C. S. Canonigo Replies

After posting "An Open Letter to C. S. Canonigo," it became the most commented post in recent memory, with messages of support coming from Filipinos and non-Filipinos, librarians and non-librarians, and bloggers who wrote about it: Ederic, Marhgil, Zarah, Igor and Nix. People whom I did not know were reading my blog also expressed their support when I met them in person. To all of you, thank you very much!

A few days after that post, I was a panelist at the Books Across Southeast Asia conference, and got the chance to raise my concern at a panel on copyright issues. The most significant advice I got was from Mrs. Karina Bolasco of Anvil Publishing, who expressed surprise that my deadline for withdrawing the book was more than a month away and suggested that I write a letter to Mrs. Socorro Ramos of National Book Store, which she would personally give to Mrs. Ramos.

Well, it took me a while before I got around to writing the letter requesting that National withdraw all the books, and ask her and her publisher to attest that all their other books were free of copyright problems, but I finally gave it to Mrs. Bolasco and guess what? Maybe the letter to Mrs. Ramos had the desired effect, maybe not, but within two days, after weeks of silence, I got the following comment on the old post:

Dear Von Totanes,
I read your open letter few days ago. I was terribly surprised. U know, so many students are contributing their researched works to me re: speeches, poems, essays. When I received speeches of Marcos, Magsaysay, Quezon, etc. I happily included them in my Talumpati book. I even said, "Naku, mabubuhay uli ang pangalan nila sa book ko." In the speech of Onofre Pagsanhan, I saw the names of Cabunagan and Alvarez. I tried to contact them by calling all the same family names in the directory but no one seems to know them so I decided to retain their names the way they were written. Von, that was my greatest mistake! I became careless in including those speeches. Buong akala ko talaga mga talumpati yun nina Marcos in Tagalog. Dami na rin kasi akong speeches nila in English. Yung mga nag contribute hindi nila inilagay ang source, wala rin ang name mo. Von, I am terribly sorry for causing you mental agony thinking that I stole your work. I'm willing to make amends with you and offer you some options, so at least I can compensate you in some way. God knows, Von, I never meant to offend you or grab credit for your work. It was an honest mistake, believe me. I am apologizing for causing you emotional disturbance. Hindi ko agad nasagot ang open letter mo kasi nagluluksa pa ako. Kamamatay lang ng mister ko nung August. Kahapon lang ang 40 Days niya. Sana Von, you'll contact me so we can talk. This is my mobile phone # XXXXXXXXXXX. Am still in Cebu now. Next week I will be in Manila. This is my Mnla landline XXXXXXX. May God enlighten our minds and show us the right path to settle everything for our mutual benefit. God bless.
C.S.CANONIGO

P.S.
To my reading fans,
I'm sorry for the mistake I committed. Sa more than 100 books na naisulat ko in 24 years, this is the very first time na nakasakit ako ng damdamin ng kapwa ko manunulat. Sana'y mapatawad ninyo ako.
Cristina Santos Canonigo

So what's next? I am currently in the middle of finishing a long-overdue paper, but I plan to get in touch with her by early next week. I still don't know what my position will be, including whether I should bring a lawyer with me, but rest assured that I'll be writing about it here =)