Jollop is Frankenstein

If you look at the posts in my main blog, Journeys from Grief to Grace (frankahilario.blogspot.com), now comprising more than 200 long essays, you will notice that my articles are a unique blend of something or other. In October 2007, I tried to describe it by coining the term Franciscan essay (‘The Franciscan Essay,’ ‘Francisco’ being my full name and ‘Franciscan’ in reference to my perspective as a Roman Catholic.

Tonight, at about 1930 hours Thursday May 29 Manila time, I was out riding my bike coming from the public market after buying some apples and oranges, when a thought occurred to me that I could describe my writings in one new word, and in fact that one word came out: Jollop.

It’s an invented word, of course, as is my wont. Jollop is an acronym: jolly journalism laced with literature in the language of a philosophy of productivity. Complicated? My thoughts exactly! You have to read it to appreciate it. Actually, it's complicated if you are trying to explain it; it's something else when you're trying to understand it.

And yes, of late Frank A Hilario has assumed the identity of Frankenstein, in reference to the genius of a scholarly mind in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Or The Modern Prometheus (Cynthia Hamberg, home-1.worldonline.nl). Here is Cynthia’s one-sentence summary of the novel:

A young Swiss student discovers the secret of animating lifeless matter and, by assembling body parts, creates a monster who vows revenge on his creator after being rejected from society.

I can empathize with what Frankenstein the scholar did in creating that monster, that is, ‘animating lifeless matter’ and ‘assembling body parts’ – that is what I do as a writer, don’t I? Having discovered the secret of creative thinking (see ‘The Frankenstein Mindster’ (frankensteinmindster.blogspot.com), I have discovered the secret of animating lifeless matter as well as assembling body parts to make a living entity that now I am happy to call a jollop essay.