Indonesia in general is largely underrepresented, or in other words, excluded from the global lists. It is clear that the richness of Indonesian literature cannot be reduced to twelve authors, and we need to keep looking beyond the list.Īnd here comes another complication: despite Indonesia’s enormous size and its diverse cultural traditions and experimentations, only a handful of Indonesian books have been translated into English. I am still struggling with representation, but I have behind me my agent and publishers in three different countries, a luxury that the majority of Indonesian authors do not have. I am honored to have been selected, but I am also confronted with my own privilege my translated short story collection just came out in the UK, and next year my debut novel will be published in the UK as well. Indonesia is the Market Focus Country for the London Book Fair this year (March 12-14, 2019), and twelve authors have been invited to participate in various events at LBF and other parts of the UK. Yet here is the contradiction: even though we are aware that any list reflects the biases and politics of selection and representation, we still expect a kind of mainstream list when we start exploring new territory. And as an Indonesian woman writer in a field dominated by (heterosexual) men, I have worked with a number of feminist activists to propose counter-lists. As someone who has been both privileged and overlooked by such practice, I have an ambivalent relationship with lists. Making a list is by necessity a practice of exclusion.

The wandering by intan paramaditha