Of Shit and Shite

I was browsing through powerbooks last saturday when i came across a familiar name. Eros Atalia, it said. But this time the cover art was different.

My first encounter with Atalia was with Taguan Pung/Manwal ng mga Napapagal (/sa PAgpapatiwakal; great cover art). A writer-friend recommended the read, saying it was the first collection of flash fiction in the Philippines.

Taguan Pung revolves on acculturation within and without the family and how these phenomena/reality/normalcy subjects the individual. From a kid's first time to hold his shit, to honesty and its drawbacks, to a manual on suicide, Atalia managed to grasp abnormality in what we consider normal. The amoral in the moral. To compare Atalia to Bob Ong is to misread/treat his stories lightly. His works are as carnivalesque as Willie Nep.

And all this in under a few hundred words (maybe 250 max per story).

Now you could understand my excitement over seeing the same name on a different book cover. Atalia has released his second collection of shorts/essays under the title Peksman (mamatay ka man) Nagsisinungaling Ako.

Am truly excited.

Wasn't able to buy the book though.

Shite.

For a sampling of Atalia's lies, click.

* Eros Atalia teaches Filipino in the University of Santo Tomas. When asked how much he's earning, he'll divert the topic and treat you to mami ("the works," innards and all; yung putok batok). Atalia was (unofficially) declared (as early as his first book) as the heir to Jun Cruz Reyes' short stories throne.

photo taken from http://www.geocities.com/phil_literatura/eros.jpg