Will Badrul Mustafa Never Die? Verse from the Front

Heru Joni Putra, the young Minangkabau poet who has made a name for himself as an enfant terrible of modern Indonesian literature has created in the person of Badrul Mustafa a new anti-hero. As Heru himself explains, Badrul Mustafa’s Arabic-derived name may be understood as “the chosen one who brings enlightenment and the truth of religion.” Even so, as he also notes, just as in real life, “an exemplary name does not always mean exemplary behavior.”Badrul Mustafa the anti-hero strives to convince one and all of his remarkable abilities-truth-bearer, hero, unrequited lover, and miracleworker-but is constantly baffled by life’s rebuffs and the futility of his self-defeating efforts. But Badrul Mustafa is not just one person. Instead, he represents an amalgam of absurd and delusional hypocrites who connive to attain power and sow communal discord. This is the “front,” the battle the author fights against the “Badrul Mustafas of all time.” The Indonesian language edition of this collection was named the Best Poetry Book by Tempo magazine in 2017 and won the Wisran Hadi Award for literature in 2019. Translated in its entirety by George A. Fowler, this book is one shot in the intellectual battle now being fought by Indonesian authors against hypocrisy and oppression.