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 fficially, no one has sex in Indonesia. At least some members of parliament would like it to be so. For the past two years a minority group in the government of this Muslim country have tried to pass an anti-pornography ban which would fine couples $29,000 for kissing publicly. A housewife who wears a skirt which is too short could wind up with a whopping $111,000 fine. "The bill had almost nothing to do with pornography," says Indonesian novelist Ayu Utami on a recent trip to New York. "It was just a way to try and control people's behavior." In this context, Utami has, once again, become a political novelist. In 1998, Utami published her first novel, Saman, and single-handedly launched the chick-lit genre in Indonesian culture. There, it is called sastra wangi ("fragrant letters") because its other practitioners, Djenar Maesa Ayu and Dewi Lestari, are young and attractive. Of this brat pack, Utami is the most literary. Saman is told through multiple perspectives and follows multiple plot lines. Imagine As I Lay Dying set in and around Indonesia and twice as lush. The book's shadowy protagonist is a priest who is thrown in prison for being an alleged Communist. He emerges a human-rights
Through her characters, Utami presents a kaleidoscopic view of contemporary Indonesian life, from the plight of migrant workers on oil derricks to the tension between Christian and Muslims, and the presence of sensuality and sexuality in the lives of everyday citizens. After her last event at the recent PEN festival in New York wrapped, the tiny thirty-six year old sat down for a beer at a Chelsea café. Wearing a loose-fitting blue tank top and jeans, she talked freely about why her political conscience prevents her from getting down to her next book. — John Freeman So you used to be involved in something called Indonesia's Alliance of Independent Journalists. I started it with some friends to protest the closing of some newspapers. It was in the 1990s, when I was still a journalist and the government was trying to crack down on free media. We did many things they didn't like. We had sort of retired it, but then this anti-pornography bill came back. Now, instead of working on my next book, I find myself distracted again. A friend of yours told me that she read Saman on diskette, like many other Indonesians. Did you have to publish the book this way at first? No, I just hadn't finished it. People would ask me what I was working on so I gave it to them like that. After a while I gave quite a few of them out. People started to talk about so that encouraged me to hurry up and finish it. I don't have that benefit now with my new book. I recently interviewed a Chinese chick-lit writer named Wei Hui, and she said that Henry Miller was a huge influence on her — what about you, were influenced by him? I liked some American writing, but I didn't get to it until I was older — when you just like something or don't, but aren't shaped by it. I guess I wasn't soft, or I was too old to be soft. Saman has sold 100,000 copies in Jakarta, which makes you the literary Dan Brown in that country. It was published the year that Suharto was ousted, so I think there was an atmosphere of hope for a breakthrough. His fall brought an end to some terrible things. But I don't regard the book as controversial. Most of the text referred to in it is Biblical. I was too afraid to address some Muslim topics directly. But there is sex in the book. Well, barely. I'm not very interested in writing sex scenes. But I am interested in sexuality, and how that plays out in the lives of a country of people — what it means. It's not that I am against sex in books, but the urgency was not to arouse people but to make them think, to make them celebrate the idea of sexuality. I don't want to be exotic about this, but I don't want to write erotica either. Where does this curiosity come from? I don't know. I come from a very conservative family — my mother is a devout Catholic and my father also became of faith. But my parents were very open in the sense that they can accept if I do something the consequences are my responsibility, and they still love me unconditionally. Were they shocked at all when they read Saman — there is one riff on masturbation that I imagine would make a parent wince. Not really. You have to remember, people in Indonesia can talk about sex openly, just as long as it's not through a formal medium. As long as it's not printed. If you walk through Jakarta you will feel the difference between what is public and what is private. Officially, nothing bad happens, but everyone knows people get divorced in droves, people go to love hotels, but they have to keep up the façade of righteousness. What about you, are you married? I'm not married, I don't have any kids. It's not that I hate marriage. I have no trauma about it. I just want to be able to respect the fact that you have a choice, that you don't have to get married. That's not an issue so much here in America, but it's still an issue in Indonesia. Still, it presents a problem about what to call my partner. I can't call him my boyfriend, because he's definitely not a boy. I guess you could call him your lover? That's too French. I know, and it makes him sound like he should be lounging in a smoking jacket. Well, I'm going to keep thinking. He'll remain my partner for now. n°
©2006 John Freeman and Nerve.com.
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