The Social Cancer

The Social Cancer, novel by Filipino political activist and author José Rizal, published in 1887. The book, written in Spanish, is a sweeping and passionate unmasking of the brutality and corruption of Spanish rule in the Philippines (1565–1898).

The story begins at a party to welcome Crisóstomo Ibarra back to the Philippines after seven years of studying in Europe. His father, Don Rafael, passed away shortly before his return, and Crisóstomo soon learns that he died in prison after accidentally killing a tax collector and being falsely accused of other crimes by Father Dámaso, the longtime curate of the church in Crisóstomo’s hometown of San Diego. Crisóstomo returns to San Diego, and his fiancée, María Clara, joins him there. After the schoolmaster tells him that Father Dámaso and the new curate, Father Salví, interfere with his teaching, Crisóstomo decides to build a new modern school in San Diego.

On a picnic with María Clara, Crisóstomo goes on a fishing boat and helps the pilot, Elías, kill a crocodile. Elías later warns Crisóstomo that there is a plot to murder him at the ceremony for the laying of the school’s cornerstone, and indeed, as Crisóstomo is placing mortar for the cornerstone, the derrick holding the stone collapses. Although Crisóstomo escapes injury, the derrick operator is killed. At a dinner later, Father Dámaso insults the new school, Filipinos in general, Crisóstomo, and Don Rafael. An enraged Crisóstomo attacks him, but María Clara stops him from killing the priest. Later her father breaks off her engagement to Crisóstomo and arranges for her betrothal to a young Spanish man, Linares.

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Father Salví plots with Lucas, the brother of the deceased derrick operator, to organize a strike on the barracks of the Civil Guard and to convince the attackers that Crisóstomo is their ringleader. Father Salví then warns the head of the Civil Guard of the impending assault. When the attack fails, the rebels say that Crisóstomo was their leader, and he is arrested. Elías helps Crisóstomo escape from prison, and they flee by boat on the Pasig River with members of the Civil Guard in pursuit. Elías dives into the river to distract the pursuers and is mortally wounded. It is reported that Crisóstomo was killed, and a distraught María Clara insists on entering a convent.

In the novel’s dedication, Rizal explains that there was once a type of cancer so terrible that the sufferer could not bear to be touched, and the disease was thus called noli me tangere (Latin: “do not touch me”). He believed that his homeland was similarly afflicted. The novel offers both a panoramic view of every level of society in the Philippines of the time and droll satire. Its description of the cruelty of Spanish rule was a catalyst for the movement for independence in the country. It later came to be regarded as a classic of Philippine literature, though it is more frequently read in English or Tagalog translation than in its original Spanish.