Books Literature

Reading for pleasure, 15 minutes a day

The National Book Committee Team - Courtesy of National Book Committee

Indonesia’s struggle to create a culture of reading

Review: Palm oil and patronage

An investigation into the transboundary haze and the palm plantations in Indonesia

Review: Kartini’s complete legacy

Bringing Kartini’s entire anthology of writings together for the first time reveals the depths of her pioneering influence

If I were Australia/ Kalau aku Australia

Poems across the Indonesian-Australian divide

A room of one’s own

Mobile libraries and writers clubs reveal a rich reading and writing culture among Indonesian migrant workers in Hong Kong

A feminist trajectory of literary influences

A writer pays homage to the women writers and intellectuals who paved the way for others

Review: Sites, Bodies and Stories

Sites, Bodies and Stories: Imagining Indonesian History - Cover Image

History and heritage in the Indonesian imagination

Review: Women, Sexual Violence and the Indonesian Killings of 1965-66

Women, Sexual Violence and the Indonesian Killings of 1965-66 - Routledge

Pohlman’s study provides sensitive and powerful testimony of the impact of this violence on women and girls

Murdering army, silent church

Rev. Mery Kolimon: ‘The Indonesian Churches did not protect the victims of 1965’ - Willem van Gent

Reverend Mery Kolimon, researcher and advocate working on the 1965 killings in Eastern Indonesia, has a personal connection to this piece of history

Review: Man Tiger strikes!

Longlisted for the prestigious Man Booker International Prize Eka Kurniawan’s novel signals the birth of a sophisticated crime noir genre in Indonesian literature

Review: Jakarta, Mon Amour

A series of illustrated books offers a visual journey through the history of Jakarta and brings back vivid memories

Review: Incubus of Intervention

Conspiracy as foreign policy

A post-colonial subversive

Like Toer’s tetralogy before it, Semua Untuk Hindia turns Indonesia’s national history narrative on its head

After ’98: Censorship, compromises and resistance

Cancellations at UWRF 2015 were just the latest example of censorship in democratic Indonesia

Introduction to Man Tiger: A Novel by Eka Kurniawan

Aquarelle Phantasm

An emerging poet takes the international stage

Review: 'Enduring impunity': Women surviving atrocities in the absence of justice

Ongoing impunity for perpetrators continues to impact on the lives of women survivors

Review: The Crocodile Hole

Saskia Wieringa’s latest novel brings to life a dark period in Indonesia’s past

Indonesia, beginning of the 1980s. The young journalist Tommy comes into contact with the survivors of the genocide that the New Order regime of General Suharto carried out. To her bewilderment she hears stories about lurid dancing, castrations and the murder by young girls of a number of generals in the night of October 1 1965. Guided by Ibu Sri, herself a former prisoner and a member of the women’s organisation that was held responsible for these alleged sexual and sadistic perversions she sets herself the task to unravel these fantasies. Who invented these hateful lies which were meant to incite mass organizations to murder possibly one million of their neighbors? Tommy is betrayed and thrown into prison.

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Lontar Modern Indonesia

A selection of stories from the Indonesian classics and modern writers, periodically published free for Inside Indonesia readers, courtesy of Lontar.