One of the most popular genre of novels in Indonesia is the “cerita silat” (cersil) or martial art story. It is based on Indonesia’s traditional martial art discipline, the “pencak silat” or simply “silat”, hence the name. The cersil flourished since early 20th century, and heavily influenced by wuxia novels or kung fu novels from China.
Like the knights stories in Europe, both cersil and wuxia novels present the stories about warriors, kings, heroes, warlords, hermits, and beautiful princesses, with historic events from ancient and medieval age to colonialism era in 18th and 19th century as a background to the whole story. Some has fantasy and mythology elements such as gods, spirits, heavenly creatures, monsters, dwarfs, witches, or demons.
What makes cersil different from other form of stories about history and ancient heroes is that it always tells characters that have masterful and sometimes superhuman skills in pencak silat. Someone who mastered the highest skill of the pencak silat is called “pendekar” or the warrior.
A good pendekar must preserve justice and rightousness to help others with his or her silat knowledge. The good ones will have to deal with endless and deadly challenge from the villains, which also have similar level of skill in silat with the good pendekars. The good ones usually called “pendekar golongan putih” or white warriors, while their counterparts are called “pendekar golongan hitam” or dark warriors.
It is the fights and clashes between the goods and the bads that makes cersil so appealing to its fanatic readers. While on duel, both parties exchange their own deadly fists which is called the “jurus” to kill or disable each other. The fights sometimes end with cruel and horrifying dead since most fights are accompanied with deep hatred and years of dreadful revenge. Love could also triggers deadly clashes as well.
One of the most prominent cersil characters in Indonesia is Mahesa Jenar from the giant novel “Nagasasra Sabuk Inten” by Indonesia’s greatest cersil author, the late SH Mintardja. Jenar is a master of silat, who’s after his retirement from the Kingdom of Demak army in mid 16th century Java, begins his long juurney to search the palace’s lost treasures, the kris Nagasasra (which means One Thousand Dragons) and the kris Sabuk Inten (Diamonds Belt).
During his journey, Jenar (Mahesa Jenar is an ancient Javanese name/phrase which literally means The Yellow Bull) must face the oppositions from supervillains such as Lowo Ijo (Green Bat), Sepasang Uling (Pair of Snakes), and the legendary Pasingsingan. If the condition become critical and he involves in life-threatening situation, Jenar must release his ultimate fist, the Sasrabirawa (One Thousand Demons), to end the opponent’s challenge.
Each pendekar like Jenar has his or her own unique deadly fist as a secret and ultimate weapon against enemies. Such power comes from special element in the body called the “tenaga dalam” or inner-self strength. It’s similar to superpower strength and special feat in superhero characters from comic books such as Spider-Man, Batman, or Superman. The tenaga dalam gives each pendekar their superhuman abilities to fight enemies and defend themselves.
Besides Mintardja, Indonesia has plenty of excellent cersil authors with outstanding talent like Asmaraman S Kho Ping Hoo, Widi Widayat, and Herman Pratikto. The famous contemporary novelist Arswendo Atmowiloto once wrote cersil novel entitled Senopati Pamungkas or The Final Warlord which garnered high critical reception from critics and readers as well.
I also once wrote a cersil. It is called Menuju Matahari (Towards the Sun) which was published in Suara Merdeka Daily Newspaper in Semarang, Central Java, from August 1997 to July 1998. It tells the story of one young and handsome warrior named Wisnumurti and his two best friends, Jaladri and Bajul Kuning.
The three of them tried to unravel the mystery that surround the tragic death of Prince Samodra, an ex general of the Sultanate of Pasir who lives in a hill called the Manyar Mount with his family. The prince and all of his family members was brutally massacred by a group of unknown warriors 20 years earlier. Later investigation shows that the recent Sultan of Pasir is probably masterminded the massacre.
Right now I’m in the middle of a process to convert the story into a full-length cersil novel, which hopefully can be published in 2011. During the process, i feature it as a serial in my Facebook page, Wien’s World. You can read it down there. But for the moment, it only available in Bahasa Indonesia version. So international audiences will have to wait until it has been completely translated to English before the story can be released internationally, which I hope can be done very soon.
