page_title: José Rizal
section_title: In Brussels and Spain (1890–92)
hierarchical_section_title: José Rizal / In Brussels and Spain (1890–92)
caption_attribution_description: http://www.guttenberg.org/files/6867/6867-h/img/b155.jpg
context_page_description: José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda was a Filipino nationalist and polymath during the tail end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. He is tagged as the national hero of the Filipino people. An ophthalmologist by profession, Rizal became a writer and a key member of the Filipino Propaganda Movement, which advocated political reforms for the colony under Spain.
  He was executed by the Spanish colonial government for the crime of rebellion after the Philippine Revolution, inspired in part by his writings, broke out. Though he was not actively involved in its planning or conduct, he ultimately approved of its goals which eventually led to Philippine independence.
  He is widely considered one of the greatest heroes of the Philippines and has been recommended to be so honored by an officially empaneled National Heroes Committee. However, no law, executive order or proclamation has been enacted or issued officially proclaiming any Filipino historical figure as a national hero. He was the author of the novels Noli Me Tángere and El filibusterismo, and a number of poems and essays.
context_section_description: In 1890, Rizal, 29, left Paris for Brussels as he was preparing for the publication of his annotations of Antonio de Morga's Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas (1609). He lived in the boarding house of the two Jacoby sisters, Catherina and Suzanna, who had a niece Suzanna ("Thil"), age 16. Historian Gregorio F. Zaide states that Rizal had "his romance with Suzanne Jacoby, 45, the petite niece of his landladies." Belgian Pros Slachmuylders, however, believed that Rizal had a romance with the 17-year-old niece, Suzanna Thil, as his other liaisons were all with young women. He found records clarifying their names and ages.
  Rizal's Brussels stay was short-lived; he moved to Madrid, giving the young Suzanna a box of chocolates. She wrote to him in French: "After your departure, I did not take the chocolate. The box is still intact as on the day of your parting. Don’t delay too long writing us because I wear out the soles of my shoes for running to the mailbox to see if there is a letter from you. There will never be any home in which you are so loved as in that in Brussels, so, you little bad boy, hurry up and come back…" In 2007, Slachmuylders' group arranged for an historical marker honoring Rizal to be placed at the house.
  He published Dimanche des Rameaux (Palm Sunday), a socio-political essay, in Berlin on 30 November 1886. He discussed the significance of Palm Sunday in socio-political terms: "This entry [of Jesus into Jerusalem] decided the fate of the jealous priests, the Pharisees, of all those who believed themselves the only ones who had the right to speak in the name of God, of those who would not admit the truths said by others because they have not been said by them. That triumph, those hosannas, all those flowers, those olive branches, were not for Jesus alone; they were the songs of the victory of the new law, they were the canticles celebrating the dignification of man, the liberty of man, the first mortal blow directed against despotism and slavery". Shortly its publication, Rizal was summoned by the German police who suspected him of being a French spy.
  The content of Rizal's writings changed considerably in his two most famous novels, Noli Me Tángere, published in Berlin in 1887, and El Filibusterismo, published in Ghent in 1891. For the latter, he used funds borrowed from his friends. These writings angered both the Spanish colonial elite and many educated Filipinos due to their symbolism. They are critical of Spanish friars and the power of the Church. Rizal's friend Ferdinand Blumentritt, an Austria-Hungary-born professor and historian, wrote that the novel's characters were drawn from real life and that every episode can be repeated on any day in the Philippines.
  Blumentritt was the grandson of the Imperial Treasurer at Vienna in the former Austro-Hungarian Empire and a staunch defender of the Catholic faith. This did not dissuade him from writing the preface of El filibusterismo after he had translated Noli Me Tángere into German. As Blumentritt had warned, these books resulted in Rizal's being prosecuted as the inciter of revolution. He was eventually tried by the military, convicted and executed. Teaching the natives where they stood brought about an adverse reaction, as the Philippine Revolution of 1896 took off virulently thereafter.
  As leader of the reform movement of Filipino students in Spain, Rizal contributed essays, allegories, poems, and editorials to the Spanish newspaper La Solidaridad in Barcelona (in this case Rizal used a pen name, "Dimasalang", "Laong Laan" and "May Pagasa"). The core of his writings centers on liberal and progressive ideas of individual rights and freedom; specifically, rights for the Filipino people. He shared the same sentiments with members of the movement: that the Philippines is battling, in Rizal's own words, "a double-faced Goliath"—corrupt friars and bad government. His commentaries reiterate the following agenda:
  That the Philippines be made a province of Spain (The Philippines was a province of New Spain – now Mexico, administered from Mexico city from 1565 to 
caption: Leaders of the reform movement in Spain: Left to right: Rizal, del Pilar, and Ponce (c. 1890).
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