Rivals in the Same Boat
The entirely guided political situation during the early 1960s put many cultural specialists in an uncertain situation. Many who refused to be regulated by political parties and rejected the dogma that 'politics is commander' came to identify with the Cultural Manifesto petition, better known as Manikebu. Unfortunately the Manifesto drew the ire of the Sukarno regime, the PKI, Lekra and other pro-Manipol Usdek groups. Nonetheless, the fate of the manikebuists was far better than that of the Lekra culturalists following the abortive coup of 1965, perpetrated by a group of army officers calling itself the September 30 Movement. Manikebuists were among those hunted down, tortured, imprisoned, banished and murdered.
October 1, 2013
The Dandy Catalyst
Reproduced on a large scale by mimeograph, the Cultural Manifesto circulated in a viral fashion from one person to another.
IT all started at the Hotel Salak, Bogor, July 1963, when Goenawan Mohamad, Bur Rasuanto, A. Bastari Asrin, a leading short-story writer, and Sjahwil, an important painter of the Sanggar Bambu Group, Yogyakarta, visited Iwan Simatupang at his room there.
Upon their arrival, Iwan, author of Visit and The Red
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