Indonesian Literary History

Artikel ini merupakan pengantar untuk buku Joel Whitney, FINKS: Bagaimana CIA Mengelabui Para Penulis Besar Dunia. Uraian dalam artikel ini berfokus pada soal jaringan Congress for Cultural Freedom, organisasi budaya antikomunis yang didanai oleh CIA, dengan para penulis Indonesia sejak pertengahan 1950-an. Jejak itu dapat dilihat dari pertalian antara Richard Wright dan para penulis yang tergabung dengan kelompok Studi Konfrontasi, seperti Sutan Takdir Alisyahbana, Mochtar Lubis, Beb Vuyk. Majalah Konfrontasi dalam hal ini menjadi penyalur secara langsung maupun tidak langsung wacana yang diproduksi oleh markas pusat CCF di Paris.

Organisasi resmi Congress for Cultural Freedom memang tidak terbentuk di Indonesia, namun keanggotaan badan semiresmi ini di Indonesia diisi oleh para pengarang liberal yang kemudian menandatangani Manifes Kebudayaan. Dengan menelusuri publikasi majalah Konfrontasi dan Horison, artikel ini berusaha menyorot jejak CIA dalam sastra Indonesia sejak pertengahan 1950-an sampai pasca pembunuhan massal 1965.

In 1941, in the midst of a small boom in the publishing of detective novels, a series of short detective novels were published in the south-central Javanese town of Yogyakarta. These novels were not published in a vacuum, but rather in the social, economic and political context of the final year before World War II. This paper examines the fifth of this series of long-forgotten detective novels featuring a Javanese detective, Raden Soebroto, and a mysterious villain, Patjar Koening, presenting the context of publication and an examination of the novel in the context of political scandals of the day. This examination demonstrates that the novel was clearly shaped in part by the legal risks facing the author and publisher, particularly where there is explicit discussion of contemporary people and events. Finally, this article briefly considers the fate of the Indonesian detective novel in periods of high political tension like the Japanese occupation or the revolutionary period which immediately followed this novel’s publication.

Pada awal 1945, setelah lebih kurang tiga tahun yang menyaksikan sedikit sekali penerbitan novel baru, terbitlah sebuah buku cantik yang dihiasi gambar dua burung yang terbang melintas di bawah barisan awan-awan. Berjudul Roman-Pantjaroba Palawidja, buku ini menggunakan kertas yang bagus, dicetak dengan garisgaris huruf rapi, dan ditambah ilustrasi yang dibuat dengan hati-hati yang tersebar di halaman-halaman buku itu. Pengarangnya juga menabah beberapa kata indah, berupah "sirih kapur" yang menerangkan artinya penerbitan roman itu pada waktu menyelsaikan penulisan pada bulan Desember 1943. Tegasnya, menilik penampilan novel ini, penerbitan Roman-Patjaroba Palawidja oleh Balai Pustaka pada awal 1945 mestinya merupakan sebuah aktivitas budaya yang penting. Namun, menilik dari kacamata di tahun 2019, sepertinya eksistensi buku ini nyaris terlupakan, nyaris terabaikan, dan bahkan mungkin nyaris tak terbaca.

Tulisan ini adalah catatan kritis atas studi Azyumardi Azra, Jaringan Ulama Timur Tengah dan Nusantara. Selain keunggulan-keunggulannya yang dijelaskan dalam artikel ini, tentu saja, tidak ada gading yang tak retak. Catatan kritis harus diberikan. Karya ini, selain sumbangannya yang sangat besar, masih memerlukan penyempurnaan eksplorasi jaringan ulama dengan studi-studi susulan berikutnya, terutama jaringan-jaringan lokal, agar jaringan ulama tidak hanya terungkap dan terlihat sebagai fenomena di permukaan air laut sejarah tetapi menjadi sebuah peta sosiologis-historis yang masuk ke kedalaman struktur historis.

This essay offers a critical reevaluation of the concept " world literature " based on a reading of a series of deliberations in Pramoedya Ananta Toer's penal colony memoirs The Mute's Soliloquy (Indonesian 1988 / English version 1999), in particular concerning German literature and history. In order to work with literature in a global context one needs to do justice to the material conditions under which literature originates and is being read; it also needs to be acknowledged that " literature " is a modern Western invention that has no precise equivalent in many other cultures. The essay argues against a Herderian-­‐Goethean view of " world literature " as an accumulation of the qualitative accomplishments and values of a specific cultural community. It also problematizes the category of " understanding other cultures " in the reception of a text. Instead, it argues that " literature " can travel in many different directions and take on a variety of functions. Pramoedya's deliberations emphasize the importance of literature as memory work, with the understanding that the memories and real­‐life experiences contained in literature can differ widely, depending on the circumstances of a text's reception. Only if we recognize the specific temporal and spatial circumstances under which texts emerge and are read, in particular also non-­‐canonical texts, we can start to think about the object perceived as " literature " as not only fostering a sense of difference, but also as having the potential to reflect on what humanity has in common.

The Indonesian Archipelago, geographically, is a strategically located area bustling with shipping lanes connecting the Western and Eastern worlds. Serving as a global maritime route, the islands of the archipelago have been stopping points for ships engaged in trade. This is evident from Chinese records (early Christian era) indicating established relations between the Chinese imperial dynasties such as the Tang, Song, Yuan, and Ming Dynasties (7th to 13th centuries AD) and the kingdoms in the archipelago. In return, China exported its products, mainly ceramics (hanging plates or porcelain), and silk fabric. Indonesian archipelago spices have been renowned since the early 7th century AD. Trades from East Asia, South Asia, and West Asia sought after valuable spices such as cloves, nutmeg, sandalwood, pepper, aloeswood, camphor, benzoin, and other spices. These spices were not only used as cooking ingredients but also for medicinal purposes in human life. Nusalaut is one of the islands that was commanded by the Dutch government at that time to be planted with cloves. Cloves are a spice plant that grows uniquely in the Maluku Islands, especially on the island of Nusalaut.

The Indonesian literary tradition during the reform period was marked by the rise of female writers who raised the issue of feminism. Within the framework of locality and contextuality, the feminism movement echoed by female writers comes in diverse expressions. This study aims to describe the reference figures and issues of Islamic feminism that are represented in novels by Abidah El Khalieqy. This research uses a feminist literary criticism approach. The data sources of the research are three novels by Abidah El Khalieqy, namely Perempuan Berkalung Sorban, Geni Jora, and Mataraisa. The technique used to gather feminist voices in the three novels is close reading. The analysis was conducted using a descriptive qualitative method. The results of the study are as follows. First, Islamic feminist figures who were referred to by the feminism movement were Fatima Mernisi and Riffat Hassan. Fatima Mernisi is known as a misogonic hadith critic, while Riffat Hassan uses the hermeneutic principle in the interpretation of the Quran. Second, the issues of feminism represented are: the lives of women in the pesantren tradition, the position of women in the family, the view of normal sexual relations and relationships, and the interpretation of the hadiths and verses of the Qur'an relating to women. Islamic feminism voiced by Abidah El Khalieqy brings its own color compared to the voice of other Indonesian feminist writers known as Sastrawangi which refers to the concept of ecriture feminine.

There is a missing subject in the conversations on Indonesian cyberliterature. This case study research identifies academic conversations on cyberliterature in Indonesia. Literature review using articles written by Indonesian academia is used to build an assumption on the discursive development of cyberliterature in Indonesia which misses electronic literature. The assumption is then verified with the data collected from one-shot method survey. The survey using two simple questions targeted Indonesian lecturers from several universities in Java, Sumatera, and Kalimantan. Qualitative content analysis is used to describe our findings. The analysis reveals that Indonesian academia conversations on cyberliterature only focus on digital publishing and the freedom of expression offers by the presence of the internet. The conversations on cyberliterature by Indonesian academia have not really covered electronic literature and how it may develop in the Indonesian literary context. Abstrak Ada bagian yang hilang dari pembicaraan mengenai sastra siber. Penelitian studi kasus ini mengidentifikasi pembicaraan tentang sastra siber di Indonesia. Kajian pustaka dari artikel yang ditulis oleh akademisi-akademisi Indonesia mengenai sastra siber dijadikan acuan asumsi tentang perkembangan pembicaraan sastra siber di Indonesia

Purpose of the study: This study aims to bridge the gap in the dispute over the beginning of modern Indonesian literature and determine which literary work marked the beginning of modern Indonesian literature. Methodology: This uses close reading over selected texts on the usage of specific words in Malay used in anti-colonialism political movement and the existence of the words Indonesia, bangsa, negeri, tanah air, and tumpah darah as the central themes for the development of the analysis from the selected texts. The selected texts are four novels published in the Dutch East Indies in the early of twentieth century: Student Hidjo (1919), Hikajat Kadiroen (1920), Azab dan Sengsara (1920), and Sitti Nurbaja (1922). Main Finding: We find that Azab dan Sengsara and Sitti Nurbaja have word Indonesia to help foster a new identity among educated natives and help conceptualize eptualize the new idea of the homeland. Whilst Student Hidjo and Hikajat Kadiroen do not see beyond the land of Java and they only relate the Dutch East Indies to the land of Java. We conclude that Sitti Nurbaja marked the beginning of modern Indonesian literature. Implications: The debate over the beginning of modern Indonesian literature should stop with the finding of this study that Azab dan Sengsara and Sitti Nurbaja marked the beginning of modern Indonesian literature. While Student Hidjo and Hikajat Kadiroen must be named as the modern pre-Indonesian literary works.