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Wilfrido D. Nolledo

But for the Lovers

But for the Lovers

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Format: Paperback
ISBN: 978-621-96757-0-3
Dimensions: 476 pages, 130mm x 180mm x 32mm

Foreword by Gina Apostol
Introduction by Audrey Carpio

First Philippine edition

In But for the Lovers, Hidalgo de Anuncio, a jaded Spanish vaudevillian brings home to Ojos Verdes a girl lost in the streets of Japanese-occupied Manila. With his attendant Molave Amoran—wistful guitarist and thief—the payaso guides his lost crew through the startling grotesqueries and tragedies inside a devastated Manila. Literary critic and writer Caroline Hau describes the book as a “comic but fraught allegory of Spanish, American, and Japanese imperial contest over the Filipino ‘alma’ (soul).” 

(If you would like to purchase a copy of But for the Lovers from outside the Philippines, please e-mail orders@explodinggalaxies.com)

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  • “The book is a marvel. It cuts no corners. It knows its purpose. Like the best of our Filipino novels, like Noli Me Tangere,it issui generis:it comes seemingly from nowhere to speak an experience of trauma unspeakably Filipino. It marks its ambition by its existence. And line after line, page after page, for me, it was also sheer fun— rereading it, every day I took the book up with an almost giddy, comforted pleasure— the comfort of reading a book that does exactly what its imagination requires and its truth demands.”
    —Gina Apostol

  • “Exploding Galaxies’ Philippine edition marks the triumphant, albeit posthumous, return of this prodigiously gifted native who has given his name to a vital period of literary experimentation and political ferment in the 1960s and continues to inspire generations of writers, Filipino and otherwise.”
    — Caroline Hau

  • “Wilfrido Nolledo’s But For the Lovers… is a fearless—and fearsome—book, its author’s eyes wide open and imagination at full throttle, a genuine masterpiece…”
    — Robert Coover

  • “...a triumph for the Filipino writer in English…”— Krip Yuson

  • “[Nolledo's] deliberately disjointed style merges personalities and events into one stunning nightmare—with a momentum all its own, and a built in, kaleidoscopic continuity.”
    — Martin Levin, The New York Times

  • “A work of epic proportions and intention...”
    — Cultural Center of the Philippines Encyclopedia of Philippine Art

  • "This is a strange, compelling book that has the tortuous complexity and is fraught with the labyrinthine terrors of a dream...."—Publishers Weekly

  • “…feverishly circumlocutious, allusive, alliterative, punning language, jungle dense and abloom with [Tagalog].”—Kirkus Reviews

  • "But For The Lovers is an outrageous book. It's very funny and savage and grim and beautiful… The style is a sustained audacity."
    — Nick Joaquin

  • “Nolledo’s work is a step forward in the making of a relevant, living literature, and that merits some celebration.”
    — Luis Teodoro

He was beginning to eat flowers and the crescent moon was in his eyes when he awoke again.

Wilfrido D. Nolledo

An influential figure in Philippine literature, Nolledo was born in 1933 in Manila. Nolledo was already a published writer at the age of 14 before studying at the University of Santo Tomas. His short stories have appeared in the Philippines Free Press where he was a staff member from 1963-1966. He received numerous Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for works such as his short story “Rice Wine”. In 1966, Nolledo was given a Fulbright-Hays scholarship to attend the University of Iowa.

After participating in the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, he eventually served as the editor of the Iowa Review. In 1972, he returned to the Philippines and wrote for various national magazines while scripting for movies. He moved back to the United States in 1990 to join his family. Nolledo died in Los Angeles in 2004.