Man Tiger

Book / Novel

by Eka Kurniawan
Author: Labodalih Sembiring

Format: Paperback, English
192 page(s)
ISBN/ISBN13: /9781781688595
Published Sep 07, 2015 by Verso Books

View on Goodreads | Google Books
Buy Now from Amazon *
Also see Lelaki Harimau

An extraordinarily beautiful, sly, ribald, and compulsively readable novel.

A slim, wry story set in an unnamed town near the Indian Ocean, Man Tiger tells the story of two interlinked and tormented families, and of Margio, an ordinary half-city, half-rural youngster who also happens to be half-man, half-supernatural female white tiger (in many parts of Indonesia, magical tigers protect good villages and families).1

  1. VersoBooks ↩



Recos James Louie in The Books We’re Reading Now (DestinAsian, Apr 24, 2020)
By preserving the Indonesian words, there are values that bring along cultural and Indonesian unique characteristics. This preservation is important, especially if applied to Eka Kurniawan's work, as he represents picturesque Indonesia in his narration.
— Annisa W F in Cultural (Un)translatability in Kurniawan’s Man Tiger (Personal Blog, Jul 01, 2018)
Man Tiger takes a different approach, for whilst we are still immersed in Eka Kurniawan’s tropics overgrowing with palm trees, cassava and papaya, the magical and the supernatural always make way for reality and are pushed aside before it
— Frank Jayne in Eka Kurniawan’s Man Tiger: Fiction that Brings us Back to the World (Books and Bao, May 20, 2018)
The Indonesian author Eka Kurniawan reverts to old folk beliefs in the novel ‘Man Tiger’. It covers not only a psychological drama but also many layers of his native culture.
— Geronimo Cristobal in Man Tiger (Eka Kurniawan, 2015) (Manila Book Review, Oct 21, 2017)
Awards Mira Nair in Winners of the 2016 Emerging Voices awards announced (Financial Times, Sep 27, 2016)
Ratih Dwi Astuti in Man Tiger (Personal Blog, Sep 24, 2016)
Anjana Basu in Oedipus or the Tiger (The Statesman, Sep 18, 2016)
Nidhi Mahajan in Lyrical, bawdy, experimental, political: There aren’t enough adjectives for this novel (Scroll.in, Aug 20, 2016)
Andreas Pohl in A Beastly Tale – “Man Tiger” by Eka Kurniawan (Personal Blog, Jun 26, 2016)
Recos Angel Cruz in 100 Must-Read Books by Asian Authors (Book Riot, May 05, 2016)
Eric Wilson in Review: Man Tiger strikes! (Inside Indonesia, Mar 01, 2016)
Maddie Crum in 10 Other Magical Books ‘Harry Potter’ Fans Should Read (Huffington Post, The, Jan 26, 2016)
Tony Malone in ‘Man Tiger’ by Eka Kurniawan (Review) (Personal Blog, Dec 03, 2015)
Hilary Plum in On Eka Kurniawan (Bookforum, Oct 27, 2015)
PW Picks: Books of the Week, October 12, 2015 (Publishers Weekly, Oct 09, 2015)
Interview Gillian Terzis in A Writer’s Haunting Trip Through the Horrors of Indonesian History (The New Yorker, Oct 02, 2015)
In “Beauty Is a Wound” and “Man Tiger” — a slimmer work — his real subject is unruly, untameable and often unquenchable desires.
— Jon Fasman in Sunday Book Review: ‘Beauty Is a Wound’ and ‘Man Tiger’ by Eka Kurniawan (The New York Times, Sep 09, 2015)
Siddhartha Deb in Where the Dead Refuse to Vanish (New Republic, Sep 03, 2015)
Claire Fallon in Maddie Crum in 2015 Fall Books Preview: 33 Can’t-Miss New Reads (Huffington Post, The, Sep 01, 2015)

*) An affiliate link. If you buy the book through this link, we may earn a small commission.