MANILA, Philippines - She has written novels and screenplays on subjects other writers dare not touch: strong women defying conventions (“Bata, Bata, Paano Ka Ginawa?”), a conflicted family coming to terms with martial law (“Dekada 70'), life among women inmates (“Bulaklak sa City Jail”), and ac-tivist parents agonizing over children waylaid in the confusion of a military raid (“Desaparesidos”).

But there is one movie that prize-winning novelist Lualhati Bautista dreams of doing someday: a small independent film about her father, Esteban. A sometime real estate agent, musician, photographer and singer, this father of nine is best remembered for the boundless imagination that gild his homespun bedtime stories.

“When I was very young, my father had this telescope and together, we would peek at the stars,” recalls Bautista in Filipino. “One time I asked him, how can I go visit those stars? And he said, someday, I'm going to build a ladder that you can climb all the way to the stars. I asked, and what about you? Are you coming with me? And he said, no, I'm staying down here to catch you should you fall. But I'm sure you won't fall. Because you are not afraid to climb.”

Adds Bautista: “My father opened my imagination wide. At night when it was warm and we couldn't sleep, he'd fan us till we dozed off. Sasabihin niya, kunwari daw, inihaw na mais kami! (He'd say, just pretend that you're corn on the cob, grilling.)”

From him she got her love of words, recalls this writer whose first story was published when she was 17. “My father was a composer, singer and writer of poetry,” she says proudly. And so Bautista wanted to be two things: writer and singer. “But singing was out of the question,” she confesses. “Once my brother told his friends defiantly: “Ang kapatid ko ay isang mahusay na manunulat! (My sister is a good writer)! I just happened to be singing at that time.”

Well, one out of two ain't bad. By the time Esteban Castel Bautista died on Valentine's Day in 1992, his writer-daughter has become a household word in Filipino literature, while he remains very much in her mind. “I want to write about the music of my father's violin,” says Bautista. “That music used to wake me so I won't be late for school.” She adds: “I want to write about him and his kindness together with all his imperfections, especially when I read or watch something that portray fathers in a bad light. Gusto kong ibangon ang dangal ng mga ama, gano'n (I want to restore our faith in fathers.)”

Reading about fathers in Bautista's novels is definitely something to look forward to. Fatherhood is a subject she rarely tackles in her novels, most of which portray female characters breaching boundaries to redefine their role in the family. Bautista's latest work, “Desaparesidos,” tells of how one mother retooled her life to look for the toddler she had entrusted to another activist in the heat of a military operation during martial law.

The circumstances hit close to home, the writer confides. “I had very little political consciousness when I got married,” says Bautista. “But my husband was an activist. I would not say that I joined the (underground Left), only that I joined my husband. It was his life, not mine. But I could not live his life without losing mine in the process.

“Three months later I left. I was pregnant and had a 3-year-old boy in tow. I had no money, no place to return to, no work because at that time, even a writer had to get clearance from the Office for Civil Relations, otherwise, no publication would accept your story. And I was too proud to go home to my parents.”

She continues: “When I think of that young woman kissing her husband goodbye and walking down the street holding her child's hand, trying to look brave and planning only where to sleep that night, I feel very very proud of her. I was that woman, and I've come a long long way.”

It wasn't an easy leave-taking, Bautista recalls. “Before I left, the other people in the movement offered to take care of my son. Of course I said no. Imagine leaving my son with (people who were on the run?) What if something happened to them? Where and how do I start looking for my son? I even imagined how the military could use children against their parents when they get caught: 'talk, or we'll kill your child while you watch!' It had happened to others. I think in a way, as early as 1973, I was already sowing the seeds for this novel.”

Writing about the intense days during martial law is something she had wanted to stop doing after “Dekada 70” and two or three other teleplays about the period, says Bautista. “But there are still so many stories waiting to be told about that era.” While set against the backdrop of those turbulent years, the two novels are also vastly different: “”Dekada” is more about a family outside the movement, a mother on the outside looking in. This is really more about a mother who changes her perception of herself and of society (because of her son's activism). 'Desaparesidos” is about people inside the movement, young people who lived the horror of militarization during the martial law period.”

“Desaparesidos” might as well be the story of her friends, she says. “Before and after martial law, there were many disappearances. Charlie del Rosario disappeared; I knew him in college. Henry Romero disappeared; he was my friend and godfather to my firstborn.”

Not that things have changed much, she acknowledges. “What is the difference between martial law and the years after if people are still being killed all the time, if they keep disappearing because they are presumed to be enemies of government?” she asks. “I may not know her personally but I feel the pain of Edith Burgos over her missing son, Jonas, just as I felt the pain of Gina de Venecia when she lost her child in a fire. I feel bonded with all the mothers who lost their children in the past and present regimes. Whenever I read about Edith's search for her son in the papers, I want to hug her even if I tell her nothing because even a writer can be at a loss for words.”

But as harsh as that reality is, Bautista also defines “Desaparesidos” in a different, albeit just as traumatic, context in this novel. Not only does the term refer to friends and kin who were deemed disappeared or missing because of state or military forces, the word also speaks of the disappearance or absence of activist parents in the lives of their children as they elude arrest to pursue their revolutionary goals.

Again, personal history has a lot to do with this insight. “When my children were very young, I could not leave them with just anybody,” recounts Bautista. “But I have known mothers in the movement who did that. Mas mabuti ba akong nanay kaysa sa kanila, o mas mabuti lang silang anak ng bayan kaysa sa akin? (Am I a better mother than them, or are they better patriots than I am?) Hindi ko ba mahal nang sapat ang bayan ko para iwan ang mga anak ko, o hindi nila mahal nang sapat ang kanilang mga anak? (Don't I love my country enough to leave my kids, or don't they love their children enough?) I have no answers to that.”

In fact, she adds, the questions she raised in the novel about commitment, priorities and choosing between family and country should not even be asked of those who had to make that difficult decision. While she writes of truths that she has come to know and of people in such circumstances, it is not for her to judge them nor direct their lives, she says. “When I write, I do not think of my characters as my creation; I think of them as real people. I don't direct them, I just follow their story.”

Her next novel, to be serialized in a vernacular magazine, similarly follows the story of women in their sixties who are fighting to live their own lives, refusing to become wards of their children and nannies to their grandchildren.

But how typical! After a novel on the “disappeared,” trust this unconventional writer to focus next on women who have finally found themselves.

“Desaparesidos” is available at all National Book Store branches.