Goenawan Mohamad

An Indonesian poet and man of letters, Goenawan Mohamad was a fierce critic of the Suharto regime which ruled Indonesia for much of the late 20th century. He founded ‘Tempo’ in Indonesia, a magazine which covers news and politics within the country, usually from a left wing perspective.

Mohamad writes a weekly column in ‘Tempo’ entitled ‘Sidelines’ in which he lambasts the current political order and the inanities of the media in Indonesia. This column has grown massively popular in Indonesia and has been compiled in book form in Sidelines. Mohamad’s radical and outspoken political views often occlude the quality of his poetic output, which has been widely lauded and is available in collections such as God and Unfinished Things and Once the Revolution No Longer Exists.¹

Mohamad was one of the founders of the Lontar Foundation and is on the advisory boards of the human rights group ARTICLE 19 and the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict. He is an alumnus of the College of Europe 1966-1967 promotion.²

1. The Culture Trip ↩

2. Wikipedia ↩