House of Glass (Buru Quartet)

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House of Glass (Buru Quartet)

In 1965, Pramoedya Ananta Toer was arrested by the Indonesian government. Although he was denied writing materials during his 14-year detention, he continued to "write" fiction, composing stories orally, which his fellow prisoners memorized. House of Glass is the final installment of the four-part epic he composed. The tale, which began with This Earth of Mankind and continued through Child of All Nations and Footsteps, encompasses the beginnings of the collapse of colonialism nearly 100 years ago. In 1995, Pramoedya Ananta Toer was cited by the Philippine government for his contribution to "the historical awakening and modern experience of the Indonesian people." -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.
From Publishers Weekly
Police commissioner Tuan Pangemanann, narrator of this concluding volume to Pramoedya's extraordinary tetralogy set in colonial Indonesia, is a Sorbonne-educated reactionary, a consummate hypocrite, a cultivated monster, a sadist with pangs of conscience. Recognizing the rottenness of the colonial administration, he greatly admires Minke, crusading newspaper editor and nationalist fighter against Dutch imperialism, considering him a man of principle. Yet, as an obedient tool of the Netherlands Indies' ruling elite in the period from 1912 through the end of WWI, Pangemanann feels duty-bound to crush Minke and the native movement he represents, whether by arrest, torture or counterinsurgency terrorism. The first three volumes of Pramoedya's quartet (This Earth of Mankind; Child of All Nations; Footsteps)?written during the author's 14-year banishment, 1965-1979, to the prison island of Buru?were narrated by Minke, a progressive witness of world events. Here, by filtering the anti-colonialist struggle through Pangemanann's ambivalent, warped perspective, Pramoedya spikes his epic saga with slyly modernist irony, creating a work that is as subversive today as when it was written. (May) FYI: Pramoedya is currently under city arrest in Jakarta: all his books remain banned in Indonesia. Penguin will reissue the first three volumes of the Buru quartet in paperback to coincide with the publication of House of Glass.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.