Rizal in Saga, A Life for Student Fans, long before it was commissioned by the Philippine Centennial Commission, was already written, in parts and in other forms, by its author, in his heart and mind. Having written biographies of other contemporary Filipinos under his continuing Project, "Philippines 1900" Nick Joaquin in Rizal in Saga, deconstructs from Rizal's own memoirs, his written works as well as from other biographies, yet his Rizal biography seems more immediate with a closer in-view into the life of the national hero.

There is no frantic attempt in it to prove or disprove, raise or resolve the "Rizal issues" - his participation in the Revolution of 1896, his affairs of the heart, his "retraction." Yet by sheer dramatic telling, by the creative writing resources employed in it, Rizal in Saga has a fictive mode that is also journalistic and places the reader into the life and times, the thoughts and feelings of Rizal.

Published in 1996 by Philippine National Centennial Comission

367 pages / Hardcover