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Pramoedya Ananta Toer: A walking contradiction
One the one hand, he had a penchant for writing broad, sweeping historical novels like Arus Balik (Turning of the Tide) or the four novels under the Buru Quartet, but on the other, the rebel writer also penned personal and introspective works like Gadis Pantai (Girl from the Beach) and his magnum opus Nyanyi Sunyi Seorang Bisu (A Mute's Soliloquy), which he wrote when he was exiled in the Buru penal colony.
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Introspective rebel writer: Dalhar Muhammadun, head of the committee set up to celebrate the centennial of Pramoedya Ananta Toer, inaugurates an exhibition at the Blora Creative Space in Blora, Central Java, on Feb. 6, 2025. (The Jakarta Post/Radhiyya Indra)
The late author Pramoedya Ananta Toer, who celebrated his centennial last week, was never an easy writer to pin down.
One the one hand, he had a penchant for writing broad, sweeping historical novels like Arus Balik (Turning of the Tide) or the four novels under the Buru Quartet, but on the other hand, the rebel writer also penned personal and introspective works like Gadis Pantai (Girl from the Beach) and his magnum opus Nyanyi Sunyi Seorang Bisu (A Mute's Soliloquy), which he wrote when he was exiled in the Buru penal colony.
Pramoedya has long been known as a leftist, anti-capitalist writer who harbored sympathy for the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), but in some of his most celebrated works like Bumi Manusia (This Earth of Mankind) he praised some aspects of modernity brought about by Dutch colonialism.
Also, while Gadis Pantai and some of the short stories compiled in Cerita Dari Blora (Stories from Blora) portrayed the characters of strong, independent women, Pramoedya refused to call himself a feminist and declined to acknowledge that he was a supporter of the PKI-affiliated Gerakan Wanita Indonesia (Indonesian Women’s Movement) or Gerwani.
His conception of Indonesia, a new nation born out the the remnants of Dutch colonialism, has also never been clear-cut, with his aspirations for an egalitarian society always being tempered by his pessimism over the country's feudal past.
It was these contradictions that were dissected by experts, analysts and readers in a series of discussions held in Pramoedya's hometown in Blora, Central Java, a sleepy, agrarian city located 75 kilometers north of the province's capital city of Semarang last week.
Feminist researcher Ruth Indiah Rahayu suggested that some contradictions in Pramoedya's work, especially in the Buru Quartet, came from his moral and social conviction, one that always stood in defense of justice.
