PHOTO: Me and the Luna's Spoliarium at the Manila National Museum
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One of the ideas that provided Rizal the motivation to write a novel about the Philippines was Luna's Spoliarium. For Rizal, Luna's canvass conveyed the plight of the vanquished and the pathetic suffering of the human race. Moreover, the Spoliarium was perceived by Rizal as a reflection of the spirit of the social, moral, and political life of his time because it clearly showed mankind under severe ordeal, mankind unredeemed, and reason and aspiration in an open struggle with fanaticism and injustice. This made Rizal write a novel depicting the country to be redeemed from bondage and repression. The Noli Me Tangere can, therefore, be considered as Rizal's Spoliarium.
Another source of idea for writing a novel about the Philippines was the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe (Zaide, 1999). This novel portrayed the brutalities committed by American slave-owners against their Negro slaves. Owing to the beauty and literary style of this novel, Rizal was able to fully comprehend the pathetic conditions of the Negro slaves. Just like Luna's Spolarium, this novel provided Rizal the springboard to write a novel portraying vividly the miseries of the Filipinos under the oppressive rule of the Spanish tyrants.
A third source of idea for a novel, was then conceptualizing the anti-clerical novel authored by Eugene Sue--The Wandering Jew. This novel made a great impression on Rizal. According to Quirino, the literary form of the Wandering Jew could had probably been used by Rizal as his model to arouse the feeling against the existing Philippine situation and, at the same time, communicate to the Filipinos the ideals he wanted them to embrace.
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