Andrea Hirata: A Possibility in Writing Literature

M. Yoesoef
University of Indonesia

Book Title: Laskar Pelangi dan Sang Pemimpi

Author: Andrea Hirata
Publisher: Bentang
Year: 2005 and 2006

A thetralogy will surely show the thin red line that binds all of its parts, as we
found in Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s thetralogy that tells the four periods of its main
character, Minke (Raden Mas Tirto Adhisuryo). What about Andrea Hirata?
Laskar Pelangi tells the story of ten kids, since the first moment they arrive at
school until one by one they finally find their existence there. Their teacher, Ms. Mus,
plays an important role as a binding tie among the kids. The ten kids are I (narrator), A
Kiong, Borek, Harun, Kucai, Lintang, Mahar, Sahara (the only girl), Syahdan, Trapani,
and they become eleven with Flo.
Like in other fictions, the author introduces all the characters in the story. To do
this, Andrea took an unusual, interesting description by reconstructing the characteristics
and physical appearances of the nine kids, Ms. Mus and Mr. Harfan. The description of
the narrator is not specifically done as those of his nine best friends.
Andrea Hirata presents his characters by bringing to the readers’ memory
references they probably have known like Nebukadnezzar, Babylon, Pearl Harbour, the
tale of the piper and the rats, etc. The same applies to the description of the school
environment, by mentioning the Latin names of the plants and animals, even a number of
terms of various subjects like physics, chemistry, biology, anthropology, astronomy, and
social sciences to give concrete pictures of events or actions of the characters. The rich
reference used by Andrea at least shows that he has a broad knowledge, ranging from the
scientific to the popular things in everyday life. Considering the various target readers, he
also completed the book with a glossary of terms. Taking Subagio Sastrowardoyo’s
statement about the relationship between the author and the work, it is true that talent will
not be enough if it is not equipped with intellectuality. In my opinion, Andrea has shown a
bright combination of talent and intellectuality in this novel.
The novel begins with the two teachers, Mr. Harfan and Ms. Mus, worrying about
whether their elementary school, SD Muhammadiyah, can open a new class with at least
10 new students. This interestingly gets the readers attention to continue reading the
following chapters and creates a suspense that rises up to the point when at the scheduled
time—eleven o’clock—only nine students have registered. Only in the last minute the
tenth student comes to save the day. The conflict is solved happily, although in this part
Andrea also plants a sad image that comes out from a paradoxical situation as quoted
below:
 Para orangtua mungkin menganggap kekurangan satu murid sebagai pertanda bagi
anak-anaknya bahwa mereka memang sebaiknya didaftarkan pada para juragan saja.
Sedangkan aku dan agaknya juga anak-anak yang lain merasa amat pedih: pedih pada
orangtua kami yang tak mampu, pedih menyaksikan detik-detik terakhir sebuah sekolah
tua yang tutup justru pada hari pertama kami ingin sekolah, dan pedih pada niat kuat
kami untuk belajar tapi tinggal selangkah lagi harus terhenti hanya karena kekurangan
satu murid.... (hlm.5)

(The parents might think that lacking one student was a sign that their children should
be registered to the masters as workers. On the other hand, me and the other kids felt so
sad: sad because our parents were poor, sad to see the last minutes of an old school that
was closed on the first day we really wanted to go to school, and sad to think about our
dream to study that should be stopped on the last step only because the school was
lacking one more student…. (p.5))

A bigger paradox can be seen from the difficult and hard life of the Belitong
natives, who live on their ancestors’ island which is rich with tin mine. The benefits from
the natural resources can not be enjoyed by the natives, only by outsiders who came and
built a social fortress that separate them from the natives.

Tak disangsikan lagi, jika di-zoom out, kampung kami adalah kampung terkaya di
Indonesia. Inilah kampung tambang yang menghasilkan timah dengan harga
segenggam lebih mahal puluhan kali lipat dibandingkan segantang padi. Triliunan
rupiah set tertanam di sana, miliaran rupiah uang berputar sangat cepat seperti
putaran mesin parut, dan miliaran dolar devisa mengalir deras seperti kawanan tikus
terpanggil pemain seruling ajaib der Rattenfanger von Hameln. Namun jika di-zoom in,
kekayaan itu terperangkap di satu tempat, ia tertimbun di dalam batas tembok-tembok
tinggi Gedong. (hlm. 49)

(Undoubtedly, if zoomed out, our kampong is one of the richest kampongs in Indonesia.
Our kampong produces tin, a handful of which is a dozen times much more expensive
than a bowl of paddy. Thrillions of rupiahs are hidden beneath the soil, billions of
rupiahs are rolling rapidly like the rolling of a grating machine, and billions of dollars
income run in quickly like the mice called by the magic flute of der Rattenfanger von
Hameln. Unfortunately, if zoomed in, all the richness is trapped in one place, it is piled
up inside the tall walls of Gedong. (p. 49))

Socially, the Gedong area is a symbol of prosperity, while outside the area poverty
and hardship become a common milieu for the natives, and this situation is described in the
beginning of this novel.

...Aku tahu beliau sedang gugup dan aku maklum bahwa tak mudah bagi seorang pria
berusia empat puluh tujuh tahun, seorang buruh tambang yang beranak banyak dan
bergaji kecil, untuk menyekolahkan anak laki-lakinya ke sekolah. Lebih mudah
menyerahkannya pada tauke pasar pagi untuk jadi tukang parut atau pada juragan
untuk menjadi kuli kopra agar dapat membantu ekonomi keluarga. Menyekolahkan
anak berarti mengikatkan diri pada biaya selama belasan tahun dan hal itu bukan
perkara gampang bagi keluarga kami. (hlm. 3)
 (…I know that he is confused and I understand that it is not easy for a
forty-seven-year-old man, an underpaid mining labor with a lot of kids, to send his boy
to school. It is easier to send the boy to the bosses in the marketplace to grate coconuts
or to the masters to work in coconut plantation so that he can help finance the family.
Sending a kid to school means binding himself to some expenses for more than ten years
and it is not an easy matter for our family. (p. 3))

The reality described above is a classic, almost-impossible-to-solve problem of this

country, a problem that has become more complex day by day. The issue raised by the
novel is how the people of Belitong get around with the poverty and hardship that have
gone deep in their lives, including the way they choose schools. There are a number of
reasons why the parents choose the school to educate their children.

Kami bertetangga dan kami adalah orang-orang Melayu Belitong dari sebuah
komunitas yang paling miskin di pulau itu. Adapun sekolah kami, SD Muhammadiyah,
juga sekolah kampung yang paling miskin di Belitong. Ada tiga alasan mengapa para
orangtua mendaftarkan anaknya di sini. Pertama, karena sekolah Muhammadiyah tidak
menetapkan iuran dalam bentuk apa pun, para orangtua hanya menyumbangkan
sukarela semampu mereka. Kedua, karena firasat, anak-anak mereka dianggap
memiliki karakter yang mudah disesatkan iblis sehingga sejak usia muda harus
mendapat pendadaran Islam yang tangguh. Ketiga, karena anaknya memang tak
diterima di sekolah mana pun. (hlm.4)

(We are neighbors and we belong to the poorest community of the Belitong Malay in
this island. And our school, SD Muhammadiyah, is also the poorest village school in
Belitong. There are three possible reasons why parents register their children in this
school. First, because the school does not require them to pay any school fee, they can
just give whatever they can give. Second, because they think that their children can
easily be tempted by the devil so that Islamic teachings should be given since early age.
Third, simply because their children are not accepted in any other school. (p.4))

Chapter one up to thirty contain various snapshots of the students’ school

adventure in the Muhammadiyah Elementary and Junior High Schools. While chapter
thirty one up to thirty four tell what happened twelve years later, after they finished junior
high school in Belitong.
It is interesting to discuss the pattern of descriptions of the characters and
happenings in every chapter of this novel. The writer refers the readers’ minds to various
things which are not unknown, especially by readers who have knowledge of certain
disciplines. This pattern is very dominant and can be said as Andrea Hirata’s artistic
achievement. Below are several quotations that show this pattern.
The references which complete the readers’ imagination can be seen in these
descriptions of characters and places.

(1) Ayahnya, yang seperti orang Bushman itu, sekarang menganggap keputusan
menyekolahkan Lintang adalah keputusan yang tepat, paling tidak ia senang
melihat semangat anaknya menggelegak. (hlm.95)

(His father, who looks like a bushman, now thinks that sending Lintang to school is
the right decision, at least he is glad to see the kid’s passion for school. (p. 95))
 The description below shows how A Ling, the daughter of Mr. A Miuaw, attracts
the narrator:

(2) Seperti kebanyakan ras Mongoloid, tulang pipinya tidak menonjol, tapi bidang
wajahnya, bangun bahunya, jenjang lehernya, potongan rambutnya, dan jatuh
dagunya yang elegan menciptakan keseluruhan kesan dirinya benar-benar mirip
Michelle Yeoh, bintang film Malaysia yang cantik itu. (hlm. 211)

(Like most Mongoloids, her cheek bones do not show, but her wide face, her
well-shaped shoulders, her long neck, her hair style, and her elegant dropping chin
create the whole image that she looks like Michelle Yeoh, the beautiful Malaysian
movie star. (p. 211))

And here are descriptions of an area:

(3) Mereka, kaum borjuis ini, bersemayam di kawasan eksklusif yang disebut Gedong.
Mereka seperti orang-orang kulit putih di wilayah selatan Amerika pada tahun
70-an. (hlm. 42)

(They, those bourgeois, reside in an exclusive area called the Gedong. They are like
the white people in the southern part of America in the 70s. (p. 42))

(4) Sepadan dengan kebun gantung yang memesona di pelataran Babylon, sebuah
taman kesayangan Tiran Nebukadnezzar III untuk memuja Dewa Marduk, Gedong
adalah land mark Belitong.

(As beautiful as the enchanting garden in Babylonia, the garden of the tyrant
Nebukadnessar III used to worship the God Marduk, Gedong is the landmark of
Belitong.)

In telling the story, in the last part Andrea changes the point of view, from the
character Ikal to Syahdan. This change of point of view surely gives a certain touch to the
readers. Until the last part of the novel readers only see from Ikal’s point of view, and
what about Ikal himself? This last part closes with a question about what happens to Ikal
in Java. The only picture given to the readers is his mother’s reaction when seeing a
photograph of him wearing punk outfits. This part also shows how one by one those
Muhammadiyah Elementary students find their ways of lives.
Sang Pemimpi (The Dreamer), Andrea Hirata’s second novel, opens with an
“escape” from a teacher named Mr. Mustar. Like in action movies, the suspense arouses
the reader’s curiosity. This kind of opening, at least, became the right choice for Andrea.
In the eyes of the students in the story—Ikal, Arai and Jimbron, at least—Mr. Mustar is
like the cruel Westerling.
The presence of a state high school in Magai, a small port town in Belitong island,
has become a blessing for the people in the area. Kids don’t have to go to Tanjung
Pandan, 120 km away from there, to study in high school. It was Mr. Mustar, the cruel
teacher in the eyes of the students, who was responsible for the birth of the school.
Sang Pemimpi becomes an adventure story of three teenage boys who use all their
youthful spirits to satisfy their naughtiness. Andrea presents their backgrounds and how
they build their dreams in a humorous way, besides adding sad and typical teenage love
stories.
Like Laskar Pelangi, Sang Pemimpi also deals with school environment of the
poor children of Belitong island. The cheerfulness of high school life is presented clearly
by Andrea, as if there were no hardships that cover most of their days in Magai. The
poignant life faced by Arai, for example, does not make him a bitter character; instead, he
becomes a young man with an open heart, who cares for others.

Meskipun perasaannya telah luluh lantak pada usia sangat muda, tapi ia selalu positif
dan berjiwa seluas langit. Mengingat masa lalunya yang pilu, aku kagum pada
kepribadian dan daya hidupnya. (hlm. 33)

(Even though his heart has been torn to pieces since childhood, he always thinks
positively and he has a soul as wide as the sky. Considering his past, that is full of
sorrow, I feel amazed by his personality and his life spirit. (p. 33))

Arai menyerahkan karung-karung tadi pada Mak Cik. Beliau terkaget-kaget. Lalu aku
tertegun mendengar rencana Arai: dengan bahan-bahan itu dimintanya Mak Cik
membuat kue dan kami yang akan menjualnya.
“Mulai sekarang, Mak Cik akan punya penghasilan!” seru Arai bersemangat.
Mata Mak Cik berkaca-kaca. Seribu terima kasih seolah tak’kan cukup baginya.
Tubuhku yang dari tadi kaku karena tegang mengantisipasi rencana Arai kini
pelan-pelan merosot sehingga aku terduduk di balik daun pintu. Aku menunduk dan
memeluk lututku yang tertekuk. Aku merasa malu pada diriku sendiri. Bibirku bergetar
menahan rasa haru pada putihnya hati Arai. Air mataku mengalir pelan. Sungguh tak
sedikit pun kuduga Arai merencanakan sesuatu yang sangat mulia untuk Mak Cik.
Sebuah rencana yang akan kudukung habis-habisan. (hlm. 51)

(Arai gave the sacks to Mak Cik. She was shocked. And I was stunned by his plan: he
asked Mak Cik to make cookies and we would help her to sell them.
“From now on you will have an income!” Arai said passionately.
Mak Cik’s eyes glisten, a thousand thanks may not be enough.
My body, that had become stiff wondering about his plan, now slowly slipped off to
the floor behind the door. I looked down and held my bended knees. I felt ashamed of
myself. My lips trembled, restraining the uproar in my heart to see the whiteness of his
heart. My tears dropped. It was beyond my thought that Arai had planned something so
noble for Mak Cik. A plan that I would back up completely. (p. 51))

A sad story is also experienced by Jimbron, a story which started with what had
happened to his father, as shown in this quotation:

Dulu bicaranya normal seperti anak-anak lainnya. Jimbron adalah anak tertua dari tiga
bersaudara. Ia memiliki dua adik kembar perempuan. Ibunya wafat ketika Jimbron kelas
empat SD. Jimbron sangat dekat dan sangat tergantung pada ayahnya. Ayahnya adalah
orientasi hidupnya. Suatu hari, belum empat puluh hari ibunya wafat, Jimbron
bepergian naik sepeda dibonceng ayahnya, masih berkendara ayahnya terkena serangan
jantung. Konon Jimbron pontang-panting dengan sepeda itu membawa ayahnya ke
Puskesmas. Ia berusaha sekuat tenaga, panik, dan jatuh bangun terseok-seok
membonceng ayahnya yang sesak napas sambil kesusahan memeganginya. Sampai di
Puskesmas Jimbron [...] kehabisan napas dan pucat pasi ketakutan. Ia kalut, tak sanggup
menjelaskan situasinya pada orang-orang [...] Beberapa menit di Puskesmas ayahnya
meninggal. Sejak itu Jimbron gagap. (hlm. 61)
 (He used to speak normally like any other kids. Jimbron is the oldest of three. He has
two twin sisters. His mother passed away when he was at the fourth grade. He was very
close and relied so much on his father. His father was his life orientation. One day, forty
days after his mother’s death, He went out with his father, riding a bicycle. While
riding, his father had a heart attack. People said Jimbron rode the bicycle in panic,
taking his father to the Community Health Center. He tried as hard as he could to paddle
the bicycle, going up and down, holding his father who barely could breathe. Arriving at
the Health Center, Jimbron […] was loosing his breath and his face was so pale with
fear. He was so frightened that he could not explain the situation. […] A few minutes
later his father died. Since then Jimbron had a terrible stutter. (p. 61))

The incident which gave him a speech handicap—in addition to his other
handicaps—did not make him an introvert, but he grew up to become a caring and
cheerful person. He even sympathized to Laksmi for he felt that they both have sorrowful
lives, “I only want to make her smile…” he said seriously.
About Laksmi’s painful life, Andrea presents the most tragic incident in this novel.
The tragedy is produced not only by fate and the painful life experienced by this character,
but also by paradoxing two situations (Seine and Manggar Rivers). The quotation below
shows that.

Namun, tak seindah cerita romansa Sungai Seine, muara [muara Sungai Manggar,
MYS] itu adalah muara air mata. Beberapa tahun lalu sebuah keluarga Melayu
berkebun di pulau kecil tak jauh dari muara. Dalam perjalanan pulang, perahu mereka
terbalik. Dua hari kemudian orang melihat sosok-sosok mengambang pelan, lekat satu
sama lain, mengikuti anak Sungai Manggar. Sang Ayah, dengan kedua tangannya,
memeluk, merengkuh, menggenggam seluruh anggota keluarganya. Istrinya dan ketiga
anaknya semua berada dalam dekapannya. Ia ingin menyelamatkan semuanya. Sebuah
upaya yang sia-sia. Tapi anak tertuanya, Laksmi, selamat. Gadis kecil itu tak sadarkan
diri, tersangkut di akar-akar bakau. Sejak itu semenanjung tempat keluarga itu
ditemukan dinamakan orang Semenanjung Ayah [...] sejak kematian keluarganya,
kehidupan seolah terenggut dari Laksmi. Ia dirundung murung setiap hari [...] Dan
selama bertahun-tahun itu pula, tak pernah lagi—tak pernah walau hanya sekali—orang
melihat Laksmi tersenyum. (hlm. 77-78)

(However, not as beautiful as the romantic story of the river Seine, the estuary [of
Manggar River, ed] is the estuary of tears. A few years ago, a Malay family worked on a
a land on a small island near the estuary. On their way home, their small boat turned
upside down. Two days later, some people saw dead bodies floating on the water,
holding each other, flowing down the river. The father, with both hands, held, pulled
and grasped all his family members. His wife and three children were all in his embrace.
He had wanted to save them all. A failing effort. But his oldest girl, Laksmi, survived.
The little girl was unconscious, caught on mangrove three roots. Since then the place
where the dead family was found has been called Father’s peninsula […] since the death
of her family, her life was like taken away. She is always sad everyday […] And for
years, nobody has ever—not even once—seen Laksmi smile. (p. 77-78))

From cheerfulness and naughtiness to painfulness. This arrangement is stretched

along Sang Pemimpi. The most touching human emotional uproar may happen when, first,
someone has to depart from or after a long separation meet again with the closest
acquaintances; second, someone gives away one’s most precious belonging to help a best
friend’s plan; third, an impossible dream becomes reality. At least those three kinds of
uproar cover the three best friends. An uproar that invites relieving tears.
The characters in the two novels are students in poor conditions and with limited
possibilities in life, but they all have strong inspirations, their teachers (Ms. Mus, Mr.
Harfan, Mr. Baia, Mr. Mustar). The inspiration from the teachers washes away their
poverty and limitations, and guides them to become independent characters. The
independence becomes a means to reach their goals in life.
There are three things, at least, that can be noted down from these two novels. The
first is the bankruptcy of PN Timah which gave troubles to the people of Belitong and
Sawang, who had been relying on that state-owned company to get income. They had to
loose their jobs. Second, both novels reflect the success story of several characters in
following their hearts, either in education or in love. Third, both novels show the spirit of
young people who love their birth place, Belitong.***