Mario I. Miclat is a professor of Asian and Philippine Studies at the University of the Philippines Diliman. H e received the prestigious 2006 National Book Award for Beyond the Great Wall (Metro Manila: Anvil Publishing, Inc., 2006) , c o-authored with his wife and daughters and a lifetime award for Literature, the 2006 Patnubay ng Sining at Kalinangan (Art and Literature Helmsman) from the City of Manila. Miclat's other books include: Pinoy Odyssey 2049 (UP Press, 2005), Beauty for Ashes: Remembering Maningning (with Romulo P. Baquiran, Jr., Anvil, 2001). Miclat is board director of the Writers Union of the Philippines and a member of the National Advisory Board of the National Commission on Culture and the Arts (NCCA). He was foreign expert at the Ministry of Radio, Film and Television of the People's Republic of China from 1971 to 1986.