Agence France-Presse
Sunday April 30, 2006 Nobel Candidate Pramoedya Dies
Indonesia's best known writer Pramoedya Ananta Toer dies at 81
Indonesia's most celebrated novelist Pramoedya Ananta Toer has died at the age of 81, his family said.
Relatives said Pramoedya died at his East Jakarta home at 8.55 am.
A relative who identified himself as Gunawan said Pramoedya had been hospitalized since Thursday for heart and other problems associated with advanced age but on Saturday evening had insisted on returning home.
The exact cause of death was not clear, though one of his grandchildren, Adit, said he believed Pramoedya died of a stroke.
Pramoedya is best known for his "Buru Quartet" series written during 14 years of political detention on Buru island in Maluku province under then president Suharto.
Hailed by many international critics as Indonesia's leading modern novelist, his work has been translated into 30 languages.
He was imprisoned by three successive regimes for writing seen as politically uncompromising and consequently his books were largely banned until Suharto's rule came to an end in 1998.
The novelist, essayist and short story writer was nominated several times for the Nobel prize for literature, first in 1986, and last year was the only Indonesian to appear on a list of 100 leading intellectuals named by Britain's cultural Prospect magazine.
While Pramoedya never openly declared his political allegiances, he was accused of being a communist by Suharto, who in 1965 banned the then powerful Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) after a failed coup attempt and launched a campaign against sympathisers that left at least 500,000 dead and saw over one million arbitrarily arrested and jailed.
In the Buru series, set in the 1920s when the country was still a Dutch colony, Pramoedya's portrayal of rising nationalism differed from the official version.
His first jail term, under the Dutch colonial administration, was in 1947-1949 for agitating for independence.
The country's first president Sukarno imprisoned him once more between 1960 and 1961, while Suharto jailed him without trial from 1965 until 1979.
His mastery of colloquial language added realism to his novels, and the alleged leftist tenor of his works angered Suharto's staunchly anti-communist government.
After his release from prison, he remained under close government surveillance until 1992, and was only able to leave the country after Suharto's fall.
He received various awards and international recognition, including France's Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and the Japanese Fukuoka Asian Culture Grand Prize, both in 2000.
He also received the 1995 Ramon Magsasay Award for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts and, in 1992, the PEN Freedom to Write Award
The Associated Press
April 30, 2006 Famed Author Pramoedya Ananta Toer Dies
JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) -- Indonesian author Pramoedya Ananta Toer, an outspoken democracy advocate who overcame imprisonment and censorship to publish dozens of stories and novels about his country, died Sunday. He was 81.
Pramoedya ''dedicated his whole life to this country through his work,'' his daughter, Tatiana Ananta, told The associated Press.
''We all have lost a great father, a great author,'' she said. ''I am very proud of him.''
Pramoedya -- jailed under successive regimes, including 14 years under ex-dictator Suharto -- was nominated several times for a Nobel Prize in literature and his 34 books and essays have been translated into 37 languages.
His best-known works -- the ''Buru Quartet'' novels about Indonesia's independence struggle against the Dutch -- were written on scraps of paper and surreptitiously smuggled out while he was imprisoned on the remote island of Buru.
Age and deteriorating health -- combined with a sense of closure in his work -- kept Pramoedya from writing since 2000, though he collaborated with one of his daughters on an encyclopedia of Indonesia.
He was hospitalized on Thursday for complications brought on by diabetes and heart disease. He was also a heavy smoker and had endured years of abuse while in detention.
Pramoedya asked to leave Jakarta's Catholic St. Carolus Hospital late Saturday, said his grandson, Kiki Sepitan.
Upon arriving home, the author immediately lit up a clove cigarette -- he was rarely seen without one -- and his condition deteriorated overnight, he said.
Born in 1925 to a rice farmer during Dutch colonial rule, the eldest of nine children criticized successive governments over more than a half century, even in his last frail years. He reserved his harshest judgment for Suharto, who was blamed for the death and imprisonment of more than a million Indonesians.
But Pramoedya's ideas -- once a major influence fueling the pro-democracy groundswell that toppled Suharto in 1998 -- have been largely cast aside as Indonesia struggles to revive its economy, defeat Islamic extremists responsible for a string of deadly bombings, and put down separatist rebellions.
Indonesian author and journalist Goenawan Muhammad credited Pramoedya with putting his nation on the world map of literature and called him ''an important example of how freedom of speech and creativity is needed.''
Pramoedya was first jailed in 1947 by Dutch troops for being ''anti-colonialist.''
He was later accused of sympathizing with Chinese communists and imprisoned again shortly after Suharto came to power in the aftermath of the assassination of right-wing Indonesian generals in 1965.
Pramoedya's left-leaning, outspoken style earned him enemies within Suharto's regime and his works were banned from circulation. He was thrown in a cell without trial, first off the coast of mainland Java, and then in the penal colony of Buru, along with thousands of other opponents of the U.S.-backed regime.
Pramoedya advocated the removal of bureaucrats and politicians ''tainted'' by Suharto-era abuses, but corruption remains rampant and some of the old dictator's cronies remain in office.
He also wanted an inclusive government that welcomed people from parts of the sprawling Indonesian archipelago outside the main island of Java, but the Javanese still hold the reins of power.
''I am half blind and almost totally deaf, but I won't stop being angry because not many people are outraged enough at the state of Indonesia,'' he told The AP in 2004.
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