The New Female Image: Dewi Ayu’s Feminist Consciousness in

Cantik Itu Luka

Mundi Rahayu

, Nahdia Aurelia Aurita

UIN Maulana Malik Ibrahim Malang, Jl. Gajayana 50, Malang. Indonesia

Keywords: feminist consciousness, Cantik itu Luka, traditional stereotype, new woman

Abstract: Eka Kurniawan’s novel “Cantik Itu Luka” is his first major novel successfully constructs the main female

character, Dewi Ayu, which is unique, controversial and heartbreaking. This study aims to analyze the main

female character, Dewi Ayu, in “Cantik itu Luka.” This study argues that although the main character is not

a native Javanese woman, she represents herself as a woman that is able to challenge traditional

stereotypes. Based on the data analysis, Dewi Ayu’s characterization, acts and actions it can be concluded

that she builds feminist consciousness. She can be called new woman because the new character is able to

challenge traditional stereotypes of Dutch and Javanese woman, which is mostly characterized by

obedience to man and social norms under patriarchal society. It can be found out from the analysis that

Dewi Ayu feminist consciousness challenges the social norms through her rebellious spirit, self-reliance,

bravity, determined, and leadership.

1 INTRODUCTION

This paper is going to discuss Eka Kurniawan’s

first major novel, “Cantik Itu Luka” which is firstly

published in 2002. This novel is one of his works

that made him awarded Prince Claus Award 2018

for literature and this literary work has been

discussed in many literary circles. Instead of a mere

fantasy, there are many interesting aspects that the

reader can grasp from this rich literary work, such as

history, legends, folklore of Indonesian under the

colonial era and the early of Indonesian

independence and the New Order regime.

Be In this novel, Eka successfully constructs the

main female character, Dewi Ayu, that is different,

unique, controversial and in some cases

heartbreaking. Dewi Ayu is not a native Javanese

woman instead, she is the descendant of a Dutch

father and a Javanese mother. As portrayed on the

cover of the novel (in the Indonesian 2015 edition),

she looks like a woman with blue eyes wearing

traditional Javanese attire sitting at a teak-wooden

chair. The main female character attracts readers’

attention because of her identity as a half Dutch and

half Javanese native, as seen on the novel’s cover.

The picture gives impression as beautiful woman

constructed by male artist (Melosik, 2015), but it

also impresses as a strong one.

The main character articulates the idea of a

woman that is able to challenge traditional

stereotypes of (Dutch and Javanese) woman. That is

why this paper is aimed at discussing the novel by

highlighting the challenging main character, in

which the study needs the incorporation of

postcolonial studies into feminist studies. In other

word, this study is aimed at scrutinizing the main

character of this novel, Dewi Ayu, by applying

postcolonial feminism perspective (Takemura,

2010).

Postcolonial paradigm is popularly articulated in

Edward Said’ phenomenal book, Orientalism (Said,

1978) stating that postcolonial theory highlighted the

issues of representation in colonial discourse and the

urgency of emerging voices of the natives. In

discussing the relationship between postcolonialism

and feminism, we have to discuss the most

influential criticism of the classic essays, “Three

Women’s Texts and a Critique of Imperialiam”

(Spivak, 1985) and “Under Western Eyes: Feminist

Scholarship and Colonial Discourses” (Mohanty,

1984). Spivak criticizes western feminism as the

perspective that reproduces the axiom of

imperialism (Spivak, 1985: 243). Mohanty’s

634

Rahayu, M. and Aurelia Aurita, N.

The New Female Image: Dewi Ayu’s Feminist Consciousness in Cantik Itu Luka.

DOI: 10.5220/0009913606340640

In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Recent Innovations (ICRI 2018), pages 634-640

ISBN: 978-989-758-458-9

criticism says that the image of the third world

woman who is always oppressed is what sustains the

illusion of “first world” women’s autonomy: the

assumption that they (western women) are secular,

liberated, and have control over their own lives”

(Mohanty, 1984: 353). These essays criticize that the

Western feminist ideas tend to colonizing the

postcolonial women. So, the criticsm goes on to the

point that it is necessary to build feminist

individualism that highlights female problems by

contextualizing in their own context.

In this postcolonialism context, one of the

important questions is how the natives’ voice

subvert the assumptions of colonial discourse and

the natives rewrite its history. The assumption of

imperialist that justifies the colonialism says that the

‘feminine’ land out there to be explored by ‘male’

explorer (McClintock, 1995). This idea shows the

interconnection between colonialism and the

movement of feminism, in the importance to raise

against the colonial power. Native’s voice and

feminist voice get the interconnection in the

postcolonial studies, as one of the tools of analysis

in scrutinizing the consequences of colonialism,

dealing with the social and economics impacts of

colonialism.

The context of colonial and postcolonial

Indonesia is narrated in the novel “Cantik itu Luka”

through the dynamic and tragic life of the female

characters, Dewi Ayu and her four daughters. Dewi

Ayu who is a Dutch-Javanese descendant needs to

be analyzed and understood in her domestic and

sexual arrangement in colonial Indonesia. In other

similar study, Stoler builds the connections between

“beliefs about European manliness, racial

membership, sexual morality and the management of

empire” (Stoler, 2002: 6).

Related with the postcolonial context, feminist

literary criticism examines the way in which

literature (and other cultural product) reinforces or

undermines the economic, political, social, and

psychological oppression of women (Mikulan,2009).

In reading literary works, this is the readers’ task to

draw attention to the examination of the ways

women are portrayed, search for archetypes from

feminist perspective, examine the feminist values

and the sense of community or focus its intention to

the patriarchal way of subject construction and

possible points of resistance towards gender

inequality (Dresang, 2002).

The issue of women’s image in literary works

has been narrated in many Indonesian literary works

since the colonial period, the era of Balai Pustaka,

up to contemporary millenial eras. The novel, Cantik

Itu Luka which is published in 2002 attracts people’s

attention because of the image of the main character

is controversial and challenging conservative

stereotype of woman. Dewi Ayu, the main

character, is a woman who has a very striking beauty

and having four daughters, three of which inherit her

beauty and the one youngest child who is

mysteriously ugly. Those women have interesting

trajectory of lifes and face many horrible sexual

abuses during the Dutch and Japan colonialism and

the early years of independent Indonesian up to New

Order regime.

2 METHOD

This is a literary criticism, a qualitative and

textual study designed to get detailed description on

how the feminist character and her consciousness

built and developed under the perspective of

postcolonial feminism. The data source of this study

is the novel “Cantik itu Luka”, Indonesian version,

written by Eka Kurniawan in 480 pages, published

by Gramedia Pustaka utama in 2015.

The data from this novel are analysed by

applying the concept of postcolonial feminism to get

detailed description on how the main female

character, named Dewi Ayu, acts, says, thinks and

responds towards any event happening surrounding

her. Postcolonial feminist literary criticism puts the

focus on the female subject character’s idea in

struggling and articulating her opinion, voice, and

interest in patriarchal society under the situation of

colonial and postcolonial eras. Her success in

articulating her interest and ideas, often with the

necessity to break social norms, shows that how she

is able to get access, control, and benefit to get

survived in turmoil years of colonialism

The concept developed by Mohanty (1984) and

Spivak (1985) helps to build the understanding on

the connection of race-and-gender-conscious

historical materialism. Through the connection, we

are able to perceive the complexities, singularities,

and interconnections between women. This

connection is necessary to understand the power,

privilege, agency, and dissent can be made by

womann.

3 DISCUSSION

In the opening of the novel, the main character,

Dewi Ayu is resurrected from her grave magically

The New Female Image: Dewi Ayu’s Feminist Consciousness in Cantik Itu Luka

635

and she is well shaped and dressed. All of a sudden

this event shocked many people she meets but she

does not care, instead she goes ahead to her home,

where her youngest daughter lives. This daughter

names Si Cantik (beauty), which is a very paradox

name because of her physical appearance that is not

beautiful in any sense at all. Then the story goes

flash back to the era of nearly the end of Dutch

colonialism, when Dewi Ayu was a girl. She is a

granddaughter of Ted Stammlers, a Dutch old man

living in Java Island in the Dutch colonial era, in

1930s.

The end of Dutch colonialism is approaching.

It is chaotic situation for Dutch government, people

and families, who have been in this Javanese land

for several generations have to escape or return back

to Europe after Japan military occupy Java in the

early 1940s. Most of Dewi Ayu’s family, Stammler

family, went back to Europe, but Dewi Ayu decided

to live and stay in her home in Java. She feels at

home in Java island, beside that she is aware that she

was born here in Java, inherited Javanese blood, and

her name is Javanese name instead of Dutch. Her

Javanese identity is strongly built in her although

she inherits European face and eyes that make her

beautiful and different both from many Javanese

girls and Dutch girls.

Dewi Ayu’s identity is a kind of hybridity in

which her phisical appearance is European look,

while her name is Javanese and she is haunted by the

ancestor (her Javanese grandmother) misery life.

The hybridity of the female character is enabled by

her grand parents’ inter-racial sexual relationship, in

which her grandmother is Javanese and her

grandfather is Dutch. This miscegenation brings

many problems as the consequence of the unequal

social political position between the Dutch and

Javanese. As stated by Young (1995) that the

centrality of colonial not only brings about economic

consequences, but also concerns about

miscegenation (inter-racial marriage) and

“hybridity”.

The occupation of Japanese military in Java

Island brings misery for Dutch people who are still

living in Java, which Japanese army collect all of

them and bring them to an empty small island, as

prisoners. All of the Dutch girls and women as well

as children are brought to the prison island,

Bloodenkamp. Dewi Ayu, a half Dutch is included

in the prison Bloodenkamp with all her friends and

neighbours who live in their village and

surrounding. The Japanese army not only bring

them to prison but the military also starts the

prostitution business to serve them. The Dutch girls

in the prison, including Dewi Ayu, are selected to be

prostitute for Japanese military, based on their

beauty and healthy body. In this case, the healthy

young women, especially Dutch, become the

preference for male Japanese military. As a smart

girl, Dewi Ayu knows how to deal with the men.

Instead of screaming and getting depressed, Dewi

Ayu prefers to keep aware and think how to control

her own body (Wiyatmi, 2009).

The new female image of Dewi Ayu presented in

this novel gives us the idea that she is totally

different from traditional types. Moreover, she takes

the attitude against the social norms. Dewi Ayu’s

rebellious spirit, self-reliance, and strong mind make

her the ideal new female image.

According to Wang (2010), there are two types

of female images in the traditional culture. The first

type is the discriminated femaleness where men are

always considered to have rational mind, superior

intelligence, and their capability of leadership, while

women are considered as inferior to men in all

aspect. Moreover, they maintain their roles in

society as their nurturance role, and considered as

not capable of reasoning and organization. The

second type is the praise worthy femaleness. This

second type implies that there are women who are

praised because of anything related with her

femaleness.

Guan (2004) states that during the Middle Ages,

men no longer attack women, they begin to flatter

women’s ability and achievement. Women are

praised as wives to support husband and they

sacrifice for family. However, these ideal female

images did not put down the existing sexism.

Instead, it is justification for men to limit women

within the circle of family life. Power and reason

still belong to men and the only thing that became

women possessions are their beautiful bodies and

frail minds.

The two types of women mentioned above are

designed to maintain the stability of men social

status. Shang (2000) asserts that women are

dependents towards their father, and then their

husband and because of the possibility of

widowhood, then women are dependent to their son

if they any, or any surviving males relatives. The

two of women are forever under control of men and

never have their right of independence.

Dewi Ayu, the major characters in Cantik Itu

Luka, does not fit within those two types of

traditional women according to Wang and Guan,

thus, the writer refers to this as the new female

image. The description of new female images is

expected to be an inspiration for the women

ICRI 2018 - International Conference Recent Innovation

636

nowadays to recognize and resist the rules and

forces that undermined women’s self-confidence and

assertiveness and strive for optimistic ideal, which is

equality between men and women.

3.1 Dewi Ayu’s Rebellious Spirit

The main female character in this novel is

constructed as distinct woman, with specific and

strong characteristic. The peculiarity of the chacarter

developed is important to support the plot and

develop the conflict. Dewi Ayu has her

consciousness that makes her rebellious to anything

or anybody that does not make sense for her. She

will fight against anybody who tell her what to do.

When Dewi Ayu wants to die and she believes

that she will die after she gave birth to her fourth

daughter, she wears shroud (white cloth for dead

corpse) everyday before her real dead. Her action

infuriates a kyai, (a religious leader) in her village,

Halimunda. The kyai then told her to strip the kain

kafan off (Kurniawan, 2015, p.8). Commonly,

people will obey whatever the religious leader says.

However, Dewi Ayu refuses to do so. Instead, she

said to the kyai that if he wants a prostitue to strips

her clothes off, he should pay for it. Dewi Ayu said

that with high confidence, so that the kyai feels

embarrassed, and without saying anything else he

leaves her.

Dewi Ayu’s response to the kyai shows that she

is confident to anybody even the kyai who has high

social status in the society because of his

religiousity. In Dewi Ayu’s mind, everybody is

equal, and she does not want to do whoever tell her

to do something without her consent< although she

is a prostitute but she is a prostitute that knows how

to determine her own choice. Her confidence also

means that she builds her own power over the other

men and women in her surrounding. Because of her

action, wearing shroud everyday to be dead soon,

there are many people visit her and try to get benefit

from the situation.

Dewi Ayu is already rebellious since she was a

little girl. She is never afraid to speak what is in her

mind. She always does what she want, not what

other people wants from her. At her school age,

Dewi Ayu has been assertive and confident. When

the nuns at her school suggest her to be a nun with

the reason that her beauty would be a problem later

in her life, without hesitation Dewi Ayu turns down

their suggestion. She replies that if all women

become nuns, then humans would go extinct like

dinosaurs (Kurniawan, 2015:38)

Realizing her power makes little Dewi Ayu

confident in speaking to her teacher. The nuns who

teach Dewi Ayu are worried with the way she thinks

which always speaks what is on her mind and even

the way she thinks is unlike any other women of her

age. She even says to the nuns who tell her and her

classmates about the war to learn how to shoot a gun

rather than just talk about it. Dewi Ayu points out

that they could actually do something for

themselves; learning how to shoot a gun. Dewi Ayu

has a very unique way of thinking, because she does

not believe that she is powerless and she is not afraid

to say what she thinks. Dewi Ayu does not agree

with the other girls who believe that they are

powerless and helpless

3.2 Dewi Ayu’s Self Reliance

During the Japanese colonialism, people in

Halimunda are having a hard time to survive for

their life. The entire cocoa and coconut farm are

bombed and Mexoli Olvado palm oil mill is under

Japanese military. Dewi Ayu, as the only remaining

Stammler descendant, refuses to return back to the

Netherlands with her grandmother, thus she must

face that unprecedented condition by herself. A

couple of months later she is imprisoned because she

is Dutch descend. Instead of hoping her condition

will get better like other imprisoners, Dewi Ayu

decides to make a plan for her own life when she is

freed from the prison. Preparing for her future, she

decides to swallow six-edged rings jade and

diamonds. This not only shows that Dewi Ayu is

independent, but also that she is smart.

Survival in the prison with hundreds people,

Dewi Ayu realizes that they face a big problem of

food supply. For overcoming this problem, Dewi

Ayu again shows her self-reliance in surviving her

life by doing many things that Dutch people never

think before, like hunting crocodile that gives them

with the abundant meat of crocodile to make soup

(Kurniawan. E, 2015:69-70). During two years in

prison where many people died one by one, Dewi

Ayu is increasing her ability to survive at wild life,

such as hunting crocodile, lizards, mice, and frogs

rather than depending on the limited supply food

from Japanese soldier. Wang (2010) in his research

stated that this is the true success for the femaleness,

which is not dependent upon men. Other evidence of

Dewi Ayu’s independence in surviving her life is

when Dewi Ayu is freed from Japanese camp and

planned to take her money for her own business.

Common women in this novel hold that women’s

role as a good wife is indicated through the ability to

The New Female Image: Dewi Ayu’s Feminist Consciousness in Cantik Itu Luka

637

manage their children and husband. The setting of

place of this novel is Halimunda, a Javanese

traditional village in 1940s, with the dominant view

that the place of women are at home with domestic

chores. Any public affairs belong to men or

husband. The women traditional role and the

challenge is one of dominant themes in many

Indonesian and Malay literary works which becomes

important theme to be discussed (Izharudin, A.,

2018).

In a patriarchal society with dominant traditional

view, Dewi Ayu rebelled against the traditional

gender role. After she got out from the prison, she

never wed to anyone. The Japanese prison becomes

the place when learns a lot about how to survive and

be more independent and relies upon her. She

becomes a prostitute with the highest price, and she

chooses the man who can be with her, not any man

who wants her can be with her.

She becomes a self-reliant woman,

economically, socially, and politically.

Economically, she gets her own money to fulfil her

necessities for herself and her daughters. Socially

she is able to be the trendsetter for women in

Halimunda. Whatever she wears becomes the main

reference for Halimunda women who always

gossiping her and at the same time imitating her

style. Politically, in many chaotic situations, she is

able to overcome her problems. She is able to

“conquer” three powerful men in Halimunda,

Maman Gendeng, the most powerful thug, Kamerad

Kliwon, militant lefties politician, and Shodanco, the

most powerful military person in Halimunda. Dewi

Ayu ‘embraces’ those three powerful men in

Halimunda by making them her sons-in law for her

three daughters, Alamanda, Adinda and Maya Dewi.

Through Dewi Ayu’s conflict management, those

three men who are conflicting each other can be

domesticated.

Women existence to overcome the problems and

challenges is determined by her performativity. Her

ability to be the subject, instead of object, that is

able to make decision on her life will make sure that

she is knowledgeable and able to calculate any

situation (Butler, 1990). Dewi Ayu’s performativity

is described obviously in this novel. She makes

herself a subject who is able to make decision on her

fate. Any action she takes is based on her conscious

consideration and material calculation. This is

obviously narrated when she has to give her sexual

service to the commander of the Bloodenkamp (the

prison) as a payment for medical service to help Ola

van Rijk’ mother. She considers her sacrifice is less

important than her friend’s mother’s life. This shows

the humanistic values that she believes in life.

3.3 Dewi Ayu’s Bravery

Bravery is a courageous behavior or character,

commonly associated with men in patriarchal

society. Women on the other hand, are always

associated with femininity; soft, quiet, pretty,

perfect, weak, but rarely brave. Dewi Ayu has these

remarkable traits. She is brave in facing many

terrible situations that broke her flesh and heart.

When she and her chosen friends are being

transferred from Blodenkamp prison to Mama

Kalong (prostitution house)’s place back in

Halimunda, the girls are shocked, afraid and finding

their fate as prostitutes they are all crying and

depressed, but not Dewi Ayu. Though she knows

exactly where they are brought to and what they

have to do, she stays calm and entertains herself and

the other girls.

Dewi Ayu and her friends are forced to be

prostitutes and they do not get paid for it. In facing

this, all the Dutch girls are angry, hysterical and

some are got mad. However, Dewi Ayu, realizing

that doing that is pointless, she thinks of another

way to accomplish the job. She stays motionless

during the sexual intercourse so her client would

eventually get tired of her. Dewi Ayu suggests her

friends to do what she always does during the

service time, in which she stays still, or chose one of

the clients that they like, and then pleasure them so

they will come to them every night, and hope to be

their mistress. However, her friends could not face

that beacuse they are afraid. The girls think that this

is terribly unbearable. The other thing she does in

this Japanese military prostitution is she gets

pregnant. By having pregnancy she is free from the

obligation of doing sexual service for the Japanese

military, and she gets privilege of special care.

The prostitution house in which the girls have to

serve Japanese is managed by Mama Kalong. In this

house the girls have to work in each of the room.

They do not get paid, or only a very little payment to

serve Japanese soldiers and military men. Sexual

worker is a job that cannot be imagined by the Dutch

girls, because this job is commonly done by women

in need of money or those in low class people. This

job is often considered as a morally negative-

stigmatized for the workers but the customers are

usually the men having financial abundance or social

capital or those in having structural or political

position in society. The social and moral negative

stigma is labelled to the women not the men

ICRI 2018 - International Conference Recent Innovation

638

involved in the business of prostitution. Dewi Ayu

later on proves that by being a prostitute she can

build her own social capital, and her power. She

knows exactly who are politically and socially

having power in the society of Halimunda and she

can overcome the social problems through her social

capital.

3.4 Dewi Ayu’s Self Detemination

Other praiseworthy traits of Dewi Ayu are her

determination. She is very decisive, she knows what

she wants and she always finds a way to get it.

When Dewi Ayu is afraid that Maya Dewi, her third

daughter will follow her sisters’ footstep and be

rebellious, she decided to wed Maya Dewi to her

lovers, Maman Gendeng. When Maman Gendeng is

informed about it, he knows that he cannot refuse it,

and his fate is decided because he knows just how

determined Dewi Ayu is. At first Maman Gendeng

wants to get married with Dewi Ayu, but Dewi Ayu

does not want him. She asks Maman Gendeng to

marry with youngest daughter, Maya Dewi. Maman

Gendeng, the most feared thug in Halimunda is

conquered by Dewi Ayu. While determination is

always associated with men, Dewi Ayu has proven

to be more determined than men, and when she

already put her mind onto something, there are

nothing other people, could do about it.

Dewi Ayu’s self determination to get married

with Ma Gedik, an old man who looks

psychologically unhealthy, living in a hut alone far

from any normal people, surprises many people.

Dewi Ayu is a beautiful woman who is wanted by

any normal man in Halimunda, but she wants to get

married with a deserted man. But what she wants

must come true. She instructs her people to look for

Ma Gedik, and when Ma Gedik is found out, he is

forced to be brought to Dewi Ayu’s house to be

married, and he just refuses anything. He does not

want to eat or drink or doing anything. Dewi Ayu

gets big challenge with Ma Gedik’s attitude. At last,

Ma Gedik runs away from the house and kills

himself by throwing away his body on top of a

steepy hill across the hill where Ma Iyang, his old

love, died years ago.

3.5 Dewi Ayu’s Leadership

Society in the novel Cantik Itu Luka was still trying

to distinguish masculine and feminine ways of doing

things in

The workplace and public space. Majority of women

in colonial era are portrayed as dependent and

socially marginalized. However, Dewi Ayu is able to

build her own leadership in many things in her life.

She is very decisive; she knows what she wants and

how to get it. This trait leads her to have a natural

leadership capability.

Her leadership is showed when she is a girl,

in Japanese camp, Bloodenkamp. Seeing that

nothing she can do in her free time, and finding out

that many children are idle, Dewi Ayu creates a

class in the hall corner and teaches the children

many simple knowledge that she knows, like history,

geography, and literacy - how to read and write. In

the late-night, she will gather all of the children in

the camp and telling them a story before going to

sleep. Also, she tries to find a doctor and later create

a hospital beside the class although without enough

bed and medicine. She is then trusted as the leader of

the group because she is considered matured enough

and has a strong sense of leadership, a trait that is

important to build in the global inter-ethnic

communication (Kaul, 2016).

When she is placed in Mama Kalong’s house

with other girls, she becomes the only woman who

is calm and uses strategy in facing her fate. She

manages to accept all the situation and she is able to

overcome any problem. When Dewi Ayu have to

deal with Shodanco, the most powerful military

person in Halimunda who is temperamental and

fierce, she knows how to deal with this man. Maman

Gendeng is also another man who is very fierce and

feared by people in Halimunda, and Dewi Ayu can

make him a good lovely man. Kamerad Kliwon, a

leftist activist and politician is also safe in her hand.

Dewi Ayu proves herself as a good leader that can

manage social and political conflicts arisen from

those three powerful persons.

4 CONCLUSION

Throughout the analysis of the novel “Cantik Itu

Luka”, it can be concluded that the main character of

the novel, Dewi Ayu is a woman who has the traits

different from the two types of traditional women

according to Wang (2010) and Guan (2014). Eka

Kurniawan creates a brand new female image, the

one that has a rebellious spirit, independent (self-

reliance) even during difficult times, brave,

determined, and has leadership. The new

consciousness of being a woman shows the progress

of the literary work in providing the example of new

feminist consciousness that inspires the woman

movement in postcolonial context (Keown, 2015).

The new feminist conscious character that is

successfully developed in a literary work like what

The New Female Image: Dewi Ayu’s Feminist Consciousness in Cantik Itu Luka

639

we find out in this novel will bring new perspectives

in understanding social problem in real life, dealing

with the man and woman relationship.

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