ARTLETS TOOK all but three awards at the 41st Gawad Ustetika Gabi ng Parangal held March 27 at the Buenaventura Garcia Paredes, O.P. Building.
Creative Writing students and alumni took 13 of the 25 awards, including the Rector’s Literary Award.
In its 41st year, the contest received 272 submissions, the highest it had received in the past five years. In this iteration, the award ceremony was invite-only for the shortlisted candidates and winners.
Artlets swept all the awards in the fiction, poetry, tula, essay and dulang may isang yugto categories.
In the fiction category, Creative Writing senior Angela Maria Tabios placed first place with “A Thousand Sweet Deaths.” Philosophy junior Lharz Gilbert Dapla placed second with “The Flood Line,” and Creative Writing senior Rafael Salaya placed third with “Endless Run.”
AB Creative Writing alumnus and graduate school student Jericho Lopez took home first place in the poetry category with “89 Seconds to Midnight,” while Dan Stromile Vega of Creative Writing took second with “Manila, I Hope the Next Typhoon is a Sandstorm.” Literature alumna and graduate school student Maria Doreen Garcia took third with “All My Skibidis Will Make Sense One Day”
Under the essay category, graduate school student Franz Austin de Mesa won first place with “Why We Travel to the Underworld: Theoretical Underpinnings of the Fantasy Writer” while Creative Writing senior Charlson Patulin won second with “The Night I Learned Silence.” Creative Writing junior Yram Garcia won third with “The Exiled Prince”.
For the tula category, English Language Studies junior Clark Vinz Pino’s “Kosmetiko ng Paglilibing” placed first, Creative Writing senior Lorenzo de Castro’s “Ang Bagong Tipan” bagged second place, while Creative Writing senior Wycliff Concepcion’s “Noong Ipagdasal Mo Ako” ranked third.
Dulang may isang yugto had Creative Writing senior Rosemarie Uy’s “I think Hindi Akin ang Buhay Ko” in first, “Manhid Ka!” by Creative Writing junior Julia Lontok in second, and “Sa Sakristiya” by Dapla in third.
In the sanaysay category, Creative Writing senior Joseph Earl Quintana placed first with “Awit ni Dulce.” Concepcion placed second with “Ang Aming Mga Bahay,” while graduate school student John Roniel Canimo placed third with “Kung magpapakwento ang Maleta.”
The katha category saw Dapla in first place with “Ang Huling Tagasalin,” John Roniel Canimo in second with “Sa Pagitan”, and Lopez in third with “Kasalang Bayan.”
The one-act play had Graduate School student Cecilia de Jesus’s “Questions” in first place, Creative Writing senior Irene Louise Rustia’s “Between the Lines” in second, and Dapla’s “Five Minutes” in third.
Entertainment writing as a serious craft
Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB) member, AB Journalism alumnus and former The Flame adviser Nestor Cuartero, received the coveted title of Parangal Hagbong during this year’s ceremony.
“Having a solid news background is important in the life of any journalist, especially in entertainment. I believe entertainment journalism is in itself a craft not unlike any other field of media… Journalists found in the media are encouraged to develop seriousness of purpose,” Cuartero, also the lifestyle editor of The Market Monitor said in his acceptance speech.
The Parangal Hagbong is a lifetime achievement award given to Thomasian writers who have left their mark on Philippine literature.
No honorable mentions were given during this year’s Gabi ng Parangal.
Gawad Ustetika is the annual and longest-running campus literary derby hosted by The Varsitarian, the official student publication of the University of Santo Tomas. F
