254
Book · 2002
Beauty Is a Wound
Cantik Itu LukaIn the fictional coastal haven of Halimunda, a beautiful Indo-Dutch prostitute rises from the grave two decades after her death to care for her monstrously ugly fourth daughter. Interweaving Indonesian folklore with dark satire and epic storytelling, Eka Kurniawan constructs a multi-generational chronicle that reflects Indonesia’s traumatic history of colonialism and violence.
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Kurniawan intertwines Indonesia’s transition from colonial Dutch to Japanese occupation and finally independence, with the tragic tale of infamous sex worker Dewi Ayu and her cursed family, in a multi-layered narrative that reads like an old-school gothic folk tale, full of dark magic, hyperbole and gratuitous violence.
Alan Vaarwerk on Readings “One afternoon on a weekend in May, Dewi Ayu rose from her grave after being dead for 21 years.” With this surprising sentence, Kurniawan sets the stage for an epic picaresque that’s equal parts Canterbury Tales and Mahabharata. Weaving back in forth in time, moving from character to character, the author tells the story of Indonesia from its Dutch colonial days, through the Japanese occupation during World War II, and into independence as a modern state.
Kirkus Reviews on Kirkus Reviews Gracefully translated by Annie Tucker, the writing is evocative and muscular, with particularly spicy descriptions and some good wry humor.
Sarah Lyall on The New York Times
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