Malaysia and Indonesian

Literature
• they have a single common linguistic ancestor.
Before the coming of Islam to the region in the
14th century, Javanese had been the language
of culture; afterward, during the Islamic
period, Malay became the most important
language—and still more so under later Dutch
colonial rule so that, logically, it was
recognized in 1949 as the official Indonesian
language
• Early Malay literature • Malay romantic tales
was influenced by were also sourced from
Indian epics, such as the the Panji cycle of Hindu
Mahabharata and the Java
Ramayana • By the 19th century,
• Hikayat Mara Karma, oral literature on the
Hikayat Panca Tanderan Malay peninsula was
and Hikayat Gul superseded by
Bakawali written literature
 • Works during this time
• This was attributed
ranged from theological
largely in part to the
literature and legal
introduction of Islam to
digests, to romances,
the Peninsula by the
moral anecdotes,
15th century and the
popular tales of Islamic
adoption of the Jawi
prophets and even
script.
animal tales, which
• This tradition was were written in a
influenced both by number of styles
earlier oral traditions ranging from religious
and Islamic literature to the Hikayat form.[
from the Middle East
Division of Indonesian literature according to
periods
• Chronologically Indonesian literature may be divided into several periods:
• Pujangga Lama: the "Literates of Olden Times" (traditional literature)
• Sastra Melayu Lama: "Older Malay Literature"
• Angkatan Balai Pustaka: the "Generation of the [Colonial] Office for
Popular Literature" (from 1908)
• Angkatan Pujangga Baru: the "New Literates" (from 1933)
• Angkatan 1945: the "Generation of 1945"
• Angkatan 1950 - 1960-an: the "Generation of the 1950s"
• Angkatan 1966 - 1970-an: the "Generation of 1966 into the 1970s"
• Angkatan 1980-an: the "Decade of the 1980s"
• Angkatan Reformasi: the post-Suharto "Reformation Period"
• Angkatan 2000-an: the "Generation of 2000s"
• The literature produced by the Pujangga lama (literally
"the old poets") was mainly written before the 20th
century, but after the coming of Islam. Before that time,
however, there must have existed a lively oral tradition
• Genres
• In written poetry and prose, a number of traditional
forms dominate, mainly:—
• syair (traditional narrative poetry)
• pantun (quatrains made up of two seemingly
disconnected couplets)
• gurindam (brief aphorisms)
• hikayat (stories, fairy-tales, animal fables, chronicles)
• babad (histories
• Works
• Some of these works are:
• syair Syair Bidasari, Syair Ken Tambuhan, Syair Raja
Mambang Jauhari, Syair Raja Siakpantun scattered
items found all over the Indonesian Archipelago,
and also incorporated in other works (e.g., Sejarah
Melayu) [4]hikayat Hikayat Abdullah, Hikayat
Andaken Penurat, Hikayat Bayan Budiman, Hikayat
Djahidin, Hikayat Hang Tuah, Hikayat Kadirun,
Hikayat Kalila dan Damina, Hikayat Masydulhak,
Hikayat Pelanduk Jinaka, Hikayat Pandja Tanderan,
Hikayat Putri Djohar Manikam, Hikayat Tjendera
Hasan, Tsahibul Hikayat
• in the 1920s, Indonesian literature came to be
dominated by fiction (both short stories and novels)
• and Western-style drama and poetry, which
gradually replaced the earlier syair, gurindam,
pantun and hikayat
• Merari Siregar's Azab dan Sengsara was the very
first modern novel appearing in Indonesian,
constituting a break with the Malay romance
tradition.
 Thai Literature
• Thai Traditional Literature is essentially religious
• Most of the literature in the old days consisted
of works on Buddhism and Hinduism directly or
indirectly
• Whatever culture the Thai people brought with
them from their homeland in Southern China
where they had been in contact with Chinese
culture for centuries was adapted to its later
conception of Buddhism, their adopted religion
• Most of the works of emotive literature were
written in veerse in various patterns.
Five prominent examples of such works

• 1. The Romance of Khun Chang Khun Phaen -

• 2. Ramakian
• 3. The Romance of Inao
• 4. Sam Kok.
• 5. Phra Aphaimani. This is a romantic tale
written in verse by one of the most famous
and popular poets of Thailand.