Chairil Anwar

Forty seven years ago tomorrow, a great poet untimely departed this world, leaving a treasure of poetic works as a national heirloom. He was undoubtedly a great and prolific poet whose works were a phenomenon in modern Indonesian literature.

Poeta nascitur, non fit, said the ancient Romans, a poet is born, not made. No wonder no one can teach how to compose a poem. This is why anyone can interpret a modern poem their own way, and why general readers find it difficult to appreciate them. No one, for instance, can exactly tell what Anwar wanted to convey in his piece Aku, the poet's most often quoted poem.

The poem I like most is probably 'Cerita buat Dien Tamaela' (A story for DT). It tells of the havoc wizards can cause people, animals and plants. There is a magical as well as sensual aura in the words.

I have unfortunately read only a few of his poems, mostly during my high school days in the early 1950s. Strikingly, the poems illustrate a total lack of reference to, or concern for, what was happening around the poet. It seems the great poet was completely absorbed in his personal musing.

During the Japanese occupation in the early 1940s, misery, poverty and hunger were daily sights in Indonesian towns and cities, including Jakarta, where Anwar lived. After independence was proclaimed, he witnessed the hustle of the "alert period" when Republican leaders and youths prepared for the return of colonial forces.

These two turbulent periods are unfortunately not portrayed in most of his poems. Only two poems can be considered to represent the two periods, 'Kepada Peminta-minta' (to a beggar) and 'Kerawang- Bekasi' (two towns east of Jakarta where colonial forces battles freedom fighters in the 1940s). These two poems, however, are paraphrased from two English poems.

I don't accuse the poet of lacking patriotism, but wonder why he did not trouble to record the events of the period. There is no epoch-marking poems in his works, they are timeless.

Some argue that poetry should keep away from politics and ideology, lest it sink into cheap propaganda.

The works of 1940s composer Ismail Marzuki, though, convey patriotism without losing artistic beauty. The lyrics and music exude romance as well as the heroic feelings of the years of struggle for independence.

The post-Chairil Anwar period has produced many poets, but only a few were alert enough to write epoch-marking poems and register the turbulent year of 1966. Poets are indeed born, and great poets often grow by braving conformism.

SOEGIO SOSROSOEMARTO

Jakarta