Lives Remembered, A Memoir

PRAISE
For Linda Ty-Casper, foremost fictionist, the first Filipina writer in English who ventured into the difficult historical novel genre, it is now her own personal history she focuses the spotlight on. And a most interesting and rich life story it is. In her characteristic meticulously detailed narrative spanning some eighty years, she brings us to a world filled with a remarkable variety of encounters, of experiences with interlocking ties of family, friends, colleagues, fellow writers, neighbors, even strangers-people, she says, ＂who have become a part of me and made me who I am.＂ Thelma E. Arambulo, Writer, Former UP Chair of the Dept. of English and Comparative Literature

Readers of Ty-Casper’s historical novels will discover clues from Lives Remembered of how an author’s life, particularly religion and family, shaped her writings. Yet more importantly, they will discover that humility of a writer who pursues and develops her talent at the service of her people. No, she does not regret giving up law practice. She thinks her classmates who practiced law and occupied key government positions made up for her decision to follow ＂the road not taken.＂ Carol A. Nuñez, Ph.D., Former Faculty Member, Department of English, Ateneo de Manila University

Linda Ty-Casper’s Lives Remembered, A Memoir is specifically about ＂the lives of all the people who have become part of me and made me who I am,＂ and she narrates her interactions with a remarkable number of people. In fact, in all respects the specificity of detail is remarkable. It’s a Remembrance of Things Past that goes beyond Marcel Proust’s Alarecherchedutempsperdu. Readers are treated to an account of a life well-lived. Lynn M. Grow, Ph.D. Emeritus Senior Professor of English, Broward College, Florida.

Always encouraging her readers to remember the past, historical novelist Linda Ty-Casper, now in her nineties, has gone on this journey for a final time through writing her own memoir. Recalling wartime moments to everyday appointments, she tenderly returns a whole cast of names and places to life, with family come and gone but all clear and warm as yesterday. A must-read for fans of Linda Ty-Casper. Mara Coson, Publisher of Exploding Galaxies

DESCRIPTION
Written in her 90s, Lives Remembered, A Memoir is the autobiography of award-winning Filipino author, Linda Ty-Casper, who says ＂this memoir is about the lives of all the people who have become part of me and made me who I am.＂
Linda Ty-Casper has written over 17 books of fiction, 11 of which center on key historical events in the Philippines: the 1896 Philippine revolution, the Philippine-American War (1898-1902), World War II, the Martial Law years of the Marcos Dictatorship, among other topics. So powerful are her books, that her so-called Martial Law books were banned by the Marcos Government.

In her Memoir, Ty-Casper brings to life the people, places, experience, and memories that remain precious to her. Beyond the remembrances, this book informs readers how she became a writer. There was her grandmother who told her stories about Philippine Revolution against Spain and the Philippine American War; there was momentous rainy day when she sought refuge at a Harvard library and discovered derogatory material about the Philippines, and which made her decide right then and there to write a historical novel. The one novel multiplied, with the help of others including her husband, Leonard Ralph Casper, the noted literary critic, who helped nurture Ty-Casper’s passion for historical novels.
Ty-Casper’s Memoir would be an important companion piece to her literary fiction, for it is in both that the reader may glimpse at and be rewarded with insights on the writer’s soul.