Traditional Malay Literature
Traditional Malay literature one of the major literatures of Southeast Asia, which combined ethnic and inter-ethnic functions, represents an important part of the cultural heritage of the peoples of Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, and Singapore. In its multifarious aspects and manifestations this heritage continues to influence and inspire the literary process in all these countries. In recent decades, thanks to the efforts of a number of scholars, first and foremost European, Malaysian, Indonesian, and Australian, knowledge of traditional Malay literature has broadened and deepened considerably.
By VLADIMIR I. BRAGINSKY
Many new publications of traditional works and new stimulating studies of a general and a particular nature, including those devoted to its literary history, have appeared. Be that as it may, ever since the well-known History of Classical Malay Literature by R. Winstedt first published in 1939, after that only slightly revised and by now very much antiquated both in the facts it contains and in its theoretical background no other comprehensive history of traditional Malay literature, written in any European language, has seen the light of day. It is to fill in this gap that is the task of the project 'The Heritage of Traditional Malay Literature'.The project is designed to meet the needs of both scholarship and education. As it has been carried out by Prof. V. Braginsky (SOAS) the organizer and the author of the bulk of the book Dr N. Phillips (SOAS) and Dr G. Koster (Universiti Sains, Malaysia), financed jointly by the British Academy and the IIAS, and planned to be published by KITLV Press, it therefore represents the result of British-Dutch co-operation.
The project includes a description of the oral traditional literature of the Malays, a reconstruction of Old Malay literature (7th14th c.), a detailed analysis of the early Islamic (14th-16th) and the classical (16th19th c.) periods of the literary evolution, as well as a study of the principal changes characteristic of the early stage of the transition to modern literature.
The history of traditional Malay literature is viewed as a dynamic process as the development of integral literary systems, replacing each other in the course of social, cultural, and religious changes in the region, subject especially to the process of Islamization. These developments are analysed both externally from the point of view of a modern scholar and, for the first time, from the viewpoint of the traditional Malay conception of literary creativity. It is precisely the reconstruction of this conception and of the functions of literature that made it possible to discern an integral hierarchical system in the totality of traditional Malay works, particularly those of the classical period. In that period, in spite of the heterogeneity of the constituent elements of the literary system, its unity was based on the Islamic literary self-awareness which permeated Malay culture. The Islamic doctrine of Muhammad as the Logos the support of everything created stipulated this unity. The hierarchical structure of the system was ensured by the fact that every group of literary genres corresponded to a definite level in the hierarchy of the Universe and of its counterpart human psychic-somatic hierarchy. The fantastic adventure romances (hikayat) and romantic poems (syair), endowed with beauty (indah), were intended to harmonize the soul and to instruct in courteous behaviour. The intellect was strengthened by the 'benefits' (faedah) of the didactic works ('mirrors' hidayat, 'framed tales') and 'chronicles' (sejarah, salasilah), more historiosophic than historiographic in their nature. The 'spiritual heart' the organ of mystical intuition was prepared for the divine illumination by the hagiographic works, Sufi allegories and the religious-mystical 'literature of kitab (treatises)'.
The development of literary self-awareness in the theoretical sphere was coupled with the emergence of literary synthesis in the sphere of creative practice. The basis for this synthesis was prepared in the Early Islamic period, when the works belonging to Hindu-Javanese and Arabic-Persian literary circles, after passing through the 'filter' of the Malay tradition, came into contact with each other within the confines of the Malay literary system as an integral whole. In the classical period the process of Malayization, transformation, and synthesis of the heterogeneous elements gained in intensity and, proceeding from the principles of Islamic literary self-awareness, these elements were fused within the confines of a new unity an individual literary work, be it a chronicle, a fantastic adventure romance, or a poem of love, whether historical or allegorical content. Finally, beginning from the second half of the 18th century, the dissolution of the synthesis started as a result of the deepening Islamization, and Malay literature has gradually approximated the model of late-medieval Arabic literature.
Within the framework of the literary developments outlined, the origin and evolution of all genres of traditional Malay literature are studied and the most important and characteristic pieces of literature belonging to these genres are analysed with a special reference to their poetics, meaning, structure, and function. *
- Liaw Yock Fang, Sejarah Kesusastraan Melayu Klasik, Jil. 1-2. Jakarta: Erlangga, 1991-1993;
- T. Iskandar, Kesusasteraan Klasik Melayu Sepanjang Abad, Brunei: Jabatan Kesusasteraan Melayu, Universiti Brunei Darussalam, 1995;
- V.I. Braginsky, Yang Indah, Berfaedah dan Kamal, Sejarah Sastra Melayu Dalam Abad 7-19, Jakarta: INIS, 1998.
Vladimir I. Braginsky, SOAS.
University of London,
E-mail: VB1@soas.ac.ukWednesday, November 22, 2000