designated manager of his sister-in-law Sarah's dramatic organization after

WWII. Later he joined the Philippines Free Press as proofreader and subsequently
became a rewrite man. He wrote feature articles he bylined as "Quijano de Manila."
They were a great hit. Soon they appeared regularly and Quijano de Manila became
one of the most famous journalists in the country.

Because of labor problems in the Free Press, he left and edited Asia-Philippine
Leader. He had been with the Free Press for 27 years (1950-77). Nicomedes
"Onching" M. Joaquin, today just "Nick," who came into the world howling, lives
quietly in San Juan del Monte writing, among others, kiddie books. And "he survives
on sheer genius," remarks one admirer of his.
A Heritage of Smallness
In that book, Joaquin devotes a whole chapter titled “A Heritage of Smallness” to delving profoundly into
the Filipinos’ confidence in doing and excelling in small things and their failures to push beyond the
small and easy into the hard and big projects.

According to Joaquin, there is probably no country in the world where one can buy tingi except in the
Philippines. He said that while foreigners buy in bulk, only in this country can one “buy and sell one stick
of cigarette, half a head of garlic, a dab of hair pomade… one single egg, (and) one single banana.”

Joaquin provides three features of this national character:

“First: the Filipino works best on small scale-tiny figurines, small pots, filigree works in gold or silver,
decorative arabesque. The deduction here is that we feel adequate to the challenge of the small, but are
cowed by the challenge of the big.

“Second: that the Filipino chooses to work in soft easy materials–clay, molten metal, tree searching has
failed to turn up anything really monumental in hardstone. Even carabao horn, an obvious material for
native craftsmen, has not been used to any extent remotely comparable to the use of ivory in the ivory
countries. The deduction here is that we feel equal to the materials that yield but evade the challenge of
materials that resist.

“Third: that having mastered a material, style, craft or product, we tend to rut in it and don’t move on to
the next phase, a larger development, based on what we have learned. In fact, we instantly lay down even
what mastery we already possess when confronted by the challenge from outside of something more
masterly, instead of being provoked by the threat of competition.”
Filipinos are a battered people. We are battered by white colonizers whom we can easily recognize but
have difficulties acknowledging the brown and yellow business colonizers among us who shackle our
attempts to keep our noses above water. Like giant vacuum cleaners, they suck in every business
opportunities open to dirt-poor Filipinos.

How can small and medium businesses fight and survive the juggernaut of huge business empires like
Shoemart and Mercury Drug? When the lions roar, the little cats can do nothing but scamper away and
find shelter inside the farthest end of a cave.
Confirmed in the feeling of insignificance, he will rationalize his smallness by saying “maliit lang ang
nakakapuwing” (only tiny objects irritate the eyes). He will be content to excel doing the small things but
will remain pusillanimous in big things where the windfalls are.

The late Fr. Jaime Bulatao, our professor in psychology, said: “You are what you think you are. If you
think you have short legs when you actually have long legs, you will probably decline to join a high jump
competition.”
-
THE smallNESS MENTALITY OF THE FILIPINO
A brief summary of the essay “A Heritage of Smallness” by Nick Joaquin

Nipa hut, small buildings and a one stick of cigarette are just the few things that signify the
smallness mentality of the Filipino. On the essay of Nick Joaquin (also known as Quijano de Manila)
entitled “A Heritage of Smallness”, shows that we Filipinos are known because of the little things we do.
We are incapable of creating massive statues, building and majestic cathedral. It only means that Filipino
wants to withdraw from any engagement or crisis. We always want to shirk from any social
responsibility. We are afraid to make big things and to face big problems in life. We can’t even challenge
our self to build great architecture because we’re thinking that small things are easy to accomplish; less
problem and less effort. It also tells that we are not the only nations who were colonized so it is not an
excuse for us to stick on what we are doing and to control what we want to express. Just like the other
country we should open our minds in all the challenges and difficulties in life. We should not be afraid to
explore new things.
-
It is a shame that we do not adapt to customs, we do not embrace changes, and we hate to leave our
comfort zone. Although yes, we work hard for our future, so hard that up to the point that we end up
sweating blood (please don't interpret it literally). But sometimes, no matter how hard we work, the
rewards are so small that we end up spending everything and still our savings are empty. Although, I am
grateful that my work pays me well compared to others since I am an OFW, but I only find it just enough
for my own personal expenses and a few for my savings, but cannot suffice the luxuries that I want.

Yes, we think small. We have to admit that most of us fear big things, some of us fear big risks, fear big
responsibilities, to the extent that we lose focus or interest in doing things that will greatly improve us.
Sadly, when we fear big responsibilities, most of us Filipinos creates an amoeba-like thinking. We fear
that when things get big, we lose our control over it. just like in our government, when a certain barangay
goes big, we split them. If a province is too big, we split them and just add suffixes like Occidental and
Oriental, delNorte and delSur instead of making them a big federation. Most of us fear to take risks and
just settle for a sub-par business instead of making a big enterprises or corporations. I guess that's why
they say that "fortune favors the bold." because big-time businessmen does bold decisions and takes risks
for breakfast. But with all these, the worst part is that we fear big things. We fear that if something or
someone is bigger than us, we tend to put them down or belittle them and this is where our crab mentality
comes in.

It is just plain sad that for how many generations, this way of thinking is still present within us. I, myself
is guilty of this, and probably what I can do is learn from my mistakes and become a better person and
start to think BIG.
-
Filipinos think small because our orientation is different. we possess a worldview that is both
romantic and anachronistic. this worldview has been propped up by our collective experience as a people.
you can blame history for how we see things, but that is what it is.

our orientation as a people is this: we focus on the family, not on the community. we will move heaven
and earth just to give the members of our family decent lives, but we have a persistent difficulty in
translating this heroism to be done in behalf of the nation.

the development of this worldview is easy to understand. aside from the fact that we are an archipelago of
islands, languages and cultures, the phenomena of a nation is something that has always been in second
priority to the family. this is because there is always a disconnection between nation-building, the role of
the individual in it, as well as the role of families a lack of common imagination of what is good for a
nation, and not just for families.

this disconnection is brought about and reinforced by the kind of political structures and political culture
that we have. national politics only exists on the tv screens. our first contact with politics are local
landlord-politicians who perpetuate themselves in power, handling out services as dole-outs like relief
goods in a disaster, expecting us to be grateful for it.

instead of imagining ourselves as a community, as a nation, we stagnate into putting our families first
above all else since we have more control over it through our own hard work.
our collective social psyche imagine things in small proportions, precisely because imagining it in
bigger servings have time and time again failed us. it is a collective defense mechanism against failure:
to imagine ourselves winning where we failed.

this problem isn't just cultural. it is also social and political in nature. our collective experience as a
people (culture) reflects how we deal with each other (social), and what dictates what is fair and what isn't
(political).

i have heard so much of how we are supposedly possess a "damaged culture" with "crab mentality" and
the likes ringing the air. i'd like to say however that our culture and our social mindset is brought
about by the things that we have experienced and are continually experiencing, and as a reaction to
it.
-
In "A Heritage of Smallness", Filipino writer and journalist Nick Joaquin makes a brave, outspoken
commentary on Filipino society, past and present. It's feisty; it stings and, most of all, it's true. But do
his words, however true, speak in absolute terms? All throughout the article, Joaquin elaborates on
how the Filipino's inability to think [and do] big denies him entrance into a world that thrives on
progress. And as if that wasn't enough, that inability happens to be part of his heritage, he says.

According to Joaquin, this heritage of "smallness" can be found in every aspect of society: retail not
wholesale buying, little chieftains not kings, small nipa huts not long houses, jeep(ney)s not cars, clay
not marble or bronze pottery, small artefacts not towering temples, and so on. This is undeniably true.
We don't have the big things: no Eiffel Tower or Parthenon. But is that something necessarily lesser?

 In the first few paragraphs, Joaquin makes it seem as if buying in tingi (cf. retail) was a bad
thing while buying in wholesale (as exemplified by most Westerners) was a better thing to do. Buying
only what one needs is not a bad thing compared to buying more than what one even wants. And since
when has consumerism been a champion of progress? It's not how much we buy but how. Perhaps
Joaquin forgot to remember how much food the Americans throw everyday because they buy more than
what they can handle. Many Filipinos buy tingi because they can't afford beyond that. Many Filipinos
are not poor because they buy small; they buy small because they're poor. Poverty is certainly a
problem to deal with, but so is wastefulness.
 Industry is not the champion of progress but culture. An industry unguided by ethics will rape
the world, murder it, and leave us all for dead; a mindless machine bent on making more money and
less art. Joaquin should have properly worded his article to clarify that, more than industrialisation, it
is culture that we need most to progress.
 So what if our ancestors never wrote any lengthy mythology (though they certainly could've if
not for the anti-pagan Spaniards)? So what if we like short stories and short proverbs? Better that, than
to create a book that gets published in almost all known languages, becomes the most widely read
book in the world and yet inspire the worst of atrocities (witch-hunts, the Inquisition, oppression of
women, etc). Yes, I'm talking about the bible. Aren't you proud the story
of Malakas and Maganda doesn't inspire intolerance of any sort?
 The santero's (maker of religious images) fixation on wood can certainly be about the
demands of his target market and not necessarily because he doesn't want to think big and use marble
or bronze. This still limits the evolution of his craft but who says wood can't be as pretty as marble or
bronze?
 The first revolutionaries had to fight in small groups or else they would have been easily
discovered and wiped out in a matter of months. Quality over quantity: a big army doesn't always
accomplish big things.
 Somewhere in the middle, Joaquin commits an error in mentioning that: "[the Malayan]
migrations were thus self-limited, never moved far from their point of origin, and clung to the heart
of a small known world; the islands clustered round the Malay Peninsula." From what we know from
contemporary archaeology, this is not true. The proto-Malays came from Formosa and migrated
southwards to the Philippines first before moving into what we know today as Malaysia and Indonesia.
Secondly, to say that the Filipino's heritage of thinking small derives from these proto-Malays is a rash
and misinformed assumption. For one, the proto-Malays or, more appropriately, the Austronesians are
one of the most widely travelled ethnic groups and one of the most diverse - stretching from Taiwan to
the Malay archipelago to Madagascar to New Zealand to the Easter Islands. If that's not thinking big, I
don't know what it is.
 More than thinking small, I think it's showing off that is the Filipino's biggest problem. There's
nothing wrong or right with either clay pottery or porcelain pottery. It's why we make them. Do we
make them so we can taste the food better or do we make them just so we can show off to the world
that we can?
 What is progress? How do we define advancements? Would we really want to work our arses
off 24/7 just so we can turn a forest or meadow into a fastfood chain, a mall, or a subdivision? If that's
the progress Joaquin wants then I don't want any part of it.
-

In terms of Philippine culture, several researches maintain that it is one of the things that separate
Filipinos from the rest of the world – the colorful and lively culture that makes us distinctly Filipino.

 That the Filipino works best on small scale - tiny figurines, small pots, filigree work gold or
silver, decorative arabesques.
 That the Filipino chooses to work in soft easy materials - clay, molten metal, tree searching has
failed to turn up anything really monumental in hardstone.
 That having mastered a material, craft or product, we tend to rut in it and don’t move on to a next
phase, a larger development, based on what we have learned.