By A. Johns
he relation of a poet to his environment: his acceptance or rejection of the world he lives in, its influence upon him, and his transmutation of his total experience into the images that find their inevitable and fitting shrine in his verse — these are perennial and fruitful questions that demand discussion whenever we are confronted with the work of a true poet. All the more so when the poet in question is one of the creators of a new literary tradition in his country, and his formative years are dominated by events as cataclasmic as the Japanesé conquest of the Dutch East Indies in 1941-42, and the sub-sequent struggle for Indonesian independence. Chairil Anwar was born in Medan in 1922 and died in Djakarta in 1949. His formal education extended only as far as the first two years of Junior High School, after which family difficulties caused him to leave home for Djakarta in 1940 — at the age of 18. Very little is known of his life in Djakarta until the Japanesé occupation, when he became recognised as a poet among the circle of Indonesian intellectuals.
Only a modicum of his poetry was published before the Japanesé
surrender, but after the war his reputation soared: he was regarded
as the creator of a new Indonesian poetry who jealously preserved his
artistic integrity during the Japanesé occupation, and after the war was
a burning patriot.
These, broadly speaking, are the terms in which many Indonesian
and foreign writers see him. Not that he has received only praise. For
a period, at least, it became the fashion to debunk him as a plagiarist.
And writers associating themselves with the left-wing cultural asso-
ciation Lekra have, on political grounds, uttered severe strictures on
his work on the grounds of his existentialist morality, and his cosmo-
politan a-political outlook.1
Neither of these views, however, contributes much to an appreciation
of Chairil Anwar as a poet, or to an understanding of his poetry as
poetry. A direct access to his work has, likewise, been impeded by
the popular image he created for himself. It is no exaggeration to say
So Virga Belan in Suluh Indonesia 17/4/63.
394
that many writers who have directed their attention to him have been
so obsessed by his personality that they have never come to grips with
his poetry in its own terms.
Now, a personality he certainly was. Irregular, arrogant, eccentric,
burnt up with an obsessional vitality, he plunged himself into every
conceivable type of experience. He had no more and no less respect
for the President than for a pedicab driver. He regarded the norms
of social life as perpetuated and sustained by hypocrisy, and virtually
destroyed himself rather than accept them. Thus, he devoted himself
to art; and to be an artist he struggled to emancipate himself from the
claims of family, religion and country, leading a characteristically
Bohemian existence. But if his irregular life was partly a matter of
principle — in the manner of Rimbaud — it was also in part a persona,
a mask to conceal his real self which he revealed only in his poems.
Chairil Anwar began to write when a whole edifice of social behaviour
was brought crashing down in ruins — when existing standards
appeared to have lost their application and validity, and concepts of
value associated with religion, morality, and the rule of law no longer
had any meaning. The poor starved to death unpitied, the Dutch were
expropriated, and all were subject to naked force which was the
supreme law.
This chaos which surrounded him is important for any understanding
of his personality, but it should not give the impression that there was
anything frenetic or expletive about his verse, still less that it was in
any way extemporaneous in character. Chairil's two guiding stars were
life and art, to which, however, he attributed a purely existential
significance. And he wrote giving expression to a kaleidoscope of moods
provoked by the world he lived in. His subject was above all his' own
self: his doubts, despairs, nostalgias; what he was, in what he could
find relief — all scrutinised and set down with an inexorable honesty
and correspondingly steel-like discipline in his technique.
His poetry then is an interior poetry: and this, together with his
concern with technique which led him to continual revisions of his
work, are the two most important facts about his as a poet. His concern
with technique was rational, not intuitive. In a letter he wrote: 'As an
artist, Ida, I must be penetrating and decisive in evaluating and
deciding. Listen!! After Beethoven's death, his note-books were dis-
cover ed filled with jottings, the groundwork and preparation for his
great melodies. His fifth and ninth symphonies did not appear ready
made. He had to work for years before such a work was ripe for the
A. H. JOHNS.
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
plucking. The composition ofhis M i s s a S o l e m n i s took more
than five years . . . So if I write without putting a total effort into my
work, I may degenerate into an itnprovisor.' 2
The same concern is evident in the selections he translated from
the letters of R. M. Rilke, chosen, undoubtedly, because they expressed
the ideas closest to his heart. The following words from a letter from
Rilke to Lou Andreas-Salomé might well have been his own: 'It is not
form that I must learn from him, but the profound concentration
necessary to create form. I must learn to work, Lou — this is my
weakness.' 3
It is usually claimed that Chairil Anwar was influenced principally
by the Dutch expressionists Marsman and Slauerhoff, and that, using
them as his models, he introduced Expressionism into Indonesian
poetry. This affiliation, however, appears too narrow and provincial.
His creation of an interior universe, and his dedication to technical
perfection, in fact, mark him as an heir to the great movement in
modern poetry inaugurated by the French symbolists. It is only neces-
sary to read Valery's aphorism, 'a poem is an intricate intellectual
problem, a struggle with self-imposed conditions — it is, above all,
something constructed', and his favourite simile: 'a poem is like a
heavy weight which the poet has carried to the roof bit by bit — the
reader is the passer-by upon whom the weight is dropped all at once,
and who consequently receives from it in a moment, an overwhelming
impression, a complete aesthetic effect, such as the poet has never
known in composing it.', 4 and compare them with Chairil's attitudes
to his art, to realize that we are in the same intellectual world.
Chairil Anwar's poetry then is a revelation of his inner self, his
moods and attitudes; his poems, accordingly, are not objective com-
ments on the external world, although they may be provoked by it;
and in the symbolist manner, the content of his poetry, and the
components of his images only becomes invested with their full meaning
when they are interpreted as symbols of his own moods and attitudes.
He tells us as much in 'Rumahku' (My House), which may be sum-
marized: 'My house, where I live, take my wife, have my children,
is of poetry; it is so transparent that from without all the intimacies
H. B. Jassin: Chairil Anwar, Pelopor Angkatan '45 (Gunung Agung, Djakarta
1956) 110. Chairil Anwar's prose is terse and concentrated. The renderings
given here are paraphrases.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 132.
E. Wilson, Axel's Castle (Charles Scribner's Sons, New York 1947) 80.
396
of my heart and mind are manifest.' 5 The poem is based on 'Woning-
looze' (Homeless), by Slauerhoff. But it is also significant to note a
sentence occurring in another letter of Rilke that he translated: 'I find,
stored within the poems that have become part of me more truth than
is to be found in (personal) relations and friendships.'
His first published poem is probably 'Nisan' (An Epitaph) (1):
A. H. JOHNS.
It is not [your] death which moves me,
But your resignation to all that befell;
I had not realised how high above dust
And sorrow, nobly you reign.6
The significance of the poem is not immediately clear, nor the focal
point of Chairil's personal involvement; and the syntactic patterns of
the original, since the form is almost that of a traditional quatrain, are
not easily definable. I understand the theme as the gulf between
generations; and the cause of Chairil's grief is not so much the loss
of the grandmother, but the loss of that sense of acceptance (keridlaan)
she epitomized, which could make life bearable.
If such is the case, then this first poem sets the stage for all that is
to follow. Chairil's world is a broken world. He recognises this and
accepts the fact (though not perhaps without a backward glance of
regret): better a broken world in which no values are sure, than a
whole one, sustained by hypocrisy.
Consistency in this attitude does not make for peace of mind: despair
awaits round every corner. And in a poem written only two months
later, he exclaims: 'The happiness granted us is a mere trifle, worth
neither treasuring nor nurturing.' 7 Not only despair, but even revulsion,
as in the poem '1943', where Chairil looks on a small child, apparently
in perfect health, but already infected beyond redemption by the
putrescence filling its lungs from the first breath of life.8
Sometimes, indeed, we find a poem flaming with self-confidence and
vitality, the vitalism that he wished to infuse into art; but these are
comparatively rare. Among them is 'Diponegoro'. Diponegoro was the
messianic leader of the Java War 1826-30 — a Mahdi type figure, a
revolutionary who in the popular Javanese imagination and tradition
5
Anwar: Kerikil Tadjam dan Jang Terampas Dan Jan Putus (Pustaka Rakjat,
Djakarta, no date) 24.
Anwar: Kerikil, 5. Numerals between brackets refer to the original text infra.
Anwar: Kerikil, 6.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 41.
6
7
8
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
would sweep away injustice, and create a new Heaven and a new
Earth (2):
At this time of reawakening
You live again
The startled embers burst into flame
In the forefront you stand
Unflinching, facing foes a hundredfold.
Swords at the right, spears at the left
Kindled with a spirit that cannot know death
FORWARD
Your rank [marches] without beat of drum
Conviction is the signal for attack
Once to be meaningful
And after that death.9
This was one of the few poems of real poetic calibre to pass the
Japanese censor, but it is to be doubted whether the Japanese censor
and Chairil understood it in the same way. To the Japanese, doubtless,
it suggested that total devotion to the cause and disregard for death
that characterises the true warrior. His Indonesian colleagues probably
understood it as the struggle for political freedom. But is it not equally
likely that the whole setting of the poem is within Chairil's mind, and
that Diponegoro is a symbol for Chairil's determination to burst into
the freedom of anarchy, even if it costs him his life. This is clearly the
case with 'Aku' (My Self),10 in which he describes himself as a wild
beast, rejected by his peers. True, he wants to live a thousand years,
but in his own way, fighting to tear down the props of hypocrisy that
shore up the rotten fagade of daily life and exulting in his own lack
of involvement in them.
A different mood, but also of revolt, is to be found in 'Kepada
Kawan' (To a Fellow Spirit), 11 a poem of carpe diem: Death, in seizing
us will destroy himself — therefore, let us take the glass of life, and
empty it at one gulp. Choose the wildest stallion and spur it onward,
tethering it to neither day nor night. Destroy all you have made, and
vanish leaving neither relative nor estate, asking pardon of none, taking
leave of none! Then, when Death comes, he will find his prey has fled.
Anwar: Kerikil, 7.
C. Anwar: Deru Tjampur Debu (Pembangunan, Djakarta 1957) 7.
Anwar: Debu, 18.
398
Perhaps only two of his poems could be called happy. One is
'Adjakan' (An Invitation) 12 a poem purely lyrical; a recall to the
time of childhood, to years full of happiness and the innocent friendship
of girl and boy. When the worst misfortune was to be caught in a
shower of rain — and what of it? In a moment they would be dry
again. The other is 'Taman' (A Garden), 13 almost a romantic 'escape'
poem. His desire: a garden for an 'I' and a 'Thou'. Small, one could
not lose the other in it; simple, without myriads of flowers or a plushy
sward; tiny, but filled with sunlight — a place to withdraw from the
world and mankind.
There are, however, two major personal themes that run through
his poetry: one is a sense of oppressive loneliness, a despair of attaining
any kind of communication between man and man; the other, a religious
sense that amounts almost to an obsession.
Among the poems of the first group, several communicate the
oppressive horror of a nightmare. One such is 'Kesabaran' (Patience),
written in 1943. 14 The poet lies awake at night, and hears, confusedly
in the distance, human conversation and the howling of dogs — dogs..
human beings, what does it matter, all are the same in the darkness
that has descended upon him like a wall of stone: he is completely
isolated (3):
A. H. JOHNS.
I wish to speak
My voice is lost, my strength fled —
Let it be! It is of no consequence —
The world does not care to be addressed,
or to pay heed.
The river has frozen hard
And life is life no longer.
I try to revive the past again . . .
Close tight my ears, close tight my eyes
Awaiting the resolution that must come.
And to me at least, the poet is saying: I am totally isolated, and can
communicate with no-one. The past is beyond my reach, my earlier
vision gone for ever. Death will bring release. 15
'Sendiri' (Alone) 1 6 is anothef of these poems of phantasmagoric
12
Anwar: Kerikil, 20.
13
Anwar: Kerikil, 15.
Anwar: Kerikil, 19.
The 'resolution' (reda) in the final line of this poem is popularly understood
as referring to the end of the Japanese occupation. This, in my view, is
doubtful. Such direct, special pleading is out of character for the poet.
Anwar: Kerikil, 11.
14
15
16
CHAIRIL ANWAR: AN INTERPRETATION.
loneliness, in which the solitude of his room holds him by the throat,
and danger lurks in every corner. The horror is only resolved when
he breaks into tears, crying out 'Mother! Mother!'
'Kawanku dan Aku' (My Self and a Companion) " Hkewise expresses
the futility of any attempt at communication (4):
We are both wanderers, overtakén by night
Struggling on through darkness
And drenched by the rain.
The boats stiffen in the harbour,
My blood congeals. I am dense, compact.
Did anyone speak?
My companion is a skeleton.
His vigour enfeebled by blows
He asked: What time is it ?
It is very late:
Meaning is lost in latency
And movement has no sense.
The poet is not describing an actual walk at night. The darkness
is in his mind, and the ships, stiff, motionless, dimly visible through
the pouring rain suggest a parallel to the sluggish flow of his congealing
blood as he feels the numbness of isolation. His companion can only
utter words as meaningless and banal as: What time is it? And the
poet comments bitterly: Whatever time it is, it is too late; nothing
has any value.
Even sexüal relationships are unable to transcend this isolation.
'Sia-sia' (Futility),i8 for example, illustrates Chairil's incapacity to
yield to love, and his fury with himself for this incapacity. A girl
brings flowers to her beloved, and lays them at his feet. But all day
long the couple can only sit facing each other, each unable to make
the first move. And Chairil exclaims in disgust (5):
Ah! My heart, which will not yield,
Die, devastated by loneliness.
'Orang berdua' (A Couple) 19 has the same tenor. The room in which
Anwar: Kerikil, 25.
Anwar: Kerikil, 9.
Anwar: Debu, 9.
400
they find themselves is their last refuge in a boundless night. Together
they reach out for a black raft (presumably, sexual union) not knowing
whether on it they will be cast up onto the shore or sncked down into
the whirlpool; uncertain whether they are truly in each other's em-
brace — achieving a full communication — or whether still pursuing
an illusion.
This theme is expressed more starkly in Tuntjak' (name of a
mountain resort). 20 After a night of naked embrace with a mistress,
high in the hills, far from the frenzied disturbance of the town, the
poet discovers that the thick morning mist resting on the green pines,
and the sound of the clear stream rippling among them, only proffer
again the same unresolved question: what is love, what is communication ?
His concern with religion should not be understood in a confessional
sense. To me, it seems that he was profoundly religious in a tempera-
ment, and that he found it far more difficult to divest himself of a
religious faith than to find one. His attitude to formal religion was
naturally determined by his total rejection of every form of social
organisation as irremediably corrupt, and he has no use for it. In the
poem 'Aku' (My Self — not to be confused with the other poem I
referred to earlier) 2 1 he declares: 'I keep at a distance teachers of
religion with their javelin words.' In 'Di Mesdjid' (At the Mosque) 2 2
he depicts his attempt to wrestle with God, and defeat Him (6):
A. H. JOHNS.
I call upon Him
Until at length He comes
We are face to face
He bursts into flame within my breast
With all my strength I strive to extinguish Him
My self, rejecting [His] yoke,
Is drenched in sweat
This hall (i.e. the Mosque)
Is our place of struggle
Bent on mutual destruction
The one contemptuous, the other mad.
Three of his poems, however, are remarkable testaments to a
religious faith. In 'Doa' (A Prayer) 2 3 he exclaims (7):
20
Anwar:
Anwar:
Anwar:
Anwar:
Kerikü, 50.
Kerikil, 27.
Kerikil, 26.
Debu, 14.
21
22
23
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
My Lord,
When overcast by thought
Still I utter your name
Even in bitter sorrow,
At the thought of you, all is filled
With your light, pure and burning
Now a flickering candle in silent darkness
My Lord
I face dissolution
and collapse.
My Lord
I wander in a strange land
My Lord
At your door I knock,
I cannot turn away.
Equally striking is the poem 'Isa' (Jesus), 24 very similar in style to
'Doa' and virtually a meditation on the crucifixion. He looks upon the
broken bleeding body of Christ, and is confronted by the question:
Am I guilty ? (8):
I see the body, bleeding,
In the blood, I see myself.
However, each of the poems has a sub-title. 'Doa' is dedicated to a
firm Believer, and 'Isa' to a true Christian. It is as though — deeply
feit as the poems are — Chairil did not wish the sentiments expressed
in them to be attributed to himself — rather they were for someone
else. A third religious poem is 'Kepada Peminta-minta' (To a Beggar). 25
This is based very closely on a Dutch poem by William Elschot of the
same title. The poet is confronted with the hideous pock-marked face
of a beggar, dripping with pus, which pursues him incessantly and
haunts even his dreams. The inspiration of the poem is the Gospel
story of Dives and Lazarus, and the beggar clearly is the accusing
finger of conscience, ordering the poet to throw himself laden with
sin, at God's feet.
Chairil Anwar had only six years of life as a poet. The themes and
A n w a r : Debu, 13.
A n w a r : Keriki, 36.
402
attitudes I have outlined are broadly representative of his work, but
not exhaustive. And it should not be imagined that Chairil was
necessarily consistent in any of his attitudes, or that the poems I have
discussed bear only one interpretation.
Some of his later poems, while not departing from his earlier con-
cerns, lack the nightmarish oppression of his earlier work, and are
marked by a tranquil acceptance of his fate — the realisation that
his ideals are never to be achieved. A poem in this vein is 'Tjintaku
djauh dipulau' (My Beloved is afar off, on an Island (9): 2 6
A. H. JOHNS.
My beloved is afar off, on an island
A sweet girl
Whiling away her time alone.
My boat surges onward, the moon radiates light,
and round my neck hangs a garland for my darling;
the wind is with me, the sea bright and yet I feel
that I shall never reach her.
For in the clear water, in the sighing wind
in the sense of all things fleeting to their close
Death sits in majesty and declares:
Direct your barque to my embrace.
Alas, so many years have I travelled
in the boat doomed to dissolution with me!
Why is it that Death should call
Before my beloved reclines in my embrace.
My sweet one is afar off, on an island;
myself dead, she too will die
whiling away her time alone.
The 'beloved' symbolises his idea of perfection. All the elements
are favourable to him as he sets out in a boat to join her. But as the
boat speeds onward, he realises in his heart that he is doomed never
to meet her — and accepts the fact.
The same stoicism is apparent in one of his last poems 'Tjemara
menderai sampai djauh' (The pines extend to the distance (10): 2 ?
The pines extend to the distance
It seems night is at hand;
Branches about the window collapse
Broken by the muffled wind.
28
Anwar: Debu, 35.
C. Anwar, R. Apin, A. Sani: Tiga Mengnak Takdir (Balai Pustaka, Djakarta
19S8) 17.
27
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
Now I can bear it
— I a m n o longer a child,
But in childhood there was something
I can take no account of now.
Life is but an attempt to defer death
As the loves of schooldays fall further behind us,
And we realise that something must remain unuttered
Until the moment we concede defeat.
The technique of this poem is masterly in its sureness of touch. The
deliberately uneven rhythm and pace paralleling the ragged line of
pines, and the uncertain irregular pattern of life itself, only serve to
highlight the steady, marching pace of the key generalisation: Hidup
hanja menunda kekalahan (life is'but an attempt to defer death). It
is a poem of resignation. Pines characterize the mountainous region of
Puntjak, to the South of Djakarta, and the opening lines then set
the atmosphere: the approaching dank chili of a mountain night, and
by association, the cold of death. The notion of impending dissolution
is crystallized by the collapsing branches about the window. And just
as it takes little to bring them down, so it will take little to dissolve
the poet's life. The poem thus states two truths, calmly accepted: life
can never be crowned with ultimate success, and death is imminent.
At first sight these final attitudes appear to contradict his avowed
ideals. In a letter he exclaims: 'Colonel Jamasaki is embodiment of
my ideals... in his total devotion to his emperor, to his people, his
country . . . in his tremendous capacity for devotion which must include
a fantastic vigour which he will pursue to death itself. Vitalism, Ida!
Vigour, the fire of life. And I see your enquiring look whether this
vitalism really could be transmuted into art. Why not, Ida ? How can
a quality of this sort be dissipated or blotted out.' 2 8 Here, so far from
writing against the Japanese, he finds inspiration in the Japanese total
devotion to the Emperor. Yet, on another occasion he could write:
'During the Japanese occupation we had to act, or at the very least
think and feel keenly on how to fight the atmosphere of that time, so
as to preserve our self-respect.' 2 9 And elsewhere he writes: 'We must
encounter the compensations and complexes within our own selves . . .
compensations and complexes, the huge. and dark store house where
our true self is concealed.' 3 0 Yet, the apparent contradictions need
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 112.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar,
Jassin: Chairil Anwar,
114.
128.
404
not concern us. He was highly mercurial, one day pro-Japanese, another
pro-Dutch, another pro-Republican. And of his violently swinging
enthusiasms, he said himself that vitalism is the primordial chaos
where art originates, and beauty the cosmic order which results when
a particular work of art has achieved its formal expression. 31 In this,
in his exploration of the primal non-ethical energies, fascinated equally
by their horror and delight, he typifies the characteristically modern
writer. 32 These enthusiasms are, to use his own term, the 'chaotisch
voorstadium' of his work, and between them and the ordered cosmos
of a finished poem lies this delving into the huge and dark store house
of compensations and complexes; the relentless scrutiny and disregard
of every taboo, the evaluation, selection, analysis, and rejection.
There remains the question of his alleged plagiarism. It is adduced
that certain of his poems are translations without acknowledgment;
and that others, if not clearly derived from individual poems of such
authors as Marsman, Slauerhoff, and du Perron, have resemblance
of themes with the works of these writers, and occasionally contain
individual lines clearly originating from their work. H. B. Jassin has
very usefully, in a recent publication, put together all those poems
which appear derivative with their alleged Dutch originals. 33
The fundamental question at issue here, of course, is the nature of
originality in a poet. The two most common illustrations to support
the charge of plagiarism are 'Datang Dara, Hilang Dara' (A girl
comes, a girl departs), a rendering of 'A Song of the Sea', and
'Kerawang-Bekasi' (these are two place names) based on Archibald
MacLeish's 'The Young Dead Soldiers'. 34 The relationship of these
two poems to English language originals is undeniable. But equally
undeniable is the subtle transformation Chairil Anwar wrought in his
adaptation. 'Datang Dara, Hilang Dara' — is far more rich musically
than 'A Song of the Sea'. And, more important, whereas 'A Song of
the Sea' is simply a romantic word painting, an evocation of a seashore
6cene, in Chairil's version the girl wandering on the seashore is a
symbol of his own self, daring and transcending the elements, and
even identifying itself with their inner essence, their vitality. This is
apparent in his modification of the phrasing at certain key points, so
31
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 113.
vid. L. Trilling 'On the Modern Element in Modern Literature',
Review ( X X V I I I No. 1) 25.
See note 2.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 94-97, 66-67.
32
33
34
A. H. JOHNS.
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
that, for example, the English 'I am like the tossing of the wild sea'
is rendered: 'Aku, sendiri getaran jang djadikan gelombang' — I
myself am the pulsation (pulsating energy?) that creates the waves.'
Similarly, 'Kerawang-Bekasi' draws on the same material as Archibald
Macleish's 'The Young Dead Soldiers' — but with a highly richened
music and rhythm, and an enhanced phrasing. It is only unfortunate
that the conclusion of the poem which has no counterpart in that of
Macleish, falls so far below the level of the earlier part. If the poems,
allegedly plagiarisms, are strongly individual, this is even more the
case with those poems which only appear to echo a Dutch author at
one point or another. There is no need to dispute the fact that he was
highly eclectic in what happened to strike a chord in his imagination,
or that occasional lines attributable to Dutch poets served as points
of departure for his own work. But in almost every case, wherever he
borrowed, he deepened and transformed.
W. A. Suchting has noted that 'Every significant artist has a
fundamental axis about which his work revolves, a basic perspective
from which, in which, he sees the world and himself.' 3 5 In my view,
Chairil Anwar, so far from being a plagiarist did possess such an axis,
a basic perspective, and that his poems are directly personal and unique.
Moreover, he was brilliantly successful in introducing into Indonesia,
one of the major traditions of 20th century poetry.
Formally, Chairil Anwar applied faithfully the formulae of the
symbolists. In particular, he shows much influence from Dutch writers.
But this is no more a detraction from his merits, than T. S. Eliot's
indebtedness to the French symbolists. And, thus, he cannot be described
as an imitator, because in some ways — writing in Bahasa Indonesia
he is clearly the superior artist, his workmanship being more perfect
than that of his Dutch models. And even where he is not original, his
work has a peculiar distinction which lies, as has been said of Eliot,
in his phrasing. 36
A. H. J O H N S
In 'The Poetry of A. D. H o p e : A Frame of Reference', Meanjin
X X I , pt. 2, 1962, p. 154.
Wilson: Tower, 98.
Dl. 120
'
406
A. H. JOHNS. ,
ORIGINAL TEXTS OF POEMS QUOTED
1.
NISAN
Bukan kematian benar menusuk kalbu
Keridlaanmu menerima segala tiba
Tak kutahu setinggi itu atas debu
dan duka maha tuan bertachta.
2.
DIPO NEGORO
Dimasa pembangunan ini
tuan hidup kembali
Dan bara kagum mendjadi api
Didepan sekali tuan menanti
Tak gentar. La wan banjaknja seratus kali.
Pedang dikanan, keris dikiri
Berselempang semangat jang tak bisa mati.
MADJU
Ini barisan tak bergenderang-berpalu
Kepertjajaan tanda menjerbu
Sekali berarti
Sudah itu mati
3.
KESABARAN
Aku hendak berbitjara
Suaraku hilang, tenagaku terbang
Sudah! Tidak djadi apa-apa:
Ini dunia enggan disapa, ambil perduli
Keras-membeku air kali
Dan hidup bukan hidup lagi.
Kuulangi jang dulu kembali
sambil bertutup telinga, berpitjing mata
Menunggu reda jang musti tiba
KAWANKU DAN AKU
Kami djalan sama. Sudah larut
Menembus kabut.
Hudjan mengutjur badan.
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
Berkakuan kapal-kapal dipelabuhan.
Darahku mengental-pekat. Aku tumpat-pedat.
Siapa berkata?
Kawanku hanja rangka sadja
Karena dera mengelutjak tenaga.
Dia bertanja djatn berapa!
Sudah larut sekali
Hingga hilang segala makna
Dan gerak tak punja arti.
Ah! Hatiku jang tak mau memberi
Mampus kau dikojak-kojak sepi.
DIMESDJID
Kuseru sadja Dia
Sehingga datang djuga
Kamipun bermuka-muka
Seterusnja Ia bernjala-njala dalam dada.
Segala daja memadamkannja
Bersimpah peluh diri jang tak bisa diperkuda.
Ini ruang
Gelanggang kami berperang
Binasa- membinasa
Satu menista lain gila.
DOA
Tuhanku
Dalam termangu
Aku masih menjebut namaMu
Biar susah sungguh
mengingat Kau penuh seluruh
tjajaMu panas sutji
tinggal kerdip lilin dikelam sunji
Tuhanku
aku hilang bentuk
remuk
,
408
A. H. JOHNS.
8.
9.
10.
Tuhanku
aku mengembara dinegeri asing
Tuhanku
dipintuMu aku mengetuk
aku tidak bisa berpaling
kulihat Tubuh mengutjur darah
aku berkatja dalam darah
TJINTAKU DJAUH DIPULAU
Tjintaku djauh dipulau,
gadis manis, sekarang iseng sendiri.
Perahu melantjar, bulan memantjar,
dileher kukalungkan olè-olè buat sipatjar,
angin membantu, laut terang, tapi terasa
aku tidak 'kan sampai padanja.
Diair jang terang, diangin mendaju,
diperasaan penghabisan segala meladju
Adjal bertachta, sambil berkata:
'Tudjukan perahu kepangkuanku sadja.'
Amboi! Djalan sudah bertahun kutempuh!
Perahu jang bersama 'kan merapuh!
Mengapa Adjal memanggil dulu
Sebelum sempat berpeluk dengan tjintaku?!
Manisku djauh dipulau,
kalau 'ku tnati, dia mati iseng sendiri.
Tjemara menderai sampai djauh
Terasa hari djadi akan malam
Ada beberapa dahan ditingkap merapuh
Dipukul angin jang terpendam
Aku sekarang orangnja bisa tahan
Sudah lama bukan kanak lagi
Tapi dulu memang ada suata bahan
Jang bukan dasar perhitungan kini
Hidup hanja menunda kekalahan
Tambah djauh dari tjinta sekolah rendah
Dan tahu, ada jang tetap tidak diutjapkan
Sebelum pada achirnja kita menjerah.
Source: www.kitlv-journals.nl
he relation of a poet to his environment: his acceptance or rejection of the world he lives in, its influence upon him, and his transmutation of his total experience into the images that find their inevitable and fitting shrine in his verse — these are perennial and fruitful questions that demand discussion whenever we are confronted with the work of a true poet. All the more so when the poet in question is one of the creators of a new literary tradition in his country, and his formative years are dominated by events as cataclasmic as the Japanesé conquest of the Dutch East Indies in 1941-42, and the sub-sequent struggle for Indonesian independence. Chairil Anwar was born in Medan in 1922 and died in Djakarta in 1949. His formal education extended only as far as the first two years of Junior High School, after which family difficulties caused him to leave home for Djakarta in 1940 — at the age of 18. Very little is known of his life in Djakarta until the Japanesé occupation, when he became recognised as a poet among the circle of Indonesian intellectuals.
Only a modicum of his poetry was published before the Japanesé
surrender, but after the war his reputation soared: he was regarded
as the creator of a new Indonesian poetry who jealously preserved his
artistic integrity during the Japanesé occupation, and after the war was
a burning patriot.
These, broadly speaking, are the terms in which many Indonesian
and foreign writers see him. Not that he has received only praise. For
a period, at least, it became the fashion to debunk him as a plagiarist.
And writers associating themselves with the left-wing cultural asso-
ciation Lekra have, on political grounds, uttered severe strictures on
his work on the grounds of his existentialist morality, and his cosmo-
politan a-political outlook.1
Neither of these views, however, contributes much to an appreciation
of Chairil Anwar as a poet, or to an understanding of his poetry as
poetry. A direct access to his work has, likewise, been impeded by
the popular image he created for himself. It is no exaggeration to say
So Virga Belan in Suluh Indonesia 17/4/63.
394
that many writers who have directed their attention to him have been
so obsessed by his personality that they have never come to grips with
his poetry in its own terms.
Now, a personality he certainly was. Irregular, arrogant, eccentric,
burnt up with an obsessional vitality, he plunged himself into every
conceivable type of experience. He had no more and no less respect
for the President than for a pedicab driver. He regarded the norms
of social life as perpetuated and sustained by hypocrisy, and virtually
destroyed himself rather than accept them. Thus, he devoted himself
to art; and to be an artist he struggled to emancipate himself from the
claims of family, religion and country, leading a characteristically
Bohemian existence. But if his irregular life was partly a matter of
principle — in the manner of Rimbaud — it was also in part a persona,
a mask to conceal his real self which he revealed only in his poems.
Chairil Anwar began to write when a whole edifice of social behaviour
was brought crashing down in ruins — when existing standards
appeared to have lost their application and validity, and concepts of
value associated with religion, morality, and the rule of law no longer
had any meaning. The poor starved to death unpitied, the Dutch were
expropriated, and all were subject to naked force which was the
supreme law.
This chaos which surrounded him is important for any understanding
of his personality, but it should not give the impression that there was
anything frenetic or expletive about his verse, still less that it was in
any way extemporaneous in character. Chairil's two guiding stars were
life and art, to which, however, he attributed a purely existential
significance. And he wrote giving expression to a kaleidoscope of moods
provoked by the world he lived in. His subject was above all his' own
self: his doubts, despairs, nostalgias; what he was, in what he could
find relief — all scrutinised and set down with an inexorable honesty
and correspondingly steel-like discipline in his technique.
His poetry then is an interior poetry: and this, together with his
concern with technique which led him to continual revisions of his
work, are the two most important facts about his as a poet. His concern
with technique was rational, not intuitive. In a letter he wrote: 'As an
artist, Ida, I must be penetrating and decisive in evaluating and
deciding. Listen!! After Beethoven's death, his note-books were dis-
cover ed filled with jottings, the groundwork and preparation for his
great melodies. His fifth and ninth symphonies did not appear ready
made. He had to work for years before such a work was ripe for the
A. H. JOHNS.
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
plucking. The composition ofhis M i s s a S o l e m n i s took more
than five years . . . So if I write without putting a total effort into my
work, I may degenerate into an itnprovisor.' 2
The same concern is evident in the selections he translated from
the letters of R. M. Rilke, chosen, undoubtedly, because they expressed
the ideas closest to his heart. The following words from a letter from
Rilke to Lou Andreas-Salomé might well have been his own: 'It is not
form that I must learn from him, but the profound concentration
necessary to create form. I must learn to work, Lou — this is my
weakness.' 3
It is usually claimed that Chairil Anwar was influenced principally
by the Dutch expressionists Marsman and Slauerhoff, and that, using
them as his models, he introduced Expressionism into Indonesian
poetry. This affiliation, however, appears too narrow and provincial.
His creation of an interior universe, and his dedication to technical
perfection, in fact, mark him as an heir to the great movement in
modern poetry inaugurated by the French symbolists. It is only neces-
sary to read Valery's aphorism, 'a poem is an intricate intellectual
problem, a struggle with self-imposed conditions — it is, above all,
something constructed', and his favourite simile: 'a poem is like a
heavy weight which the poet has carried to the roof bit by bit — the
reader is the passer-by upon whom the weight is dropped all at once,
and who consequently receives from it in a moment, an overwhelming
impression, a complete aesthetic effect, such as the poet has never
known in composing it.', 4 and compare them with Chairil's attitudes
to his art, to realize that we are in the same intellectual world.
Chairil Anwar's poetry then is a revelation of his inner self, his
moods and attitudes; his poems, accordingly, are not objective com-
ments on the external world, although they may be provoked by it;
and in the symbolist manner, the content of his poetry, and the
components of his images only becomes invested with their full meaning
when they are interpreted as symbols of his own moods and attitudes.
He tells us as much in 'Rumahku' (My House), which may be sum-
marized: 'My house, where I live, take my wife, have my children,
is of poetry; it is so transparent that from without all the intimacies
H. B. Jassin: Chairil Anwar, Pelopor Angkatan '45 (Gunung Agung, Djakarta
1956) 110. Chairil Anwar's prose is terse and concentrated. The renderings
given here are paraphrases.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 132.
E. Wilson, Axel's Castle (Charles Scribner's Sons, New York 1947) 80.
396
of my heart and mind are manifest.' 5 The poem is based on 'Woning-
looze' (Homeless), by Slauerhoff. But it is also significant to note a
sentence occurring in another letter of Rilke that he translated: 'I find,
stored within the poems that have become part of me more truth than
is to be found in (personal) relations and friendships.'
His first published poem is probably 'Nisan' (An Epitaph) (1):
A. H. JOHNS.
It is not [your] death which moves me,
But your resignation to all that befell;
I had not realised how high above dust
And sorrow, nobly you reign.6
The significance of the poem is not immediately clear, nor the focal
point of Chairil's personal involvement; and the syntactic patterns of
the original, since the form is almost that of a traditional quatrain, are
not easily definable. I understand the theme as the gulf between
generations; and the cause of Chairil's grief is not so much the loss
of the grandmother, but the loss of that sense of acceptance (keridlaan)
she epitomized, which could make life bearable.
If such is the case, then this first poem sets the stage for all that is
to follow. Chairil's world is a broken world. He recognises this and
accepts the fact (though not perhaps without a backward glance of
regret): better a broken world in which no values are sure, than a
whole one, sustained by hypocrisy.
Consistency in this attitude does not make for peace of mind: despair
awaits round every corner. And in a poem written only two months
later, he exclaims: 'The happiness granted us is a mere trifle, worth
neither treasuring nor nurturing.' 7 Not only despair, but even revulsion,
as in the poem '1943', where Chairil looks on a small child, apparently
in perfect health, but already infected beyond redemption by the
putrescence filling its lungs from the first breath of life.8
Sometimes, indeed, we find a poem flaming with self-confidence and
vitality, the vitalism that he wished to infuse into art; but these are
comparatively rare. Among them is 'Diponegoro'. Diponegoro was the
messianic leader of the Java War 1826-30 — a Mahdi type figure, a
revolutionary who in the popular Javanese imagination and tradition
5
Anwar: Kerikil Tadjam dan Jang Terampas Dan Jan Putus (Pustaka Rakjat,
Djakarta, no date) 24.
Anwar: Kerikil, 5. Numerals between brackets refer to the original text infra.
Anwar: Kerikil, 6.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 41.
6
7
8
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
would sweep away injustice, and create a new Heaven and a new
Earth (2):
At this time of reawakening
You live again
The startled embers burst into flame
In the forefront you stand
Unflinching, facing foes a hundredfold.
Swords at the right, spears at the left
Kindled with a spirit that cannot know death
FORWARD
Your rank [marches] without beat of drum
Conviction is the signal for attack
Once to be meaningful
And after that death.9
This was one of the few poems of real poetic calibre to pass the
Japanese censor, but it is to be doubted whether the Japanese censor
and Chairil understood it in the same way. To the Japanese, doubtless,
it suggested that total devotion to the cause and disregard for death
that characterises the true warrior. His Indonesian colleagues probably
understood it as the struggle for political freedom. But is it not equally
likely that the whole setting of the poem is within Chairil's mind, and
that Diponegoro is a symbol for Chairil's determination to burst into
the freedom of anarchy, even if it costs him his life. This is clearly the
case with 'Aku' (My Self),10 in which he describes himself as a wild
beast, rejected by his peers. True, he wants to live a thousand years,
but in his own way, fighting to tear down the props of hypocrisy that
shore up the rotten fagade of daily life and exulting in his own lack
of involvement in them.
A different mood, but also of revolt, is to be found in 'Kepada
Kawan' (To a Fellow Spirit), 11 a poem of carpe diem: Death, in seizing
us will destroy himself — therefore, let us take the glass of life, and
empty it at one gulp. Choose the wildest stallion and spur it onward,
tethering it to neither day nor night. Destroy all you have made, and
vanish leaving neither relative nor estate, asking pardon of none, taking
leave of none! Then, when Death comes, he will find his prey has fled.
Anwar: Kerikil, 7.
C. Anwar: Deru Tjampur Debu (Pembangunan, Djakarta 1957) 7.
Anwar: Debu, 18.
398
Perhaps only two of his poems could be called happy. One is
'Adjakan' (An Invitation) 12 a poem purely lyrical; a recall to the
time of childhood, to years full of happiness and the innocent friendship
of girl and boy. When the worst misfortune was to be caught in a
shower of rain — and what of it? In a moment they would be dry
again. The other is 'Taman' (A Garden), 13 almost a romantic 'escape'
poem. His desire: a garden for an 'I' and a 'Thou'. Small, one could
not lose the other in it; simple, without myriads of flowers or a plushy
sward; tiny, but filled with sunlight — a place to withdraw from the
world and mankind.
There are, however, two major personal themes that run through
his poetry: one is a sense of oppressive loneliness, a despair of attaining
any kind of communication between man and man; the other, a religious
sense that amounts almost to an obsession.
Among the poems of the first group, several communicate the
oppressive horror of a nightmare. One such is 'Kesabaran' (Patience),
written in 1943. 14 The poet lies awake at night, and hears, confusedly
in the distance, human conversation and the howling of dogs — dogs..
human beings, what does it matter, all are the same in the darkness
that has descended upon him like a wall of stone: he is completely
isolated (3):
A. H. JOHNS.
I wish to speak
My voice is lost, my strength fled —
Let it be! It is of no consequence —
The world does not care to be addressed,
or to pay heed.
The river has frozen hard
And life is life no longer.
I try to revive the past again . . .
Close tight my ears, close tight my eyes
Awaiting the resolution that must come.
And to me at least, the poet is saying: I am totally isolated, and can
communicate with no-one. The past is beyond my reach, my earlier
vision gone for ever. Death will bring release. 15
'Sendiri' (Alone) 1 6 is anothef of these poems of phantasmagoric
12
Anwar: Kerikil, 20.
13
Anwar: Kerikil, 15.
Anwar: Kerikil, 19.
The 'resolution' (reda) in the final line of this poem is popularly understood
as referring to the end of the Japanese occupation. This, in my view, is
doubtful. Such direct, special pleading is out of character for the poet.
Anwar: Kerikil, 11.
14
15
16
CHAIRIL ANWAR: AN INTERPRETATION.
loneliness, in which the solitude of his room holds him by the throat,
and danger lurks in every corner. The horror is only resolved when
he breaks into tears, crying out 'Mother! Mother!'
'Kawanku dan Aku' (My Self and a Companion) " Hkewise expresses
the futility of any attempt at communication (4):
We are both wanderers, overtakén by night
Struggling on through darkness
And drenched by the rain.
The boats stiffen in the harbour,
My blood congeals. I am dense, compact.
Did anyone speak?
My companion is a skeleton.
His vigour enfeebled by blows
He asked: What time is it ?
It is very late:
Meaning is lost in latency
And movement has no sense.
The poet is not describing an actual walk at night. The darkness
is in his mind, and the ships, stiff, motionless, dimly visible through
the pouring rain suggest a parallel to the sluggish flow of his congealing
blood as he feels the numbness of isolation. His companion can only
utter words as meaningless and banal as: What time is it? And the
poet comments bitterly: Whatever time it is, it is too late; nothing
has any value.
Even sexüal relationships are unable to transcend this isolation.
'Sia-sia' (Futility),i8 for example, illustrates Chairil's incapacity to
yield to love, and his fury with himself for this incapacity. A girl
brings flowers to her beloved, and lays them at his feet. But all day
long the couple can only sit facing each other, each unable to make
the first move. And Chairil exclaims in disgust (5):
Ah! My heart, which will not yield,
Die, devastated by loneliness.
'Orang berdua' (A Couple) 19 has the same tenor. The room in which
Anwar: Kerikil, 25.
Anwar: Kerikil, 9.
Anwar: Debu, 9.
400
they find themselves is their last refuge in a boundless night. Together
they reach out for a black raft (presumably, sexual union) not knowing
whether on it they will be cast up onto the shore or sncked down into
the whirlpool; uncertain whether they are truly in each other's em-
brace — achieving a full communication — or whether still pursuing
an illusion.
This theme is expressed more starkly in Tuntjak' (name of a
mountain resort). 20 After a night of naked embrace with a mistress,
high in the hills, far from the frenzied disturbance of the town, the
poet discovers that the thick morning mist resting on the green pines,
and the sound of the clear stream rippling among them, only proffer
again the same unresolved question: what is love, what is communication ?
His concern with religion should not be understood in a confessional
sense. To me, it seems that he was profoundly religious in a tempera-
ment, and that he found it far more difficult to divest himself of a
religious faith than to find one. His attitude to formal religion was
naturally determined by his total rejection of every form of social
organisation as irremediably corrupt, and he has no use for it. In the
poem 'Aku' (My Self — not to be confused with the other poem I
referred to earlier) 2 1 he declares: 'I keep at a distance teachers of
religion with their javelin words.' In 'Di Mesdjid' (At the Mosque) 2 2
he depicts his attempt to wrestle with God, and defeat Him (6):
A. H. JOHNS.
I call upon Him
Until at length He comes
We are face to face
He bursts into flame within my breast
With all my strength I strive to extinguish Him
My self, rejecting [His] yoke,
Is drenched in sweat
This hall (i.e. the Mosque)
Is our place of struggle
Bent on mutual destruction
The one contemptuous, the other mad.
Three of his poems, however, are remarkable testaments to a
religious faith. In 'Doa' (A Prayer) 2 3 he exclaims (7):
20
Anwar:
Anwar:
Anwar:
Anwar:
Kerikü, 50.
Kerikil, 27.
Kerikil, 26.
Debu, 14.
21
22
23
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
My Lord,
When overcast by thought
Still I utter your name
Even in bitter sorrow,
At the thought of you, all is filled
With your light, pure and burning
Now a flickering candle in silent darkness
My Lord
I face dissolution
and collapse.
My Lord
I wander in a strange land
My Lord
At your door I knock,
I cannot turn away.
Equally striking is the poem 'Isa' (Jesus), 24 very similar in style to
'Doa' and virtually a meditation on the crucifixion. He looks upon the
broken bleeding body of Christ, and is confronted by the question:
Am I guilty ? (8):
I see the body, bleeding,
In the blood, I see myself.
However, each of the poems has a sub-title. 'Doa' is dedicated to a
firm Believer, and 'Isa' to a true Christian. It is as though — deeply
feit as the poems are — Chairil did not wish the sentiments expressed
in them to be attributed to himself — rather they were for someone
else. A third religious poem is 'Kepada Peminta-minta' (To a Beggar). 25
This is based very closely on a Dutch poem by William Elschot of the
same title. The poet is confronted with the hideous pock-marked face
of a beggar, dripping with pus, which pursues him incessantly and
haunts even his dreams. The inspiration of the poem is the Gospel
story of Dives and Lazarus, and the beggar clearly is the accusing
finger of conscience, ordering the poet to throw himself laden with
sin, at God's feet.
Chairil Anwar had only six years of life as a poet. The themes and
A n w a r : Debu, 13.
A n w a r : Keriki, 36.
402
attitudes I have outlined are broadly representative of his work, but
not exhaustive. And it should not be imagined that Chairil was
necessarily consistent in any of his attitudes, or that the poems I have
discussed bear only one interpretation.
Some of his later poems, while not departing from his earlier con-
cerns, lack the nightmarish oppression of his earlier work, and are
marked by a tranquil acceptance of his fate — the realisation that
his ideals are never to be achieved. A poem in this vein is 'Tjintaku
djauh dipulau' (My Beloved is afar off, on an Island (9): 2 6
A. H. JOHNS.
My beloved is afar off, on an island
A sweet girl
Whiling away her time alone.
My boat surges onward, the moon radiates light,
and round my neck hangs a garland for my darling;
the wind is with me, the sea bright and yet I feel
that I shall never reach her.
For in the clear water, in the sighing wind
in the sense of all things fleeting to their close
Death sits in majesty and declares:
Direct your barque to my embrace.
Alas, so many years have I travelled
in the boat doomed to dissolution with me!
Why is it that Death should call
Before my beloved reclines in my embrace.
My sweet one is afar off, on an island;
myself dead, she too will die
whiling away her time alone.
The 'beloved' symbolises his idea of perfection. All the elements
are favourable to him as he sets out in a boat to join her. But as the
boat speeds onward, he realises in his heart that he is doomed never
to meet her — and accepts the fact.
The same stoicism is apparent in one of his last poems 'Tjemara
menderai sampai djauh' (The pines extend to the distance (10): 2 ?
The pines extend to the distance
It seems night is at hand;
Branches about the window collapse
Broken by the muffled wind.
28
Anwar: Debu, 35.
C. Anwar, R. Apin, A. Sani: Tiga Mengnak Takdir (Balai Pustaka, Djakarta
19S8) 17.
27
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
Now I can bear it
— I a m n o longer a child,
But in childhood there was something
I can take no account of now.
Life is but an attempt to defer death
As the loves of schooldays fall further behind us,
And we realise that something must remain unuttered
Until the moment we concede defeat.
The technique of this poem is masterly in its sureness of touch. The
deliberately uneven rhythm and pace paralleling the ragged line of
pines, and the uncertain irregular pattern of life itself, only serve to
highlight the steady, marching pace of the key generalisation: Hidup
hanja menunda kekalahan (life is'but an attempt to defer death). It
is a poem of resignation. Pines characterize the mountainous region of
Puntjak, to the South of Djakarta, and the opening lines then set
the atmosphere: the approaching dank chili of a mountain night, and
by association, the cold of death. The notion of impending dissolution
is crystallized by the collapsing branches about the window. And just
as it takes little to bring them down, so it will take little to dissolve
the poet's life. The poem thus states two truths, calmly accepted: life
can never be crowned with ultimate success, and death is imminent.
At first sight these final attitudes appear to contradict his avowed
ideals. In a letter he exclaims: 'Colonel Jamasaki is embodiment of
my ideals... in his total devotion to his emperor, to his people, his
country . . . in his tremendous capacity for devotion which must include
a fantastic vigour which he will pursue to death itself. Vitalism, Ida!
Vigour, the fire of life. And I see your enquiring look whether this
vitalism really could be transmuted into art. Why not, Ida ? How can
a quality of this sort be dissipated or blotted out.' 2 8 Here, so far from
writing against the Japanese, he finds inspiration in the Japanese total
devotion to the Emperor. Yet, on another occasion he could write:
'During the Japanese occupation we had to act, or at the very least
think and feel keenly on how to fight the atmosphere of that time, so
as to preserve our self-respect.' 2 9 And elsewhere he writes: 'We must
encounter the compensations and complexes within our own selves . . .
compensations and complexes, the huge. and dark store house where
our true self is concealed.' 3 0 Yet, the apparent contradictions need
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 112.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar,
Jassin: Chairil Anwar,
114.
128.
404
not concern us. He was highly mercurial, one day pro-Japanese, another
pro-Dutch, another pro-Republican. And of his violently swinging
enthusiasms, he said himself that vitalism is the primordial chaos
where art originates, and beauty the cosmic order which results when
a particular work of art has achieved its formal expression. 31 In this,
in his exploration of the primal non-ethical energies, fascinated equally
by their horror and delight, he typifies the characteristically modern
writer. 32 These enthusiasms are, to use his own term, the 'chaotisch
voorstadium' of his work, and between them and the ordered cosmos
of a finished poem lies this delving into the huge and dark store house
of compensations and complexes; the relentless scrutiny and disregard
of every taboo, the evaluation, selection, analysis, and rejection.
There remains the question of his alleged plagiarism. It is adduced
that certain of his poems are translations without acknowledgment;
and that others, if not clearly derived from individual poems of such
authors as Marsman, Slauerhoff, and du Perron, have resemblance
of themes with the works of these writers, and occasionally contain
individual lines clearly originating from their work. H. B. Jassin has
very usefully, in a recent publication, put together all those poems
which appear derivative with their alleged Dutch originals. 33
The fundamental question at issue here, of course, is the nature of
originality in a poet. The two most common illustrations to support
the charge of plagiarism are 'Datang Dara, Hilang Dara' (A girl
comes, a girl departs), a rendering of 'A Song of the Sea', and
'Kerawang-Bekasi' (these are two place names) based on Archibald
MacLeish's 'The Young Dead Soldiers'. 34 The relationship of these
two poems to English language originals is undeniable. But equally
undeniable is the subtle transformation Chairil Anwar wrought in his
adaptation. 'Datang Dara, Hilang Dara' — is far more rich musically
than 'A Song of the Sea'. And, more important, whereas 'A Song of
the Sea' is simply a romantic word painting, an evocation of a seashore
6cene, in Chairil's version the girl wandering on the seashore is a
symbol of his own self, daring and transcending the elements, and
even identifying itself with their inner essence, their vitality. This is
apparent in his modification of the phrasing at certain key points, so
31
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 113.
vid. L. Trilling 'On the Modern Element in Modern Literature',
Review ( X X V I I I No. 1) 25.
See note 2.
Jassin: Chairil Anwar, 94-97, 66-67.
32
33
34
A. H. JOHNS.
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
that, for example, the English 'I am like the tossing of the wild sea'
is rendered: 'Aku, sendiri getaran jang djadikan gelombang' — I
myself am the pulsation (pulsating energy?) that creates the waves.'
Similarly, 'Kerawang-Bekasi' draws on the same material as Archibald
Macleish's 'The Young Dead Soldiers' — but with a highly richened
music and rhythm, and an enhanced phrasing. It is only unfortunate
that the conclusion of the poem which has no counterpart in that of
Macleish, falls so far below the level of the earlier part. If the poems,
allegedly plagiarisms, are strongly individual, this is even more the
case with those poems which only appear to echo a Dutch author at
one point or another. There is no need to dispute the fact that he was
highly eclectic in what happened to strike a chord in his imagination,
or that occasional lines attributable to Dutch poets served as points
of departure for his own work. But in almost every case, wherever he
borrowed, he deepened and transformed.
W. A. Suchting has noted that 'Every significant artist has a
fundamental axis about which his work revolves, a basic perspective
from which, in which, he sees the world and himself.' 3 5 In my view,
Chairil Anwar, so far from being a plagiarist did possess such an axis,
a basic perspective, and that his poems are directly personal and unique.
Moreover, he was brilliantly successful in introducing into Indonesia,
one of the major traditions of 20th century poetry.
Formally, Chairil Anwar applied faithfully the formulae of the
symbolists. In particular, he shows much influence from Dutch writers.
But this is no more a detraction from his merits, than T. S. Eliot's
indebtedness to the French symbolists. And, thus, he cannot be described
as an imitator, because in some ways — writing in Bahasa Indonesia
he is clearly the superior artist, his workmanship being more perfect
than that of his Dutch models. And even where he is not original, his
work has a peculiar distinction which lies, as has been said of Eliot,
in his phrasing. 36
A. H. J O H N S
In 'The Poetry of A. D. H o p e : A Frame of Reference', Meanjin
X X I , pt. 2, 1962, p. 154.
Wilson: Tower, 98.
Dl. 120
'
406
A. H. JOHNS. ,
ORIGINAL TEXTS OF POEMS QUOTED
1.
NISAN
Bukan kematian benar menusuk kalbu
Keridlaanmu menerima segala tiba
Tak kutahu setinggi itu atas debu
dan duka maha tuan bertachta.
2.
DIPO NEGORO
Dimasa pembangunan ini
tuan hidup kembali
Dan bara kagum mendjadi api
Didepan sekali tuan menanti
Tak gentar. La wan banjaknja seratus kali.
Pedang dikanan, keris dikiri
Berselempang semangat jang tak bisa mati.
MADJU
Ini barisan tak bergenderang-berpalu
Kepertjajaan tanda menjerbu
Sekali berarti
Sudah itu mati
3.
KESABARAN
Aku hendak berbitjara
Suaraku hilang, tenagaku terbang
Sudah! Tidak djadi apa-apa:
Ini dunia enggan disapa, ambil perduli
Keras-membeku air kali
Dan hidup bukan hidup lagi.
Kuulangi jang dulu kembali
sambil bertutup telinga, berpitjing mata
Menunggu reda jang musti tiba
KAWANKU DAN AKU
Kami djalan sama. Sudah larut
Menembus kabut.
Hudjan mengutjur badan.
CHAIRIL ANWAR : AN INTERPRETATION.
Berkakuan kapal-kapal dipelabuhan.
Darahku mengental-pekat. Aku tumpat-pedat.
Siapa berkata?
Kawanku hanja rangka sadja
Karena dera mengelutjak tenaga.
Dia bertanja djatn berapa!
Sudah larut sekali
Hingga hilang segala makna
Dan gerak tak punja arti.
Ah! Hatiku jang tak mau memberi
Mampus kau dikojak-kojak sepi.
DIMESDJID
Kuseru sadja Dia
Sehingga datang djuga
Kamipun bermuka-muka
Seterusnja Ia bernjala-njala dalam dada.
Segala daja memadamkannja
Bersimpah peluh diri jang tak bisa diperkuda.
Ini ruang
Gelanggang kami berperang
Binasa- membinasa
Satu menista lain gila.
DOA
Tuhanku
Dalam termangu
Aku masih menjebut namaMu
Biar susah sungguh
mengingat Kau penuh seluruh
tjajaMu panas sutji
tinggal kerdip lilin dikelam sunji
Tuhanku
aku hilang bentuk
remuk
,
408
A. H. JOHNS.
8.
9.
10.
Tuhanku
aku mengembara dinegeri asing
Tuhanku
dipintuMu aku mengetuk
aku tidak bisa berpaling
kulihat Tubuh mengutjur darah
aku berkatja dalam darah
TJINTAKU DJAUH DIPULAU
Tjintaku djauh dipulau,
gadis manis, sekarang iseng sendiri.
Perahu melantjar, bulan memantjar,
dileher kukalungkan olè-olè buat sipatjar,
angin membantu, laut terang, tapi terasa
aku tidak 'kan sampai padanja.
Diair jang terang, diangin mendaju,
diperasaan penghabisan segala meladju
Adjal bertachta, sambil berkata:
'Tudjukan perahu kepangkuanku sadja.'
Amboi! Djalan sudah bertahun kutempuh!
Perahu jang bersama 'kan merapuh!
Mengapa Adjal memanggil dulu
Sebelum sempat berpeluk dengan tjintaku?!
Manisku djauh dipulau,
kalau 'ku tnati, dia mati iseng sendiri.
Tjemara menderai sampai djauh
Terasa hari djadi akan malam
Ada beberapa dahan ditingkap merapuh
Dipukul angin jang terpendam
Aku sekarang orangnja bisa tahan
Sudah lama bukan kanak lagi
Tapi dulu memang ada suata bahan
Jang bukan dasar perhitungan kini
Hidup hanja menunda kekalahan
Tambah djauh dari tjinta sekolah rendah
Dan tahu, ada jang tetap tidak diutjapkan
Sebelum pada achirnja kita menjerah.
Source: www.kitlv-journals.nl
