Secrets Need Words: Indonesian Poetry, 1966–1998 (Volume 105) (Ohio RIS Southeast Asia Series) - Softcover

Aveling, Harry

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0896802167 ISBN 13: 9780896802162

Publisher: Ohio University Press, 2001

Synopsis

Short listed for the 2007 New South Wales Premier's Translation Prize

The period from 1966 to 1999 represents a distinct era in Indonesian history. Throughout the “New Order” regime of President Suharto, the policies of economic development and political stability were dominant. However, the public opinion of personal expression was consistently under suspicion, and indeed dissent was severely punished.

Secrets Need Words traces the development of Indonesian poetry throughout this entire period. Texts are presented both in the original Indonesian and in careful, stylistically sensitive English translations.

In this anthology of contemporary work by Indonesian poets, the renowned translator and editor Harry Aveling presents a series of ongoing analyses detailing the political and social shifts that have influenced the work of particular poets.

Professor Aveling's analyses, along with the poems themselves, demonstrate how the poets responded to the power of the state in a variety of ways ranging from direct confrontation to withdrawal into personal and private realms characterized by fantasy and the use of heavily rhythmic language.

Secrets Need Words will be of interest to scholars of Indonesia and comparative literature, and will be for many years to come a basic text for scholarship and teaching. But it also offers all readers of poetry an opportunity to explore a new, complex, and exciting body of literature from one of the world's largest nations.

About this title

About the Author

Harry Aveling is head of the Indonesian/Malay Program, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia. He has translated extensively from both Indonesian and Malay literature, and co-translated from Hindi. In 1991 he was awarded the Anugerah Pengembangan Sastera by the Federation of Malay Writers Associations.

Reviews

"Indonesia's future is two-hundred million gaping mouths./ Indonesia's future is 15-watt light globes, some white and some black, lighting alternately./ Indonesia's future is a game of Ping Pong, going on all day and all night with a ball shaped like a goose egg./ Give/ Indonesia/ Back/ to me." From the wonderfully didactic verse of Taufiq Ismail and the rest of "The Generation of 1966" to "The Post Indonesia Generation" that continues to press for renewal, Secrets Need Words: Indonesian Poetry, 1965-1998, a bilingual anthology, introduces readers to the political complexities and samizdat poetic salvos that marked the Suharto era. Edited by Harry Aveling, head of the Indonesian/Malay program at La Trobe University in Australia, the book is divided into theme-based chapters ("Nature and Irony"; "The World Become Absurd," etc.) with short, cogent introductory notes and excellent translations throughout. The energy and inventiveness of this work are not to be missed.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Ohio University Press
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0896802167
• ISBN 13: 9780896802162
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 390
• Editor: Aveling Harry