Indonesian-Germany poem night breaks down barriers

Indonesian-Germany poem night breaks down barriers

By Kafil Yamin

BANDUNG (JP): Words often unintentionally become chains of a
poems' soul. Only poets gifted with extraordinary strength of
spirit are capable of breaking through the bars of words.

Such an obstacle is more obvious when someone attempts to
translate a poem into another language. Poet and editor Goenawan
Mohamad was well aware of this when, upon being awarded the
Netherlands literary award in Amsterdam a few years ago, he said:
"Words should be freed from dictionary definition."

This suggestion does not sound easy to follow, but an
Indonesia-Germany collaboration in philology and literature
deserves a special salute for its success in breaking the chains.

An Indonesian-German poem night, held at the Bandung Goethe
Institute on Aug. 22, could be the showcase of an irresistible
quest of poets. It was earlier held at the Taman Ismail Marzuki
arts center in Jakarta on Aug. 20.

Poets are united by intellectual exploration as well as a
yearning for human ideals. When it comes to this, geographic and
ideological demarcations do not matter, as the German poet Johann
Wolfgang von Goethe put it: Those who know themselves/and know
others/will surely be aware/that East and West is no longer
separable/It is worthwhile to proceed in between/to wander
between East and West/to reach the glorious end.

Berthold Damshuser, an Indonesian literary expert at Bonn
University, managed to penetrate the language barrier when he
performed the late Chairil Anwar's Aku (I) in German.

In a baritone and with total comprehension, Damshuser seemed
to be bursting with the expression of his own ego and of the
German's state of mind through the lines of Chairil, among the
most revered poets here: Carrying forward my wounds and my
pain/running/Until suffering disappears/And I won't care
anymore/I want to live a thousand years more.

The attempted reincarnation of Chairil Anwar's Aku in the
German state of mind was made possible by the background music of
Peter Habermehl, a composer in Dortmund.

The combination of synthetic sounds and Damshuser's spirited
baritone overwhelmed the audience.

With only an electric guitar, Habermehl produced various
sounds that seemed attached to every phrase Damshuser uttered.
The various sounds were wrapped up in perfect harmony. "I did not
compose the music," Habermehl said after the performance. "I just
let my senses, fingers, breathe work on their own. I just let
them be part of greater motion around me."

Alienated

Habermehl's keyword in his music concept is "to stop the
process of thinking" -- ignore your being. Then be sensitive. Let
your hands, feet, breathe and tongue lead you to play an
orchestra, he says.

Habermehl says he is not sure about what his music should be
called. But once he came across the term "musique automatique" in
a music dictionary. And from then on that is what he called his
music.

Damshuser's total comprehension of poems should then be
attributed to Habermehl's music. "When I performed Aku, the music
flowed in a soft, tender and strange manner. It created a sense
of being alienated and lonely, a circumstance which would
normally be felt by a wild beast, as Chairil personified
himself." He was referring to Chairil's famous lines: Here I am,
a wild beast/driven out of the herd (Aku ini binatang jalang/dari
kumpulannya terbuang.)

"Musique automatique", then, is a reliable, sensual and
intellectual device of literary works, as experienced by Hamid
Jabbar, another performer at the Indonesia-Germany poetry night.

"The other day I performed a poem expressing democracy and
freedom. The Indonesian music group accompanying the performance
produced songs of praises to God -- an expression of yearning. It
implied that for us (Indonesians) freedom and democracy is
something far away," Hamid said.

"But when you listen to Habermehl's music accompanying
Democratie, Mathias Schreiber's poem, which is strong, clear and
assertive, you feel that democracy is something real, something
that already exists."

However, Damshuser differs in opinion: "It maybe true that
Indonesia has yet to have democracy and German has. But what we
have is not the democracy we want," he said.

He pointed out that he felt that democracy in Germany favored
the wealthy. He shared the poem Democratie in Indonesian. A loose
translation reads: I want it/you want it/he wants it/what we want
becomes reality/but what becomes reality/is not wanted by any of
us.

Hamid's masterful skill of bringing forward Indonesia's state
of mind in German poems equally deserves credit. He was good at
performing Helmut Heissenbuettel's poem So What, as if he was
representing Indonesians' disbelief of politicians and religious
figures:

Honest people are in fact corrupt/good people are in fact big
boasters/vitality is in fact impotency/holiness is in fact
excessive lust/morality is narrow-mindedness .../justice is in
fact cruelty .../to be corrupt honestly or to be honest
corruptly ...

Hamid also read out an Indonesian version of a poem written by
Max Dauthendy during his stay in Garut, West Java, in 1915.
Titled Unter dem grossen Waringinbaum (Under the large banyan
tree), some of the lines go:

In a mosque enlightened by lamps/not far from the banyan's
gloomy branches/pillars stand/made as though of snow/the imam's
voice echoes between the kneeling congregation.

Collection

Another work of Dauthendey's tells of how in Garut he met God:
You teach us to see far above routine/You teach us to trust
eternity.

The breaking down of barriers between poets of different
languages was not limited to the poetry reading nights.

The Indonesia-Germany Commission, established on Sept. 27 in
Jakarta, has published a collection of Indonesian poems in German
titled Gebt mir Indonesien Zuruck, taken from a creation of noted
poet Taufik Ismail, Kembalikan Indonesia padaku (Give Indonesia
back to me). It was edited by Damshuser and poet Ramadhan K.H.,
and a CD version was issued last year.

The collection includes poems of Chairil Anwar, Trisno
Sumardjo, Sapardi Djokodamono, Abdul Hadi W.M., Toto Sudarto
Bachtiar, Ajip Rosidi, Wing Karjo, Goenawan Mohamad, Sutardji
Chalzoum Bachri, W.S. Rendra, Taufiq Ismail and Darmanto Jatman.

Indeed, the Indonesian literary community is greatly indebted
to Damshuser and Habermehl. Their collaboration has introduced
Indonesian poems in Europe. Damshuser tirelessly traveled
European cities to read out Indonesian poems, equipped with
Habermehl's poetical music.