Bitterness of love-HATE Relationship:
Analysis of Rizal’s “The Philippines, a Century Hence” “The less you remember your history, the more likely you are to repeat your mistakes over and over again” – Jose Rizal The statement above was written by Rizal to remind the Spain of their own history of revolution that lead to their liberty. In the view of social criticism, I believed that Rizal wrote “The Philippines, a Century Hence” to warn the Spaniards. In the year 1889, Rizal witnessed the celebration of two successful revolutions in Europe – French and Spanish. France’s celebration, where Rizal was there to witness, aimed to let the French people remember and keep alive the principle of liberty, equality and paternity, which brought about the French Republic and ended the centuries of tyranny and oppression. Similarly, in that year, Spanish celebration of revolution was held. Hence, I believed, Rizal felt that it was timely to remind Spain that the forces which brought about Spanish and French Revolution could be the same forces that the Philippines might use to revolutionize and liberate themselves from the oppressor. Here, the historical event in Europe that affect European society could be the context that led to the writing of the aforementioned text. In the view of traditional criticism, we could take a look at Rizal’s biographical information. During 1888-1889, Rizal stayed in London where he performed research studies in British Museum especially Morgan’s book