Media Clippings

A Brilliant Tribute to Indonesian Literature in GPU’s MISTERI PEMBACA TERAKHIR

Sep 23, 2024 / Broadway World Indonesia by Rakaputra Paputungan
As part of Pesta Literasi Indonesia , Gramedia Pustaka Utama hosted the show from August 30th to September 1st, 2024.

As part of Pesta Literasi Indonesia (Indonesia’s Literation Party), Gramedia Pustaka Utama hosted a theatre performance titled Misteri Pembaca Terakhir (Mystery of the Last Reader) from August 30th to September 1st, 2024. The show ran three times at Graha Bhakti Budaya. Agus Noor acted as the writer and director, with Dexara Hachika as the assistant director. Alongside the Gramedia Team, they’ve crafted an amalgamation of famous Indonesian literary works in Misteri Pembaca Terakhir.

Misteri Pembaca Terakhir tells a story about a group of friends who love to read even when literacy is at an all-time low. They lamented this as their bookstore got vandalized by hoodlums, risking closing. Then suddenly, one of them, RonRon, mysteriously disappears. This group of friends then goes on a journey to find him, discovering the truth of his disappearance through encounters with book characters that come to life.

It’s revealed that RonRon was kidnapped by a group of mysterious beings. These beings seek to eliminate all books and readers as they fear that readers are able to take hold of knowledge and truth. Eventually, the people who are loyal to reading manage to unite their power and defeat this antagonistic force. In the end, RonRon and his friends renovate their bookstore so that they can keep encouraging people to read and there won’t ever be ‘The Last Reader’.

Under the poetic stars

Aug 09, 2024 / Inside Indonesia by Caitlin Hughes
Benteng (Fort) Rotterdam is a cream-brick, red-roofed fortress complex on the historic, harbourside edge of Makassar, South Sulawesi. The seventeenth-century Dutch colonial fort does not look out of place in a part of Makassar where Chinese, Dutch, and local South Sulawesi architecture stands alongside glassy, high-rise hotels. Today the Fort is Makassar’s most famous landmark, an enduring symbol of tempo doeloe (the olden times).

When I first visited Fort Rotterdam last October it was a searing hot day at the end of the dry season and the place was eerily quiet. When I returned for the opening night of the 2024 Makassar International Writers Festival (MIWF) in late May this year, the ambience was very different. It was a clear, cool night. Crowds of people milled around the site. Someone told me that opening night is always ‘like a giant reunion’ for the local arts community and the public. There were rows of food stalls and coloured signs and banners and the main stage was decorated with bright cartoons.

Since it began in 2011, MIWF has witnessed a remarkable growth. The festival was established by the late Dr Lily Yulianti Farid, a writer and academic, through Rumata’ Artspace – a multidisciplinary ‘artspace,’ which she co-founded with prominent film director Riri Riza at the Riza family’s old home in Gunung Sari Baru, Makassar. Although some outside observers perceive MIWF to be a ‘spinoff’ event from Bali’s famous Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (established 2006), the reality is very different.

Best-selling Indonesian authors you should be reading

May 21, 2024 / Jakarta Post by Josa Lukman Sheena Suparman
To mark National Book Day on Friday, we are delving into the world of literature to highlight some of the country’s best authors.

As the clouds descend upon Jakarta, similar to how Alice retreats to wonderland and Wendy flies off to Neverland, we are retreating to our separate rooms and touring the country through books all weekend long.

Come join our journey with these amazing local authors.

The Consulate General Holds Indonesian Arts and Culture Promotion Week, “Jalan-jalan Indonesia” in Perth

May 02, 2024 / Foreign Affairs
The Consulate General of the Republic of Indonesia in Perth, in collaboration with a number of partners in Western Australia, The Sharon Flindell, the Literature Centre, and The State Library of WA, had organised Indonesian Art and Culture and Culinary Week titled "Jalan-Jalan Indonesia."

Arts and culture promotion activities included screenings of various Indonesian cultural films and documentaries, talk show with Indonesian writer Reda Gaudiamo and local Western Australian writers, and a culinary event featuring celebrity chef Wayan Kresna Yasa.

Ten Indonesian Writers selected for Emerging Writers Program

Apr 30, 2024 / UWRF News
Yayasan Mudra Swari Saraswati is thrilled to announce the talented Indonesian writers selected for the Ubud Writers & Readers Festival 2024 Emerging Writers Program. From 449 submissions, ten Indonesian writers were chosen by the curating team of literary figures Dee Lestari, Faisal Oddang, and Putu Juli Sastrawan for their exceptional and original stories. These writers will now participate in a mentorship program, including the publication of their work in the annual anthology and being featured at the 2024 Festival this October.

Right Where They Have Always Been

Apr 04, 2024 / ArtReview by Max Crosbie-Jones
Why aren’t the literary scenes of Southeast Asia getting more regional and global traction?

Try as international book publishers might, Southeast Asia’s literary scenes cannot easily be distilled to a marketable essence – or bound together. Take the S.E.A. Write Award, for example, a prestigious literary accolade that was, until recently, presented annually at Bangkok’s storied Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Since 1979, novelists from across the ASEAN region have gathered for a ceremony that is arguably as infuriating as it is inspiring: no scheme for translating each country’s winning novel into any other language exists. As a result, an award that seeks to expand readership and foster a sense of literary unity in diversity is, in fact, a recurring reminder of how Southeast Asia’s manifest pluralism, its myriad languages and motley cultural histories, hinders such intraregional exchanges. Southeast Asia in this context is an unedifying construct: a winning Thai or Indonesian novel will still only be read in Thai or Indonesian, and so the literary worlds of participating nations remain siloed from one another.

How’s Indonesian poetry today?

Feb 15, 2024 / TFR by Rahma Yulita
What is the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the word “poetry”? For some, it might be famous poets like Chairil Anwar, Sapardi Djoko Damono, or even Rupi Kaur. Others might think of works such as "Aku" by Chairil Anwar which still occasionally returns to the spotlight in this modern life.

Rarely will people think about what poetry is, because nowadays, poetry seems to be placed in a box that can only be enjoyed almost exclusively.

Poetry is a part of literary work which is generally created to express the writer's feelings, be it anxiety, sadness, or happiness. That is why poetry comes in beautiful, imaginative words.

Indonesian book giant turns to tech to fight piracy

Jan 06, 2024 / Nikkei Asia by Randy Mulyanto
Indonesian conglomerate Kompas Gramedia's book publishing unit is optimistic that blockchain technology can help it fight persistent online content piracy, as it also works to overcome challenges including lifting reading levels and reducing regional pricing discrepancies in the sprawling island nation.

The company's storied history began in 1963, and six decades later it has eight business pillars: retail and publishing; media; education; event and venue; printing and packaging; property; hospitality; and digital. It has a network of over 100 Gramedia stores selling books and other goods including stationary across Southeast Asia's largest economy.

Adi Ekatama, publishing director of the company's Group of Retail & Publishing (GoRP) division, is responsible for six book publishers including Gramedia Pustaka Utama (GPU) -- the largest and oldest and which will celebrate its 50th anniversary in March. It has produced over 25,000 books since its founding in 1974.

GoRP published 1,865 books last year -- compared to 1,912 titles throughout 2022.

A part of history

Dec 10, 2023 / Inside Indonesia by Keith Foulcher
When Inside Indonesia was launched in November 1983, the events of 1965/66 were still fresh in the Indonesian nation’s collective memory. The official interpretation of those events – that the Army had foiled an attempted coup by the Indonesian communist party (PKI) and its supporters, incarcerating tens of thousands of PKI members and sympathisers in the name of national security – was well-entrenched in the workings of state institutions and popular attitudes. Any challenge to this orthodoxy, including attempts to uncover the suppressed history of the widespread massacres that accompanied the Army’s rise to power, risked reprisals from an increasingly authoritarian state. Nevertheless, a lively climate of dissent continued to feature in Indonesian intellectual debate and expression in literature and the arts. It was given added impetus by the quietly assertive and courageous contributions of a cohort of ‘ex-tapols’, former political prisoners who had been ‘returned to society’ – if not unconditionally ‘released’ – in the period from 1976 to 1979, after sustained international pressure on the New Order government.

UNESCO Designates The Birthdays Of 2 National Heroes As International Days

Dec 02, 2023 / Observer
UNESCO closed its 42nd General Assembly in Paris, Wed (22/11) with the announcement that the birthdays of two Indonesian heroic figures, Keumalahayati and AA Navis, to be celebrated internationally.

The decision took into account UNESCO’s purpose and philosophy in the fields of education, culture, natural sciences, social sciences and humanity, as well as gender representation. The proposal also met the criteria of receiving support from at least two countries and has a major impact on the country or the world.