Lessons on Censorship:
Pramoedya Ananta Toer Visits Kroch Library

by Allen Reidy, Curator, John M. Echols Collection, Kroch Library

Pramoedya Ananta Toer's Visit to Cornell

The visit of Pramoedya Ananta Toer, one of Indonesia's most distinguished contemporary authors, to the Cornell University campus in April gave all of us in the library an opportunity not only to shake hands and talk with one of the world's truly remarkable men, but also to reflect on the role of libraries as custodians of ideas expressed through the written word and as defenders of unfettered access to information.

For more than fifty years, Pramoedya's literary talents have described the condition of the Indonesian people, as a subject colonial people awakening to the possibilities of an independent nation and as a nation struggling to give voice to those oppressed by authoritarian rulers. For these transgressions against the established orders of the Dutch, Sukarno, and Suharto, his books were banned and he was imprisoned on three separate occasions. He was recently released from house arrest in Jakarta following Suharto's fall. Subsequently, he embarked on a two-month-long trip to the United States to attend a symposium dedicated to his works, and to visit universities, bookstores, and organizations committed to the freedom to read and write. All of which justify a life filled with self-sacrifice for the betterment of his fellow citizens.

Despite the fact that his most well-known body of work, the four-volume Buru Tetralogy has been translated into twenty languages, Pramoedya's books are not widely available in Indonesia, at least through "legitimate" channels. They will not be found on bookstore shelves nor in library catalogs. Though some libraries may have copies of his works, they are not readily available to the public. The systematic exclusion from the public domain of works by particular authors or on certain subjects is not an unusual phenomenon. It has happened throughout history in all countries, and is in fact more the norm than the exception. It was really only fairly recently with the establishment of public libraries in the United States that the idea of making easily accessible books on all subjects to the general public has become the norm, in the United States.

While authoritarian regimes routinely ban books, and do so openly and without apology, the restriction of information in democracies is often more subtle. Challenges to books, mostly those in school and public libraries, are quite common and well-known in the U.S., as are more recent efforts to control access to the Internet. American literary classics by the likes of Mark Twain and John Steinbeck continue to be the targets of book-banners in the 1990s. Incidentally, in 1950 Pramoedya published an Indonesian translation of Of Mice and Men, the second most challenged book in the U.S. in the 1990s.

What is more insidious is the restriction of information by publishers who, through restrictive-access clauses in contracts, intend to exact as high a price as possible from libraries, in effect to deny information to large segments of the population. A case in point, though not one that affects Southeast Asianists or even most Cornellians, but is illustrative and perhaps a portent of the future, was the recent decision by our Law Library to discontinue the print subscription to Shepard's state citations. Shepard's state citations are included as part of an on-line service that the Law Library already subscribes to, so in effect it was paying for two subscriptions. Understandably, given pressures on its budget, it took the opportunity to save $25,000 by canceling the print subscription, with the knowledge that the state citations are not used widely outside the Law School. The contract with the on-line service, owned by a large commercial publishing firm, specifically limits the use of the service to members of the Law and ILR schools. Even walk-ins from the Cornell community are barred from using this resource. Where previously anyone could walk into the Law Library and use Shepard's, now it is impossible to do so.

This specific example is just that-only an example that affects very few people. However, it points to a potentially much larger problem of restricted access to information by large commercial firms, through pricing policies that effectively exclude large segments of the population, usually poorer, but as can be seen from the illustration above, even the rather well-off. There are now a number of databases to which Cornell subscribes that are restricted to the Cornell community and which even those who purchase off-campus library cards are unable to use offsite. As we go further into the electronic information age, where print resources are replaced by electronic resources with restrictive-access clauses, quality information is in danger of becoming a luxury good.

The power and potential of information on-line are astounding. The growth of the Internet and our ability to get information at the rate we do was science fiction ten years ago. We can now read abridged on-line versions of newspapers from Southeast Asia the day they were written. Maps, travel guides, statistics, bibliographies, and indexes are available for the price of a cheap computer and Internet connection. Yet, increasingly large slices of information are being privatized and commodified and the day may not be far off when only information garbage is free, when vast portions of the resources of the library are not for all but only for those who fit certain categories.

Which brings us back to Pramoedya and his visit to the United States. The motivation behind restricting access to his works and the effect of denied access to information because of commercial policies are not particularly similar. But, as we celebrate his-and Indonesia's-flight to freedom, we should be ever vigilant that we do not lose what he so valiantly fought for, the right to write and the right to read what has been written.

Pramoedya Ananta Toer's Visit to Cornell

Pramoedya, his wife, Ibu Maemunah Thamrin, and his friend Joesoef Isak met with Cornell University president Hunter R. Rawlings III, SEAP faculty members Thak Chaloemtiarana, Abby Cohn, Paul Gellert, Martin Hatch, and Kaja McGowan, and staff members Ben Abel and Rohayati Paseng Barnard on April 16. Pictured here, President Rawlings and Pramoedya exchange gifts at Day Hall; also pictured are Ibu Maemunah, left, and Rohayati Paseng Barnard, right.

A public reception, courtesy of SEAP and held in Pramoedya's honor, was followed by a book signing at the Andrew Dickson White House coordinated by the Cornell Campus Store. Pictured here are Pramoedya and graduate student Juliana Atmaja.

Pramoedya presented a reading from his memoir, The Mute's Soliloquy (Hyperion Press), at Hollis E. Cornell Auditorium in Goldwin Smith Hall on April 19. He selected a letter written to his daughter, Pujarosmi, from "Natant Ruminations." The author delivered the reading in Indonesian, which was followed by an English translation presented by Professor Kaja McGowan, left, and Rohayati Barnard, right.

The Echols Collection on Southeast Asia at Kroch Library displayed an exhibit of its holdings by and about the author in the library's Asia Reading Room, April 10-25, 1999. Royayati Barnard, Southeast Asian Librarian of the Echols Collection, shows Pramoedya abd Ibu Maemunah through the exhibit.

The Southeast Asia Program hosted a dish-to-pass supper and reading at the home of Professor Benedict Anderson. Pramoedya read "Ketjapi," from Tales of Djakarta: Caricatures of Circumstances and their Human Beings, a book of the author's short stories published by SEAP Publications.

Video footage of two readings by Pramoedya-"Ketjapi" and "Natant Ruminations"-are available at the Echols Collection. An additional 50-minute video production of his visit to Ithaca will also be available by November 1.