Binding: Hardcover Dewey Decimal Number: 959.9046 EAN: 9780446513982 ISBN: 0446513989 Label: Warner Books Manufacturer: Warner Books Number Of Pages: 483 Publication Date: 1989-03 Publisher: Warner Books Studio: Warner Books
Customer Rating: Summary: Enlightenment on Philippine History Comment: I bought this book looking for reasons why my elders consider the 1986 EDSA Revolution so special and why Ninoy Aquino was so revered and the Marcoses so reviled.
This book didn't disappoint as it provided a glimpse of history - from the moment Ninoy Aquino stepped into that China Airlines flight to the ascension of his widow Cory Aquino to the presidency. Sandra Burton who was with Ninoy during that flight provides us with first hand accounts of Ninoy's assassination, the failed coup that brought about People Power as well as Cory Aquino's presidency.
More significant in this book was Burton's own take as history was unfolding. Particularly poignant is her analysis of the Filipino psyche. I came across these lines which described squabbling within the opposition ranks after the Aquino assassination in p. 314.
"Both sides (Aquino and Laurel) knew unity was essential if they were hope to beat Marcos, yet neither could overcome its own prejudices or rise above its petty interests to compromise. The concept that 'No man is an island' was not one that Filipinos readily conceded, perhaps because they belonged to an archipelagic culture. Not until they found themselves poised on the brink of disaster, could obstinate individuals finally be convinced to consider the collective good"(parenthetical notes mine). - words that still ring true today in a land of impossible dreams.
