The Crucible: An Autobiography by Colonel Yay, Filipina American Guerrilla

Introduction

introduction On December 8, 1941, Yay Panlilio found her life suddenly and irrevocably changed by the bombing of Pearl Harbor.1 Panlilio, a mestiza Filipina-Irish American woman, had moved from the United States to the Philippines and quickly ensconced herself in the capital city, Manila, as one of its most intrepid journalists.2 When reports of Pearl Harbor reached Manila, Panlilio was one of a few envoys selected to relay grim news to President Manuel Quezon. The war was on its way to Philippine shores. In a matter of days, she would see her beloved newspaper, the Philippines Herald, razed to the ground, American and Filipino troops deployed to Bataan and Corregidor in the north to defend the islands, and Manila in turmoil. Panlilio surveyed the growing chaos surrounding her and thought furiously: how would she, a Filipina American, contribute to the war? That question would have a complicated answer. Panlilio’s response is the subject of her 1950 memoir, The Crucible: An Autobiography by Colonel Yay, originally published in the United States. The book narrates her incredible experience as a journalist, triple agent, leader in the Philippine resistance against the Japanese, and lover of the guerrilla general Marcos V. Agustín. Panlilio’s sweeping focus moves from the war-torn streets of Japanese-occupied Manila, to battlegrounds in the Philippine countryside, to the rural farmlands of central California. Written in a style that blends wry commentary, rigorous journalistic detail,and popular romance conventions,The Crucible weaves together appearances by well-known military figures like Douglas MacArthur and Carlos Romulo, dangerous networks of espionage, and a tumultuous romantic relationship that recalls the plots of Hollywood war films, or at least, as Panlilio’s good friend and fellow writer, Lydia Arguilla noted,“a pulp-magazine love story”(chapter 35). For Yay Panlilio, however, The Crucible was meant to be much more than a good story, and certainly more than a mere account of her life experiences during the war. Rather, she saw the book as a necessary act of political redress and retribution. Ever the consummate journalist, Panlilio published The Crucible with clear objectives: to publicize the important yet unrecognized contributions of the guerrilla resistance in ix the war against Japan, to recognize the role of Filipinas in wartime efforts, and to articulate a nationalist formation of mestiza Filipina identity. The book is a complicated and often vexed attempt to champion Philippine independence and Filipina American feminism. To appeal to a U.S. audience, Panlilio uses organizing metaphors of motherhood and domesticity (what she calls “guerrilla motherhood”), emphasizes her dual Filipina and American heritage as the biological foundation of her ability to represent both countries, and fosters a potential sisterhood that includes U.S. readers. But unfortunately, The Crucible failed to significantly influence how Americans or Filipina/os remember World War II.3 Despite the many war-era books that mention Panlilio with admiration and respect, her name is now relatively unknown. Today, few Americans are aware of the guerrilla resistance in the Philippines, and fewer still know the details of Filipinas’ involvement. And although Macmillan’s 1950 release of The Crucible,one of the first Filipina-authored works of literature published by a U.S. press, was a landmark in literary history, the book was never recognized or studied by scholars of Filipina/o or Asian American literature.4 More than fifty years after its original publication, we return to The Crucible with renewed attention to Panlilio’s original goals and their contemporary ramifications. For today’s readers,The Crucible serves as a reminder of the complicated and interconnected histories of the Philippines, the United States, and Japan. As a rare example of Filipina American authorship in the mid-twentieth century, the book invites new intersections in studies of Filipina/o, Asian American, and American literature. As a memoir that details a mestiza woman’s role as a guerrilla, the text diversifies our knowledge of resistance in the Pacific War and explores the complexities of mixed-race and transnational identity.And as a document of how the war affected and still continues to affect the lives of Filipinas and Filipinos, The Crucible is a call to reconsider how we tell the story of World War II. Intersections: Yay Panlilio and Filipina/o American History Yay Panlilio (1913–1978) was born in Denver, Colorado, to a Filipina mother and an Irish father. She grew up in Colorado in a working-class family that included her mother, her stepfather, and her...