Northern Illinois University Center for Southeast Asian Studies THE WRITER'S RESPONSIBILITY: A Preliminary Look at the Depiction and Construction of Indonesia in the Works of Pramoedya Ananta Toer Author(s): Patricia B. Henry Reviewed work(s): Source: Crossroads: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Vol. 6, No. 2 (1991), pp. 59-72 Published by: Northern Illinois University Center for Southeast Asian Studies Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40860348 . Accessed: 16/07/2012 20:11 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Northern Illinois University Center for Southeast Asian Studies is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Crossroads: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Southeast Asian Studies. http://www.jstor.org THE WRITER'S RESPONSIBILITY: A PreliminaryLook at theDepiction and Construction of Indonesia in the Worksof PramoedyaAnanta Toer PatriciaB. Henry The historyof Indonesianliterature has always been inextri- cably intertwinedwith the political realities surroundingit.1 Since the 1928 Sumpah Pemuda (Oath of Youth),which pledged allegiance to the One Country,One Flag, One Language of Indonesia, and especially throughthe revolutionaryperiod of 1945-1949,the constructionof literaturein Indonesianwas closely tied to the developing national identity. In large part this was because it was writtenin a language that,although based on Malay,was not reallythe "native"language of anyonein Indone- sia. It also lacked literaryancestors, inasmuch as it could not truly trace its originsto any one of the regional,"traditional" litera- tures,and its relationshipwith the European literarytradition, whilereal, was poisonedby colonialism. PramoedyaAnanta Toer, one of Indonesia'smost renowned writersand certainlyone of its most controversial,has played a seminalrole in this history. Bornin Blora,Java, in 1925,he has lived in themidst of tremendouschaos - witnessing,suffering, and participatingin such eventsas the IndonesianNationalist move- ment,the Japanese occupation during World War II, thestruggle for independenceand, afterindependence, the struggle for a workable nationand nationalidentity, including the upheavals of 1965. 1 A preliminaryversion of this(still preliminary) paper was presentedat the 3rd Annual Conferenceof the NorthwestRegional Consortiumfor SoutheastAsian Studies,The Universityof Washington,Seattle, October 19-21,1990; the comments of Dr. Umar Kayam,the panel discussant,are gratefullyacknowledged, especially his suggestionto look moreclosely at BuhanPasar Malam. Thanks also to Laurie Sears,Gai Littler,Mohd. Nor Ismail,and RobertVore fortheir comments and discussion. 59 Pramoedya'swritings include stories of revolution and strug- gle,and his concernwith human suffering is evidentnot only in his literaryworks but also in his politicalactivities prior to 1965. As a memberof Lekra,a communist-frontcultural organization, he was activelyinvolved in tryingto definea sociallyrelevant role forart and literature,strongly criticizing writers who ascribed to the notionof "artfor art's sake" fromhis positionas editorof Lentera (a weekly literarysupplement of Sukarno's nationalistparty paper, Bintang Timor). After the abortive coup of 1965, Pramoedya's status as a "fellow traveller"with the Indonesian CommunistParty resulted in his arrestand imprisonmentfor four- teenyears on theisland of Buru. Since his releasein 1979,he has receivedmuch attention and critical praise for four historical novels about the birth of Indonesian nationalismat the beginningof this century. These works,along with all his other writings,are at this point still bannedin Indonesia.^ In this paper I would like to considerseveral themesthat come up repeatedlyin Pramoedya'swork, through which he has, over theyears, defined his roleas a writer,as a Javanese,and as an Indonesiannationalist. His earlierworks of the 1940s and 1950s will be discussed as well, but we will firstconsider the firsttwo books of the above-mentionedquartet, Bumi Manusia (1980) and AnakSetnua Bangsa (1980), summarized below: The youngprotagonist, Minke (modeled, it eventuallyturns out, on the Javanesejournalist and nationalistR. M. TirtoAdhi Soeryo)casts himselfin therole of thenote-taking Javanese with a Westerneducation; between both cultures,he looks at both as an outsider. He is 18, theyear is 1898,and he is one of the veryfew Javanesebeing educatedat a Dutch secondaryschool in Surabaya. His worldis fullof new inventions,such as thelocomotive, photog- raphy,and printing,as well as new kindsof knowledge,and at the beginningof BumiManusia (translatedby Max Lane as ThisEarth 2 A recentarticle in theFar EasternEconomic Review (August 9, 1990) by MargaretScott presents an excellentdiscussion of Pramoedya,past and present,especially with regard to his statusas a "non-person"in Indonesia since 1965. BenedictAnderson (1984, 1989), Keith Foulcher (1981), Savitri Scherer(1981), and AnthonyJohns (1979), among others,have written extensivelyon Pramoedya'swritings and his role in Indonesianliterature. See Anderson1983 forbiographical and bibliographicalinformation on Pramoedya. 60 of Mankind)he is fullof enthusiasmfor it all. He is by no means the only "outsider" in his world, which is populated with Javanese,Chinese, Madurese, Japanese, Dutch, French, and various combinationsof thesegroups, the most significant for Minke being the familyof Nyai Ontosoroh. She is a Javanesewho had been sold into concubinageby her fatherto the Dutch businessman HermanMellema and has two children,Robert and the beautiful Annelies. Nyai has been runningthe dairy business of Tuan Mellema formany years; he has become completelydegenerate because of a traumaticconfrontation with Maurits, the son of his legal,Dutch marriage, and is no longerable to function. Anneliesand Minke fall in love and eventuallymarry, but when the elder Mellema dies his Dutch son and wife claim the businessas well as guardianshipof Annelies. In theDutch courts of the time,Nyai's relationshipas motherand Minke'sas husbandto Anneliesare null and void since theyare Natives. Despitea noble effort,including eloquent writings by Minkeand othersin theDutch press,Annelies is takenoff to Holland,leaving Minke in despairat havingbeen betrayedso terriblyby his "teacher,"Europe. Anak Semua Bangsa (translatedby Lane as Child of All Nations)picks up thestory at thispoint and is verymuch the part- nerto BumiManusia. As Foulcher(1981: 10) pointsout, it "charts [Minke's]slow and oftenpainful progression" towards a morehis- toricallytrue sense of himselfand his responsibilities.Annelies dies shortlyafter having arrived in Holland; Minke and Nyai Ontosorohcontinue to struggleto hold on to thebusiness and to come to termswith losing Annelies. Minke, who is now outof school, con- tinuesto writefor the Dutch language newspaper in Surabaya,but he is constantlybeing urged by his friends,including Nyai, to learn to writein Malay (the precursorof modernBahasa Indonesia). At firsthe resists,seeing this as a step down, and a key series of episodes revolvearound his comingto termswith his non-Dutch- speakingidentity. He meetsa youngmember of the Chinese Reform Movementwho speaks Englishand has been studyingin Japan;he learnsof nationalistmovements elsewhere in Asia, includingthe Philippines;and, perhapsmost importantly, he undertakesa jour- neyof discoveryof Javanese peasant life, a grouphe had heretofore knownfar less aboutthan he did aboutEurope. Wherein BumiManusia, Minke's choices had been between Europeand thestagnant world of theelite Javanese priyayi, by the end of Anak Semua Bangsahe has expanded his range consider- 61 ably, with China, Japan,and the Philippinesas models forpro- gressivismand peasant Java as an alternativeto the priyayi bureaucracyas a model fora Javaneseidentity (Foulcher 1981: 12). At the end, thesenew facetsof his personaenable Minketo help Nyai fightoff the prédationsof MauritsMellema, as he triesto takeover the business. This also bringsthe grieving process for the death of Anneliesto a kind of conclusion,and the stage is set for Minke to set off,finally, for Batavia, where he will studyto be a doctor. The thirdand fourthbooks, JejakLangkah and Rumah Kaca,continue and concludethe story of Minke's development as a nationalist,but I will notconsider them here. Instead,I would like to look back to a timein Pramoedya's careerwhen he was writingabout the tumultuousworld around him,as the nationof Indonesia came into being. Such worksas Perburuan[The Fugitive](1950), BukanPasar Malam [Not an All- Night Fair] (1951), and Tjerita dari Blora [Stories from Blora] (1952) are among those on which Pramoedya's reputationas a writerwas established. The firsttells of the twenty-fourhours preceding the Japanese surrender(which made possible the Indonesiandeclaration of independence)of 1945. The Japanesehad organizednative militia groups, and thehero, Hardo, is on therun afterhaving participated in the rebellionof one such group. The storydevelops as a seriesof conversations,first with the corrupt and treacherousfather of his fiancee,then with his own father