Hang Tuah lives

"Hang Tuah was not Malay."
"Are you trying to pick a fight with me?"
"It is the truth."
"How could you say that? That’s the most absurd thing I have ever heard," Subuh stares at Angeh.
"He was not a Malay man."
"What else was he? A lost Arab?"
Jumaat laughs. SiTumi remains quiet and observes his friends.
"Hang Tuah was an aboriginal man like me. He was Semang."
"What?" Jumaat and Subuh say in unison.
"His name was SiTuah, not Hang Tuah; that was the name Malays gave him in Malacca. SiTuah is a common name among the Semang people. It is common to put a prefix Si in front of one’s name in our community, like SiTumi."
"I seriously doubt that," Subuh shakes his head.
"It is the truth. When Malacca fell to the Portuguese, Tuah escaped to Perak. He lived with the aboriginal tribes here and was elected as their leader. He became the chief of a village called Suah Padi Village near Changkat Melintang in Perak. He later died in Lambor Kanan, a town half a day’s journey from his village."
"I very seriously doubt that," Subuh says again.
"Tuah was not only a hero for the Malays, he was a hero for all."
Jumaat and Subuh look at one another.
SiTumi smiles, but says nothing.

The Beruas Prophecy by Iskandar Al-Bakri, Silverfish Books, 2011

Hang Tuah is a great story; so strong that even the Chinese and the Orang Asli want a piece of it. It is a good Malaysian story; unfortunately, it cannot be taught in schools because it is not history; it is a myth, or so says Emeritus Professor Khoo Khay Kim. He is right, of course. Not only is there no historical evidence, the story has many contradictions. (Was it Hang Kasturi he fought or Hang Jebat?) But the Hang Tuah story has far deeper roots than the good professor gives credit, emotional roots, which are not surprising, given that his interest is in history. One dismisses myths at one’s own peril, although it has become increasingly fashionable to do so in some circles (especially in this country).

The power of the myth

An interesting demonstration of the power of the myth was provided by the Sethusamudram project in India that began in 2005, involving dredging the shallow waters of the Palk Straits known variously as Adam’s Bridge, Ram Sethu or Ramar Palam, to reduce navigation distance between east and west of the country by some 650 km. In May 2007, Subramanian Swamy of the BJP challenged the dredging of the Adam’s Bridge arguing that it is a man-made structure going back to Hindu mythology despite Archeological Survey of India (ASI) and the Geological Survey of India (GSI) both having conclusively proved that it is a natural feature. Finally, in July 2008 the Government was compelled to withdraw its submission from ASI due to political and religious sensitivities.

That is the power of the myth. Rama and Hanuman may have been merely products of a fertile imagination (or imaginations), but try telling the 800 million Hindus in India that the Adam’s Bridge was not built by Hanuman, and a horde of monkeys, for Rama. The Ramayana has been a part of the daily life of Hindus for milliniums, and is, on top of that, a great story. Also, one could try telling 1.8 billion Christians that, since there are no historical records currently, Jesus or Moses and other biblical characters are not real. Some may be willing to accept the absence of hard records, but that would hardly diminish the relevance of these stories in their lives for over two thousand years (with minor variations).

“There should be no question that we should pursue the truth” said the headline in the New Straits Times on Sunday 29 January over an op-ed piece. (The rest of the story was not worth reading.) Really? Are you ready for the truth? How much of history is about the truth, whatever the good professor says, or believes it should be. He would protest that history is not perfect, but the shocking reality is how imperfect it is. But is that really a problem? "Western societies remembers its historical figures and separates legend and history ..." Khoo was quoted in the NST interview on the same day. Unfortunately, reality has a way of upending statements like that.

Agincourt

(There are hundreds of examples, but this is a good one): The Battle of Agincourt, which was the centrepiece of the play, Henry V, by William Shakespeare, has been taught for centuries in schools in Britain as a major English victory against a numerically superior French army in the Hundred Years' War. (It was also part of my school curricullum in the early sixties.) According to that version of history (or legend, depending on who you ask), Henry V deployed his exhausted English army of 1500 men-at-arms and 7000 longbowmen,  against a French army of 8000 men-at-arms, 4000 archers and 1500 crossbowmen in the vanguard, and two wings of 600 and 800 mounted men-at-arms, and, complete with a rousing speech, defeated the enemy. This victory of "the band of brothers" became the stuff of popular legend, complete with folk songs. Not so, say modern historians, especially the French (and there is enough information on that on the internet for the reader to check out). The truth is more complicated. But, so what? That victory at Agincourt, that myth, that legend, that lie, played a huge part in making Britain what it became; it gave the Brits self-belief, that cocky confidence that made them the greatest imperial power the world has ever known (whether one likes it or not).

That story alone should be enough to discourage devaluation of legends. I have always been fascinated by the influence of myth, however patently false they are, and how history and science remain powerless it their presence. Is it only a matter of time before myths are broken down and replaced with truths? What would happen then? No more stories and no more storytellers? Imagine living in such a world; will we even remain human? We can live without food for a while, but once we stop telling (or listening to) stories, we're dead, even if there's still a pulse.

Hang Tuah may be a myth, but that does not in any way take away its relevance and power. Khoo, in dismissing its value (albeit only with respect to history) has stepped on an emotional minefield. One can take away Hang Tuah (or Hang Jebat) from the Malay ethos as much as one can attempt to remove the Ramayana from Hindus, or Journey to the West from the Chinese. Myths give us our aspirations and inspirations; our rights and wrongs; our prides and prejudices. But I agree;  they should not be part of the history syllabus. Their content is cultural and should be part of the humanities. Literature would be a good place. Unfortunately, this subject is either not taught at all, or chucked under language. (Literature with a small 'l'; what the hell is that?!)

Why do language departments in universities teach Literature, with all their provincial interpretations? Literature studies should be open and not subject to language limitations. One should be able to study and analyse Hang Tuah, Ramayana or the Journey to the West in the same class, or even Kalidasa, Cervantes and Shakespeare (or any other combination). But that calls for enlightenment minds, a commodity in extreme short supply at the moment in this country. 'Parochial' is the best we've got.

On a parting note: The late Professor Lim Chee Seng told us how he was taken on a tour to visit Juliet's house in Verona. Yes, that same Juliet of Shakespeare's fiction. If the Italian tourism officials can do that, surely it's not too much for the museum authorities of Melaka to pass off a fake tomb as Hang Tuah's.

Raman Krishnan
Silverfish Books

Living in interesting times

It was the best of times, and the worst of times for the book industry in 2011; a year of living dangerously. Borders finally shuttered its stores after a long terminal illness. It seemed like the end of an era when, in fact, it was not. The international age of the superstore started only in 1999, when the super chain store opened shop in Singapore. Within 12 years, it was all over. Twelve years is not an era; it is an aberration. It was bizarre to any thinking person: how could bookstores that operated on such small profit margins, most of which they were giving away as discounts on bestsellers, afford to rent such large expensive real estate in prime locations in major cities throughout the world? After killing off thousands of independents over the decade, the romance with the mega bookstore has ended, leaving the landscape looking like Japan and Germany after the second world war.

A war zone

If book retailers tried to defy gravity, the 'big four' publishers were involved in a weird outer-space ballet in the first decade of the second millennium. By some accounts, out of 300,000 new titles published by Anglo-American industry, 3,000 or one percent made it to bookstore shelves, given three months to perform before being axed. Most books sold in double digits, many of those shortlisted for the Man Booker doing no more than three digits. Add to this overprinting and the SOR terms for book retail, it was waiting to be exploited and it was (by the major chains). The wreckage in the aftermath of this disaster looks like another war zone.

In Frankfurt, I decided to walk around Hall 8, the international hall, on Friday afternoon of the Bookfair after most business transactions had been concluded. In the last -- or was it the first -- row, I came across the stands for remaindered book dealers from the US and the UK. I was browsing through one, The Book Depot, and speaking to the bloke who was there, who asked me where I was from. You should have seen his face light up when I told him that I was from Malaysia. He has several Malaysian customers, he said happily, and rattled off a few names. I was not surprised to hear the name of one independent remainder-books shop, but when I heard the names of the other two, both major chains in the country, I was taken aback. So the big boys are in it, too. It’s no wonder The Book Depot guy’s face lit up. Looks like I've got another live one, here!

The Yellow Submarine

2011 was also the year of the e-book and print-on-demand (POD). The e-book is of the future, and is still work-in-progress (as anyone who’s looked at the free download of The Yellow Submarine from the iBook store can see). How big it is going to be? That depends on how creative the products become. Something is bound to happen, there are too many talented people out there for it not to. As for POD, we have always had vanity publishing. It has now gone high-tech, although most sales numbers are still in single or double digits. POD is good for keeping publisher’s backlists in print, but that’s not the only reason to support it.

I read this in a Publishing Perspective’s story, What is the ‘New’ Publisher? : ‘The “new publisher” is a creative intermediary between the author and reader, and not merely a gatekeeper.’ Strange. That’s what I used to think all publishers were about -- to be creative intermediaries. As a bookseller, I was frustrated when local distributors (who don't read) decided what books the people got to buy. Life was bad enough with government censorship, only to discover later that big Anglo-American publishers subscribed to the same ethos. POD is, in part, a reaction against this hegemony. It is a little sad, because there are many talented writers out there who will have to be satisfied with double digit sales because they do not avail themselves of the ‘creative intermediary’ role good publishers can provide.

Maybe, like Borders and super stores, that hegemony will break. After all, they are run by MBA’s and, if there is more money in watered down syrup, they’ll shift. Despite the unrelenting cry in the media in 2011: the book is dead; the book is dead, we say, “Long live the book.”

Happy New Year.

Raman Krishnan
Silverfish Books