Rethinking Categorization in Javanese Literary History: Some Reflections on a Fin-de-Siècle Memoir by Raden Sasrakusuma

Abstract

Raden Sasrakusuma (b. 1848) was a teacher and well-published writer who at the request of his first-born child, namely Raden Sasrasuganda, also a teacher and wellpublished writer, wrote a first-hand account of his life, entitled Layang Raga Pasaja (Book of My Unadorned Self), penned in intervals between 1901 and 1906. Although this memoir is classified in academic literature as an early example of modern, Western-influenced Javanese literature, it only had a most limited circulation, known to only a few people. In fact, it is only on account of a few Dutch Javanologists who happened to have access to a Romanized copy of Sasrakusuma's reminiscences that his text became part of the canon of modern Javanese literature. This chapter argues that the existent categorization of Sasrakusuma's narrative as a supposedly unique and innovative autobiography should be problematized, advocating to understand Javanese literature on its own terms, looking beyond the narrow confinements of "biography and history"with Western and modern biases.