View Full Version : Works of fiction/history?
S.Workman
23rd July 2017, 09:48 PM
Its been a long while since I was here; its very good to see some familiar names and that the interest is still strong in the keris.
I was wondering if anyone knows of works of fiction or historical fiction that deal with precolonial life, or early colonial life, in those parts of the world where the keris is found. It seems that in post colonial Africa, Southeast Asia, and most particularly Japan there is a whole body of this kind of literature. Do any similar works exist in Indonesia?
Rick
23rd July 2017, 10:45 PM
The Outcast Of The Islands
Karain A Memory
https://archive.org/details/KarainAMemory
Victory
The End Of the Tether
Falk
Typhoon
The Rescue
Most can be read free these days with Google's help.
A. G. Maisey
24th July 2017, 12:15 AM
Perhaps the best known and most influential novel of the colonial period in Jawa is "Max Havelaar" by Multatuli
Multatuli was the pen name of Eduard Douwes Dekker.
Here is a link that tells of the author, it is worth reading:-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multatuli
S.Workman
24th July 2017, 02:33 AM
Excellent, thank you so much for those recommendations. I will most definitely look into those.
Laowang
24th July 2017, 03:42 AM
Joseph Conrad, Lord Jim
S.Workman
24th July 2017, 12:27 PM
Has anyone written a book about precolonial times? Something like Musashi by Eiji Yoshikawa but with the islands of Indonesia as a back drop? Perhaps the national character, if there is such a thing in a country that diverse, precludes it.
colin henshaw
24th July 2017, 01:39 PM
I recently bought a copy of a biography (non-fiction) of Sir Stamford Raffles which has a fair bit of information on local culture etc. Some of the Malaysian and Indonesian artefacts he collected are in the British Museum. The book is "Raffles and the Golden Opportunity" by Victoria Glendinning 2012.
Rick
24th July 2017, 03:04 PM
That one sounds interesting, Colin.
You can get Raffles' History of Java free as a kindle download, but it is unreadable unfortunately. :(
S.Workman
25th July 2017, 11:50 PM
That one sounds interesting, Colin.
You can get Raffles' History of Java free as a kindle download, but it is unreadable unfortunately. :(
Unreadable as in formatted badly or unreadable as in soporific to the modern reader?
Bob A
26th July 2017, 07:28 AM
If you enjoy historical fiction, George MacDonald Fraser fills the bill. His Flashman series of novels includes one, Flashman's Lady, which features our antihero, who chases pirates in 1841 in the company of James Brooke, later Rajah of Sarawak.
The whole series is a pleasant, amusing, raffish and informative read. Link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Flashman
S.Workman
26th July 2017, 02:04 PM
If you enjoy historical fiction, George MacDonald Fraser fills the bill. His Flashman series of novels includes one, Flashman's Lady, which features our antihero, who chases pirates in 1841 in the company of James Brooke, later Rajah of Sarawak.
The whole series is a pleasant, amusing, raffish and informative read. Link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Flashman
I've read them all, they are really hilarious. Flash is just the worst.
Rick
26th July 2017, 02:38 PM
Unreadable as in formatted badly or unreadable as in soporific to the modern reader?
Unreadable as in garbled, missing words, paragraphs etc.
Not to mention in physical book size; our member Naga Sasra had an old copy that was two very thick volumes.
Seerp Visser
26th July 2017, 08:24 PM
That one sounds interesting, Colin.
You can get Raffles' History of Java free as a kindle download, but it is unreadable unfortunately. :(
Look for "History of Java" at archive.org, they offer a number of copies from different editons, free to read and download.
Special the first edition of 1817 is of very good quality with beautiful drawings.
A. G. Maisey
26th July 2017, 10:19 PM
I have an Oxford in Asia reprint, two vols., cased, 1978
It does contain a lot of statistics on commerce, production, trade, but it also contains a lot of very interesting information. Even though it was written in the first quarter of the 19th century, it is easy, maybe very easy to read. The style is not at all academic, and print size is such that if you speed read it is very easy to scan. I have seen this reprint come up for sale from time to time, it is expensive, but not prohibitive.
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