Nyai Ontosoroh: Female Character in Postcolonial Indonesian Literature
In order to clash the patriarchal view that demeaning the opposite gender; which cold-heartedly distinguishes it into an object, Milan Kundera, in his novel The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, has given the example with an interesting allegoric.
As if spelling the holy verses, Kundera stated that woman is not utterly incapable of opposing patriarchal view. If the view changes her into an object, it can be said that woman can also see a man as an object.
Just like a hammer which suddenly having eyes and looking keenly its user, when the holder sees the eye of hammer, he is losing his confidence and suddenly hits his own thumb.
IMO, this way of seeing is quite elegant and of course: impressive. The holder is the master of the hammer, however, the hammer will win eventually: because indeed the hammer as a tool knows itself how to be handed, meanwhile the holder can merely be assuming.
Apparently, Pram also used this way of seeing when he depicted the characteristic of Nyai Ontosoroh in his well-known Buru Quartet.
If you had read Pram’s work, when he spent sort-of sorrow life in exile, we will easily find Nyai Ontosoroh in every part of his Quartet. Even when the other characters come and go, yet, Nyai Ontosoroh still exists till the end of his last romance, The House of Glass.
Indeed, she is a fictitious, fictional past, but not with her character and passion; it becomes real and continues to exist today.
Nyai Ontosoroh, as has been written by Pram on his first work (Earth of Mankind), is the owner of Buitenzorg Company. She himself was originally named Sanikem who at the age of 14 was sold by his biological father, a clerk at the sugar factory of Tulangan, Sidoarjo, in order to get the desired position to a Dutchman named Herman Mellema; who later made her a mistress so she was forced to accept the nickname “Nyai”.
Losing her honor because of being sold does not necessarily put her down. She actually rose and determined her destiny. Utilizing the wealth and accesses provided by her master, Sanikem aka Nyai Ontosoroh learn counting and literacy.
Her independent figure was able to dismiss the notion that women are only fit for the kitchen-mattress business and are not entitled to a more viable place:
“I had a father, past, not now, if he is not your guest, I would have expelled him.”
“No,” he said.
“It’s better to get out of here than to meet him.”
“How do I go, how are the cows? Nobody can take care of them.”
“A lot of people can be hired to take care of it.”
“The cows only know you.”
Anyway, I’m beginning to understand, Mama is totally independent of Mr. Mellema. On the contrary, he is dependent on me. So Mama then took a deciding attitude into everything. (Earth of Mankind, p. 93).
And as Kundera said, Nyai Ontosoroh is a hammer that hits the holder of the hammer itself. She turned out the dominance of Herman Mellema after all this time. Even when her master died of being killed by an unknown person, she was able to manage the Buitenzorg Company with the skill she had.
In addition, Nyai Ontosoroh is a Godmother who contributes a lot of thoughts and views towards Minke. In the second romance, Child of All Nations, Nyai Ontosoroh was the one who encouraged Minke to continue writing to voice the fate of his people.
Even when Minke finally chose the way of journalism to fight Dutch colonialism by establishing Medan Prijaji, she also contributed material assistance in his movement.
From that woman Minke also gained his confidence. “Do you know why I love you more than anyone? Because you write, your voice will not be swallowed by the wind; it will be eternal, far, far in the future.”
Her idealistic yet open mindedness had made Nyai Ontosoroh an indigenous woman equal to the European’s dignity: “Do not call me a real woman if life is just a man, but that does not mean I do not need a man to love.”
Nonetheless, her idealistic attitude is not a form of artificial idealism which then removes her own feelings. Evidently, until the end of the story, she accepted the proposal of Jean Marais, a former company soldier who was stranded in the middle of nowhere as well as Minke’s best friend, and changed her name to madame Sanikem Le Boucq.
She does not then reject her nature as a creature that requires a partner and does not take the path of solitude for the rest of her life.
Nyai Ontosoroh to me is a manifestation of indigenous women that transcends her time. I once suspected that this imaginative character of Pram was inspired by a woman, daughter of the Regent of Jepara, who at the age of seventeen had been able to read and write, instead of using his mother tongue. Considering that Pram himself has also written her story in a book entitled Just Call Me Kartini (1963).
Presumably, in the past, it was difficult to find an Indonesian author who provides writings of equality for the female character in their works. There are indeed some old literary works that deal with women, such as Sitti Nurbaya by Marah Rusli (1922) and Nyai Dasimah by Gijsbert Francis (1896), but not in the way and portion used by Pramoedya.
Also, both of them were written before the independence period.
It seems that Nyai Ontosoroh is indeed one of the earliest characters, or if I may call it “proto-feminist” in Indonesian literature. And for Pramoedya Ananta Toer, whose birthday on February 6th, which helped pioneering the equality women’s rights through literature, it is worthy to be honored by all women in Indonesia.
“Deposuit Potentes de Sede et Exaltavat Humiles (he lowers those in power and raises those who are insulted)” — House of Glass, p. 646.
