Scent of Apples

Bienvenido N. Santos (1911–1996) first came to the United States in 1941 as a government pensionado (scholar) at the University of Illinois, Columbia University, and Harvard University. During World War II he served the Philippine government from exile in Washington, DC, before returning to the Philippines in 1946. He came back to the United States in 1958 and attended the University of Iowa’s Writers’ Workshop. In 1965 he received the Republic Cultural Heritage Award in Literature from the Philippine government.

"Santos writes simply and skillfully of his countrymen who leave home for America, of the pain of separation, loneliness, longing, yesterday’s hopes and tomorrow’s dreams. His portraits of these gentle, courageous exiles are moving as he shows how each one struggles to make his way in the new land, trying to find a life far from his roots while sustained by the dream of a return home. . . . Santos gets to the heart of what it is like to be uprooted, alone, alien."