Did Burgess Get it Right?

Rob Spence asked a very good question in the comments a couple of days back. Referring to The Malayan Trilogy by Anthony Burgess, he asks:

What does the average Malaysian make of Burgess's portrayal of the place?

meaning of course, Malaysia.

Rob is a UK academic, and Burgess his area of special interest, so the question is a particuarly pertinent one (and you never know, might end up in a research paper!).

All I can say is that the local readers I know (including the members for my book club) have very much enjoyed it, and were not offended by its portrayal of the different racial groups. There are those in academia apparently (or so Faridah informs me) who consider the book a nasty bit of orientalism especially as it propagates "the myth of the lazy native", and have had a nice bit of post-colonial revenge on the text. (I want to follow this up.)

But I'd like to throw the question open to those of you who have read it.

BTW I've just finished writing an article for Kakiseni about the book and the banning thereof and it will be up as soon as the site is revamped.

And if we can get the status of the book sorted out, I suggest that we have a KL readathon of the book and a public debate later in the year. Who's up for it??

The Malayan Trilogy Run-Around

Following my rant of the other day ...

Contacted the distributor, Pansing in Singapore about the status of the Anthony Burgess book. Could they tell me more about why the book can't be distributed in Malaysia?

It seems that copies bound for Malaysia were seized at customs with no more explanation than that the book is "restricted". Were Customs officers acting arbitrarily, or is the book on a Ministry of Home Affairs list? If so, on what grounds and who decided? (A statement, please!)

Tried to call the Ministry of Home Affairs for clarification. But predictably got the run-around. Got passed on and passed on and passed on, until I got passed to the Deputy Director's phone which wasn't answered. And probably the whole department was tittering behind their hands about how they deflected an angry mat salleh. (Though I did do my best to be polite.) Never mind.

Worth bearing in mind is that the book goes by different titles according to the edition. The UK Vintage edition goes by the title The Malayan Trilogy, and the American edition published by the Norton Library (and still available at Kinunya) The Long Day Wanes: A Malayan Trilogy.

Confusing, hey? Well, that could be a good thing if it confuses the right people.

Postscript

Meanwhile, if you want to buy a copy of the book at a very reasonable price, try abebooks.com. Prices start at US1 and really all you are paying for is the postage. I've found that the books arrive really quickly too.