Carlos Bulosan
| Carlos Bulosan | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Carlos Sampayan Bulosan November 24, 1913 Binalonan, Pangasinan, Philippine Islands |
| Died | September 11, 1956 (aged 42) Seattle, Washington, United States |
| Cause of death | Bronchopneumonia |
| Occupation | Novelist, essayist, labor union organizer |
Carlos Sampayan Bulosan (November 24, 1913 – September 11, 1956) was an English-language Filipino novelist and poet who spent most of his life in the United States. His best-known work today is the semi-autobiographical America Is in the Heart, but he first gained fame for his 1943 essay on The Freedom from Want.
Bulosan was born to Ilocano parents in the Philippines in Binalonan, Pangasinan. There is considerable debate around his actual birth date, as he himself used several dates, but 1911 is generally considered the most reliable answer, based on his baptismal records, but according to the late Lorenzo Duyanen Sampayan, his childhood playmate and nephew, Carlos was born on November 2, 1913. Most of his youth was spent in the countryside as a farmer. It is during his youth that he and his family were economically impoverished by the rich and political elite, which would become one of the main themes of his writing. His home town is also the starting point of his famous semi-autobiographical novel, America is in the Heart.
Following the pattern of many Filipinos during the American colonial period, he left for America on July 22, 1930 at age 17, in the hope of finding salvation from the economic depression of his home. He never again saw his Philippine homeland. Upon arriving in Seattle, he met with racism and was forced to work in low paying jobs. He worked as a farmworker, harvesting grapes and asparagus, and doing other types of hard work in the fields of California. He also worked as a dishwasher with his brother and Lorenzo in the famous Madonna Inn in San Luis Obispo.
Bulosan was active in labour movement along the Pacific coast of the United States and edited the 1952 Yearbook for International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 37, a predominantly Filipino American cannery trade union based in Seattle.
...
Wikipedia