INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INDONESIAN STUDIES …artsonline.monash.edu.au/indonesian-studies-journal/files/2017/06/... · Malay translation of song-lyrics-any errors are my own; Dr

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INDONESIAN STUDIES ISSUE 4, 2017

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Poetics in Indonesian-Malay Theatre: Mendu in Indonesia’s Northern Riau Islands with Special Reference to Ladun

and Nasib Song Lyrics1

Karen Kartomi Thomas

Biodata: Karen Kartomi Thomas is ARC Research Fellow in the Sir Zelman School of Music at Monash University. Her area of focus is traditional and contemporary theatre performance in Indonesia, in particular those of the provinces of the Riau Islands and Lampung, Sumatra.

Abstract

Popular at the turn of the 20th century but in serious decline since the early 1980s, the little-known traditional genre of mendu theatre in the Natuna archipelago (also performed in the neighbouring Anambas archipelago) staged episodes of the mythical Dewa Mendu story as in the literary epic Hikayat Dewa Mandu (Story of Dewa Mandu). Natuna regency is located in Indonesia’s far north between the Malay Peninsula in the west and the Malaysian state of Serawak in the east at the southern edge of the South China Sea. Performing arts’ groups in the Mempawah region of West Kalimantan also performed mendu theatre, however its history, form, style and function differ significantly from that of Natuna (and Anambas). My ethnographic video recordings of four mendu performances I attended in 1984 held in one of Natuna’s main centres of the traditional arts (Ceruk and Teluk Selahang villages (kampung) near the capital Ranai) on Bunguran island, inform this study. To my knowledge these are the only recordings of the traditional Ranai-style form in existence as it was known in 1984. Mendu songs were integral to every performance, and actors structured their lyrics

1 The original field research on mendu theatre conducted on Natuna’s Bunguran island in 1984, formed the basis of my BA Honours thesis (1986), written jointly at Monash University and the University of California under the careful supervision of the late professors Cyril Skinner and Amin Sweeney respectively, both of whom introduced me to Malay literary and oral traditions. This study would not have been possible without, firstly, the generous assistance of Bp Idrus M.T., senior high school teacher, and Bp Syamsuddin from the office of the District Head in Ranai, who organised the four mendu performances we recorded, and secondly the directors and the many actors, musicians and assistants, in particular Bp Bujang Ahmad, who made these performances possible. I am grateful to my interlocutors the late Bp Ahmadiah Zulman, Ibu Sulfarini, Ibu Erlina SH, and Bp Jafri Dusai among others, who kindly and patiently shared their deep knowledge with me, and the researchers and theatre directors of mendu theatre, namely the late Bp Asmui Bakar, Bp Syafaruddin, and Bp S. Ismail, who documented four of the six sets of lyrics included in part 2 of this study. My thanks to the late Bp Tenas Effendy, well known author and guardian of Malay culture from Pekanbaru, ethnomusicologist Ashley Turner with whom I travelled to Natuna in 1984, to the then Monash Music Department for the loan of a video recorder, and to the Monash University Music Archives for the loan of photographic and recording equipment to record a mendu performance in 2013. My thanks to Professor Stuart Robson for his criticisms and useful suggestions for this article; Professor Harry Aveling for his encouragement and expertise in Indonesian-Malay translation of song-lyrics-any errors are my own; Dr Gijs Koster for his insights in the Hikayat Dewa Mandu among other hikayat; Jesse Kartomi Thomas for helping with editing earlier drafts of this article; and the editors of IJIS Yacinta Kurniasih and Matthew Piscioneri for their kind editorial assistance at every step of the way.


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in pantun form. The traditional poetics and the compositional method underlying the lyrics were, and remain key to the theatre even in its rejuvenated, revitalised form. Keywords: Indonesia, Indonesian-Malay theatre, Riau Islands, poetics, oral tradition

Introduction

Figure 1. Dewa Mendu (left, in a green cape) and Angkaran Dewa (in a red cape) as birds perched in a tree listening to the elephant’s lament. Male characters wore sunglasses to conceal their eyes to overcome stage shyness, and to protect members of the audience from looking into the eyes of the actors believed to be in trance. Teluk Selahang village, 1984. Photo: Ashley Turner.

One of the most popular mendu theatre episodes performed in the villages of Natuna’s

largest island, Bunguran, was the White Elephant story (lakon). This episode belongs to a

little-known Malay epic about Dewa Mendu, a young prince who, in a world of humans and

spirits, conquers evil with his physical and supernatural powers, marries (a princess) and

becomes king.2 It begins with characters Dewa Mendu and his brother Angkaran Dewa,

whom the gods throw down to earth from the heavens. Landing in the Galzum sea they

2 The origin of the mendu story remains unknown. It may have derived from the Indian and Middle Eastern tradition of storytelling (pers.comm. Robson in Melbourne, 2017; see Chambert-Loir 1980, also Braginsky 2004: 321). Like most traditional Malay narrative, the protagonist is a handsome prince with magical powers who roams the world to overcome challenges, defeat villains, marry a beautiful princess, and become king.


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eventually find their way to the jungle. In the kingdom of Langkadura, the villain Raja

Laksemalik asks for princess Siti Mahdewi’s hand in marriage, a proposition that the king

rejects. Furious, the villain lures her to a beautiful garden with the help of his off-sider, the

comedic masked jin (genie) character, Nenek Buta Raksasa. When the garden appears in Siti

Mahdewi’s dream, she feels compelled to visit it. As to be expected, disaster befalls her

soon after she arrives, much to the shock of her dayang-dayang (female companions)

accompanying her, as she suddenly finds herself transformed into a white elephant, and

later, alone and exiled to the jungle.

Meanwhile, perched in a tree in the jungle as birds, Dewa Mendu and Angkaran

Dewa overhear a white elephant (Siti Mahdewi) weeping as she sings the nasib (fate)

lament about her sad banishment from the kingdom (figure 1). The brothers alight from the

tree and immediately resume their human forms. While Angkaran Dewa comically fears the

worst, Dewa Mendu places a serious magical mantra around the elephant that eventually

releases her from the spell. No longer inhabiting the body of an elephant, Siti Mahdewi,

journeys back to Langkadura kingdom together with her companion heroes and three of the

king’s clown servants (tukang kayu) whom they meet by chance in the jungle collecting

firewood for a ceremony to be held one thousand days after the death of a princess.

Naturally, King Langkadura rejoices at the sight of his daughter, and arranges for her

marriage to Dewa Mendu, who is then installed as the king’s successor (figure 2).

Figure 2. Siti Mahdewi performed by a male actor cross-dresser seated with Dewa Mendu on their wedding

day, Ceruk 1984. Photo: Karen Kartomi.

Until the early 1980s, village mendu groups of around 25-30 performers regularly

enacted stories such as the one described above. As with most traditional theatre in

Indonesia, actors and musicians integrated drama and comedy with elements of song,


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dance, and ensemble music. Mendu performances combined these elements, which were

then interspersed with sections of dialogue spoken both in formal stylised Malay language

and in local, everyday Malay dialect.3 Such shows occurred nightly between 2-7 days or

more, often at celebrations such as weddings, end-of-harvest seasons, healing ceremonies,

and Islamic days including Idulfitri organised by the camat (village leader and head of

district) and carried out by the whole kampung. 4 The open-air, bamboo stage frame

(bubungan) was built at ground level and designed for audiences to stand or sit around on

three sides while looking in at the dramatic action, not unlike that of main puteri healing

ceremonies in Kelantan. 5 Locally grown bangsawan troupes were commercial and travelled

around the Natuna islands in the 1950s until the 1980s with the last performance being

staged in 1988. They sought after paying audiences, a very different scenario from

traditional mendu theatre groups, which neither toured nor sold tickets but were

community based and performed locally.6

This article aims to provide a brief overview of some of the last traditional mendu

theatre performances held in 1984 in Ceruk and Teluk Selahang villages located about 20km

from the capital, Ranai, before narrowing the focus to the lyrics of mendu songs. Part 1

provides a description of the socio-cultural context of the early-mid 1980s as experienced in

village settings, and the traditional theatrical performance space in which mendu lyrics were

composed and sung. Part 2 then examines the lyrics themselves and also the main poetics of

two essential verse-types sung at every performance based on comparative analyses. Here,

poetics is defined as those structural elements of verse consisting of devices such as

parallelisms, word pairs, and a variety of other mnemonic tools including rhyme, repetition,

alliteration, and fillers. As stand-alone devices, poetics formed the basis of most motifs. I

use the term “motif” interchangeably with the term “formula.” Both Sweeney (1987; 1994)

in his studies of Malay storytelling and Malay wayang, and Tokita (2015) in her study of

Japanese singers of stories developed Lord’s theory of formulas or the formulaic system

underlying oral storytelling among Yugoslavian bards (Lord 1978). The term “motif” is also

3 An individual’s village could be identified by the Indonesian-Malay dialect she/he spoke. The “o” sound in Sedenau, for example, is pronounced “e” in the Ranai region. 4 P.c. Bp Bujang Ahmad in Ranai, Bp Ahmadiah Zulman in Sedenau, Bp Jafri Dusai in Ceruk, Bp Asmui Bakar (originally from Sedenau) in Tanjungpinang, (2013). 5 Main ‘teri (main puteri) theatre structures in Kelantan (also found in Patani in southern Thailand and Kedah on the eastern coast of the Malay peninsula) were similarly made of bamboo, open on all sides, and not to be raised above the ground (Ghulam-Sawar 1994: 161). The performances, however, differed significantly from mendu; the former were healing ceremonies where patients actively participated emotionally and psychologically in the dramatic performance. 6 (p.c. Ahmadiah, 2013). Mendu groups held performances regularly in many other places of the Natuna islands including on Bunguran island in Semedang, Kelanga, and Sungai Ulu villages in the east, Kelarik in the north, and Midai in the west; on Pulau Tiga south of Bunguran island; and as far as Serasan island near the coasts of West Kalimantan (Indonesia) and Serawak (Malaysia).


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used interchangeably with the term “clusters of words” that were typically contained in

pantun and syair forms as identified in the literature on traditional Malay verse.

Part 1. Traditional mendu theatrical performance in Natuna’s socio-cultural context (1984)

Natuna’s Indonesian-Malay predominantly Muslim population lived mostly on- or around

the regency’s largest island of Bunguran, and on many of the smaller islands nearby, such as

Sedenau in the busy port town of the same name. Consisting of both Malay sea people

(Orang Suku Laut) living on small houseboats (sampan) at sea who stayed close to the

coastlines of the islands, and land-based Malays residing on the islands, the people obtained

their livelihoods largely from harvesting their fish traps, cultivating crops on the land and/or

producing homewares, and also from trading their catch, produce and wares with locals and

with foreign visitors or traders.7 Apart from a primary school, and a junior and senior high

school, the then tiny town of Ranai housed a small mosque and a few government office

buildings.

In Teluk Selahang village where we stayed, groups of men and boys gathered almost

nightly in the front room of the home of the village leader to play traditional ensemble

music. Musicians played an array of instruments such as gendang panjang (drum), bedug

(large drum), tawak (gong) and talempong (set of seven kettle gongs). Sometimes the

ensemble accompanied various dances including tari topeng (masked dance) and the zapin

(Malay-Arabic dance) style tari ayam sundul (lit. headbutting chicken dance), performed

only by men. Popular forms of traditional village performance other than mendu included a

related theatrical form, lang lang buana (lit. roaming the world [Jav]), main ambung (lit. toss

up and down) in which a life-sized wooden doll attached to a small platform was carried on

the shoulders of men, believed to be brought to life by the bomoh (shaman); and main alu

(lit. play the pestle), the rhythmic and melodic stamping of seven, long wooden poles (alu,

pestle) of various lengths to pound corn into flour.8

Like all forms of traditional entertainment in Natuna, mendu was dialogical;

performances aimed to engage both their village audiences as well as the spirits of the

supernatural world, in particular those of their ancestors and of nature. Actors and

musicians always performed barefoot in order to maintain direct contact with the earth, an

action that the people believed enabled benevolent spirits to enter their bodies through

their feet to ensure their own, and their villages’ safety. A special pulai (also pulaik) tree

7 Visitors and traders regularly arrived in the islands and have done so for centuries . During the colonial period, regional boats carried local travelers from neighbouring islands including Anambas, Kalimantan, and Pattani. Foreign ships also carried travelers from England, China, India and elsewhere to and from the region with stopovers in the Natuna- and Anambas islands en route to the Malay peninsula (principally Singapore and Malacca). Today, ships arriving from Hong Kong dock at Sedenau port in search of fresh seafood produce sourced from Natuna’s waters (p.c. Ibu Erlina, Sedenau, 2103). 8 To explore the main alu instrument in depth, see Kartomi (2016).


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attached to the front of the stage frame and believed to be the home of the spirits (jin), was

considered the vehicle through which supernatural beings entered the stage area, the

bodies of the performers, and mendu theatre items such as the musical instruments. The

performers’ and the director’s expression of gratitude for protection and inspiration from

the ancestral spirits, illustrated the socio-religious function of this traditional form.9 In

addition, mendu songs were heard daily outside the performance context, firstly as lullabies,

and secondly for their spiritual content and as entertainment sung by farmers in fields and

fishermen in their boats to pass the time. It was clear that the people were immersed in

traditional village mendu culture.

In pre-Muslim orthodox times and until the turn of the 20th century, both men and

women likely performed in mendu theatre together. As adherence to Islam became more

strictly enforced in the early part of the 20th century and mendu was deemed incompatible

with religious principles, women were no longer allowed to perform on stage (nor indeed

participate in informal gatherings of music and dance practice); instead they were invited to

work as makeup artists (tukang hias) backstage and to remain in the kitchen preparing

sustenance or making/repairing costumes for the performers (p.c. Bp Ahmadiah and Ibu Uci

in Sedenau, 2013). Going back at least six generations, traditional village mendu theatre in

Ceruk and Teluk Selahang only ever featured all-male casts who played not only the roles of

kings, princes, clown servants, giants, and animals; but those of princesses, queens, and

royal female attendants (dayang-dayang).10

As commonly practiced in the traditional performing arts across many parts of the

Indonesian-Malay world, both actors and musicians learned directly from their elders and

teachers under an apprentice system. Students worked to commit their performative

knowledge to memory over many years and under close guidance. 11 Knowledge was

therefore encoded in mendu’s lyrics, dance movements, melodies and rhythms, which

became firmly embedded in their minds, bodies and muscle memory.12 Thus, performers

and the kalipah (bomoh or shaman and theatre director; lit. caliph), together gave physical

9 Thomas (2015: 573) 10 The oral genealogy of mendu theatre in the Ranai region can be traced back to 1926 (p.c. Bp Bujang in Ranai, 2013). When I returned to Natuna in 2013, women in Ranai were still not permitted to perform publicly. By contrast, however, female actors had played the roles of female characters since the late 1970s when mendu theatre director Bp Ahmadiah first invited women to assume the roles of female characters. 11 The term performative refers to “performed identity” developed through the repeated processes of bodily acts and gestures (Price and Shildrick 1999: 9). The difference between performance and performativity is that “performance is something a subject does.” Performativity is the process through which the subject emerges” (Kulick in Spiller 2014: 342). 12 This is similar to the Malay storyteller’s “schema,” in relation to her/his “schematic composition” methods, in which knowledge was stored within plots, topoi, recycled formulas etc (Sweeney 1994: xiii). As an encoded form of information, the lyrics were a way of storing knowledge about the culture that stretched back for generations. Examples of similar encoding from other cultures abound, see, among others, Tokita (2011: 99) and Kelly (2017: 2).


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and theatrical form and expression to the dramatic story by basing their performances on

versions of the Dewa Mendu legend13 that they had heard through storytelling, song-lyrics

and stage enactments from their forebears. In short, they learned and experienced all things

mendu, orally.14

The mendu performance space and scene structure

The open-air bamboo stage frame measured approximately 4 x 6 metres square,

creating clear boundaries that separated the audience from the performance space.

Situated in a grassy clearing in the front yard of the home of the camat, the stage frame

took several hours to construct and was lit by two hanging kerosene lamps on either side.

The back part of the stage space was enclosed with a smaller bamboo fence and a single

opening. This area provided the setting for palace scenes with the king and his ministers in

hilang wayat (audience-with-the-king) scenes, and/or with foreign kings or their messengers

during royal visits. Villagers decorated the front area with daun kelapa muda (coconut palm)

and other fresh greenery, providing the setting for all outdoor scenes such as those

occurring in the jungle, in the tree tops, in a garden, in the palace grounds, or in the ocean.

An elaborate, colourful and intricately woven cloth back-drop measuring about two metres

wide covered the back wall. Curtains at both sides of the frame concealed two door

openings to the backstage area where actors dressed and waited to be called to perform.

On the day of the performance, the kalipah carried out certain rituals alone and in

secret at the foot of the pulai tree to bless the stage frame, each of the performers and the

musical instruments. Then, to inform the community that the performance was about to

begin, loud drumming of the introductory (peranta) music led by two drummers situated to

one side of the stage was heard over the airwaves as far as neighbouring villages, often

lasting for over two hours or more. One drummer played a large bedug (single-headed drum

on a low stand beaten with sticks), the other played either a gendang panjang (double-

headed drum worn around the neck beaten with both the palm of his hands and finger-

tips), or a kaleng (large tin or wooden box placed on the ground upside down and beaten

with sticks). Families of parents, elders, and young children from local village communities

and surrounds gathered together in large numbers at the front and both sides of the stage.

As they waited expectantly, the musicians of the rest of the ensemble, who played the biola

(violin) and a tawak (gong), eventually joined the drummers on one side of the stage, until

the time came for the kalipah to address the audience with a brief summary of the episode

(madah) about to be enacted. 13 The (sixteen) manuscripts of the Hikayat Dewa Mandu (Story of Dewa Mandu [Mendu]) in existence, the oldest of which dates back to 1785, never reached the shores of Natuna. Handwritten in Jawi (Malay Arabic script) these manuscripts are housed in various libraries in Indonesia, the Netherlands and United Kingdom. The legend is also known on the Malay peninsula, and a manuscript titled Akayet Deva Mano and written in Cham language was found as far afield as Vietnam (ChambertLoir 1980: 1; Gallop 2013). 14 Examples of similar student-teacher methods abound; see Thomas for Lampung province example (2014).


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Upon the kalipah’s cue after madah, mendu actors entered the stage singing the

essential, opening ladun song (examined below) in unison as they introduced their

respective characters through dance gestures, in pairs. The hilang wayat (also ilang wayat)

scene that followed, integrated song and dance items which were also interspersed with

sections of dialogue.15

Performances ended with the beremas (closing) scene in which actors and the

kalipah thanked the spirits (in song-dance) for their attendance and their protection, and

asked them to depart from the stage, the performers’ bodies, and the musical instruments.

A session of joget (traditional Malay social dance) followed, in which members of the

audience danced socially with mendu female characters on stage.

Mendu theatre organised content into verbal, melodic, rhythmic, dance, and

dramatic forms, and was a complex way of structuring discourse orally (see Bowen 1991:

140). An array of common poetics, integrated with mendu’s combined performing arts was

employed in performance primarily for their effects on the audience, and to put the people

into a certain frame of mind or to arouse their interest through such emotions as fear, pity,

anger, and pleasure and/or happiness. 16 This became clear as I watched the kalipah remain

at the wings of the stage, making minute by minute assessments of the audience’s

reactions. Mendu practitioners uniformly pointed out that whenever audience attention

waned, the kalipah quickly shut down the act or scene in progress and moved on to the

next; he then cued clown characters waiting backstage to begin their comedy acts at

appropriate moments in the plot, principally for the purpose of recapturing the attention of

the audience. 17

The revitalisation (revitalisasi) of mendu theatre after autonomy in 2004

The Riau Islands (Kepulauan Riau) gained political autonomy from mainland Riau

(Riau daratan on the island of Sumatra) in 2004 and became one of the nation’s newest

provinces. Many socio-political changes occurred in Natuna then and in the following

decade, in particular the revitalisation of mendu theatre (among other traditional art forms),

which by the early 2000s, was on the verge of extinction. 18 Funded under the bupati’s

15 Royals spoke in stylised language that featured Malay terms of address such as kakanda (older brother) and adinda (younger brother). 16 In the Aristotelian sense; see Aristotle’s Rhetoric 1356b, 1450a 15, 1455a 35; Poetics 1449b 35. 17 P.c. Bp Bujang, Bp Idrus, and Bp Syamsuddin BM in Ranai (1984); Bp Bujang and Bp Jafri in Ranai; Bp Ahmadiah and Ibu Sulfarini (known as Ibu Uci) in Sedenau, and Bp Asmui and Bp Syafaruddin in Tanjungpinang, (2013). 18 Significant socio-political change had, in fact, been gaining momentum previously in the late 1970s when rich submarine reserves of oil and natural gas in the Natuna Sea Basin were discovered. In the three decades prior to autonomy, major socio-political events playing out in Natuna brought the region to the attention of the nation’s leaders, economically and politically. The eventual export of rich submarine reserves of oil and natural gas in the Natuna Sea Basin, it was hoped, would provide a lucrative source of income for the country. The stepping up of military (naval) border security in light of ongoing international disputes over the South


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(regent’s) revitalisation-of-the-arts program and implemented upon the directive of the

province’s governor at the time-the late Bp Muhammad Sani-a vastly different mendu

theatre form emerged. By 2013, all-male mendu theatre groups in Ranai and other mendu

centres in Natuna had become defunct due to a decline in both patronage and local interest

in the theatre among village communities, leaving Semadun Dewa Mendu the only viable

performing mendu theatre group left in Natuna. Mendu shows in their revitalised form have

since been held infrequently (every other year) in urban centres, largely for official

audiences attending government events in Natuna and regionally (such as at the Institut

Kesenian Jogjakarta [IKJ, Arts Institute] in 2008 and 2009, and at the large-scale Tamadun

festival in Tanjungpinang organised by the governor the Riau Islands province and attended

by the then Indonesian vice-president Bp Budiono in 2013) and national religious holidays.

Performed by a mixed female and male cast, and in broad daylight for an hour or two, the

theatre greatly downplayed connections with the spirit world; it no longer emphasised acts

of spirit veneration, and omitted any of the before- and after-performance rituals carried

out by the kalipah in the past.

Stylistically, the motifs of dance movements, song melodies, and instrumental music,

underwent many more significant changes to the point where Natuna’s artists themselves

viewed the revitalised form as almost unrecognisable.19 Mendu had become a very different

form than the one they once knew. However, both the essential poetics of the lyrics and the

actors’ oral creative process of generating their lyrics, have withstood the test of time (as

shown below), despite the theatre’s transformation in appearance, function and style since

autonomy in 2004.

Part 2. Poetics of mendu lyrics in performance

In examining the poetics and the compositional method by which actors composed their

lyrics, it is important to acknowledge that actors developed their dramatic parts not by

relying on written materials (such as scripts or notation with written lyrics) committing them

to memory, and preparing them in isolation beforehand, but by working together with

fellow cast members orally at rehearsal or in performance as a group exercise. Actors put

their lyrics to their vocal melody simultaneously as they danced. They embellished the lyrics

of well-known songs by manipulating and adding specific poetics. Such manipulations did

China Sea and the Spratly islands further thrust the Natuna region into the political limelight (on recent socio-political change in Indonesia (including the fall of Suharto in 1998) and the impact of the revitalisation program on the Riau Islands’ arts, see Thomas 2016). The huge submarine oil and gas supplies, and the Islands’ pristine beaches and prime, undeveloped land, in the 1990s led the state minister for research and technology, B.J. Habibi, to formulate a vision to attract investors to Natuna to develop the region with new technology parks and tourist resorts (much like the island of Bintan in the southern Riau islands). However, finding big international or domestic investors to carry out these developments has proven to be elusive so far (p.c. Bp Daria, Ranai, 2013). 19 P.c. Bp Bujang in Ranai and Bp Jafri in Ceruk, and Bp Asmui, Bp Ahmadiah in Sedenau 2013


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not necessarily influence the overall contour of the melody as the melody was often

independent of the lyrics, (though it did the dance movements as they were usually cued by

the lyrics). 20 Actors also coordinated simultaneously with the instrumentalists through

constant, real-time adjustments. The instrumentalists, in turn, equally followed closely what

the actors were doing and made adjustments to their respective musical parts when

required. Performances were therefore integrative, complex, and accommodating of each

performer; they were whole-body, all-encompassing experiences for both actors and

musicians alike.

To deconstruct the lyrics’ essential poetics integral to the creative process, three

versions of ladun lyrics and three versions of nasib lyrics were compared (appendix 1). The

term ladun derived from ilmu laduni (cosmological or spiritual knowledge). As an address to

the audience, this verse was sung in the opening scene of every performance, always

beginning with a praise to God, Dengan nama bismillah (In the name of Allah), sung only by

male royal characters as they entered the stage in pairs. Ladun verses also contained an

offer of apology to the audience in anticipation of actors and musicians not performing to

the expected standard during the course of the show as in the version below (figure 3a).

(Please note that all English translations of verses in this study were intentionally literal in

order to highlight the structure, repetition, and the poetic additions, omissions, and

segmentations of motifs.)

Dengan nama bismillahah dengan nama bismillah ya Illahi dengan nama menanak nasi

Jikalulah jugalah termentah ya Illahi kepal janganlah dikepal

Dengan nama bismillah dengan nama bismillah ya Illahi mengurai pantun dan nyanyi

Jikalulah jugalah tersalah ya Illahi jangan dikesallah jangan

In the name of the Lord, in the name of the Lord, oh Lord, in the name boil rice

Oh if it is still oh raw, oh Lord, oh eat it by the handful oh don’t eat it by the handful 21

In the name of the Lord, in the name of the Lord, oh Lord, string together pantun and sing

Oh when mistakes are oh also made, oh Lord, (please) don’t regret it oh don’t

Figure 3a. Ladun verse, Ranai 1980s. Performed by lead actor Bp Bujang Ahmad, recorded in Ranai, 1984

20 At times the melody was subordinate to the lyrics, though the additional linguistic sounds or sound clusters helped articular some or all of the vocal melody’s corresponding notes. Caesura’s were usually cued by the final syllable of the last word of each line, and often heard as a sustained note either sung by the actor or played by the biola. An explanation of the relationship between the lyrics, vocal melody, dance movements and the music of the ensemble lies beyond the scope of this study, and is examined elsewhere (Thomas forthcoming). 21 kepal – lit. roll a handful of rice to pop into the mouth


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The other verse form, nasib, whose title refers to one’s destiny or lot in life, was sung

by female royal characters during scenes of sadness or distress (figures 4a). In the context of

this particular case study, nasib expressed the deep sorrow of princess Siti Mahdewi after

having been turned into an elephant and sent into exile. The lyrics’ emotional appeal aimed

to emphasise the tragedy of the situation as in figure 4a:

Dari Geresik dari Geresik darilah Geresik lalang ke pantailah lalang

Hai daun kecapa amboi sayang amboi sayang, daunlah kecapa mandi ku basahlah mandi

Sudahlah nasib sudahlah nasib malang ku badan hai malang

Hai padalah siapa amboi sayang, padalah siapa lagi kusesallah lagi

From Geresik, from Geresik and from Geresik, grass to the oh grassy beach

Hey cassava leaves, ah dear, ah dear, cassava leaves, bathing I get wet oh bathing

Enough oh fate, enough oh fate, the ill fortune of my body, hey ill fortune

Hey, oh to whomever, ah dear, oh to whomever, again I regret it oh again

Figure 4a. Nasib verse, Sedenau 1980s originally sung by Ibu Ismar Ermayati. Performed by understudy and lead actress Ibu Uci, recorded in Sedenau, 2013.

Mendu verses showed little variation in the poetics and compositional method

employed from that of nasib. Indeed, they possessed many of the familiar motifs and

structural features as the basic Malay pantun in addition to the distinctive and intentional

use of fillers to segment motifs (discussed below). Found throughout the Indonesian-Malay

world, the pantun form was commonly known to comprise two couplets with an a b a b

rhyming scheme, and four word clusters divided by caesuras. The structure similarly

resembled that of the syair, known for its a a a a rhyming scheme.22

As mendu actors composed their lyrics orally, I describe their couplets as consisting

not of lines but of “stretches of utterances,” (a point made by Sweeney [1994: 29]). The

label “stretches of utterances” or in the case of mendu’s song-lyrics, “stretches of lyrics” is

preferable to the term “lines” which conjures up images of words on pages to be read,

detracting from the context of live performances that were consumed by audience in the

same instant, aurally.

When performed, mendu’s pantun couplets sometimes more than doubled the

expected 9 to 12 syllables. In figures 4a and 4c (appendix 1), for example, the syllabic count

22 As in many text-based pantun, the rhyming scheme extended to the penultimate syllables of vowels (in mendu’s case usually the “a” sound) of each stretch of lyrics (see also Braginsky 2004: 494). For a detailed examination of the features of pantun and various explanations of the semantic and symbolic relationships between each of the pantun parts by such authors as Marsden and Overbeck, Hooykaas, Wilkinson and Winstedt and others, see Braginsky 2004: 491-502; 494-5; also Liaw 2011: 11, 15).


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in a single stretch of lyrics reached 25 and 29 respectively. Actors freely embellished their

lyrics by adding and/or omitting extra syllabic sounds (poetics) or segmenting and/or

repeating them as they saw fit. Possessing a fluctuating number of syllables that often

exceeded the standard syllabic count, naturally led to an additional increase in the number

of caesuras, which almost always occurred at the end of each motif, repeated motif, and

stretch of lyrics.23

Drawing on their memory banks, actors first generated their lyrics by piecing

together sequences of motifs often in predictable ways. A clear common motivic structure

arose when the three ladun verses were compared. The ladun rendition in figure 3b below

(the shortest version of the three ladun verses examined) shows both couplets comprising

motifs A, B, C, and D only, and in simple sequence:

Dengan nama bismillah (A) menanak nasi (B)

Kalau termentah (C) dikepallah jangan (D)

Dengan bismillah (A implied) memulai lakon dan menyanyi (B)

Jika tersalah (C) dikesallah jangan (D)

In the name of the Lord, boil rice

If it is raw, oh eat it by the handful, don’t

In the Lord (we) begin the story and sing

When mistakes are made, oh (please) regret it, don’t

Figure 3b Ladun verse, recorded in Ranai in the early 1990’s (Ismail 1992:67)

Actors then repeated motifs, and they did so often to embellish their lyrics. Note, for

example, in figure 3a the recurrence of dengan nama bismillah (motif A) three times in the

very first stretch of lyrics (with the third time being abbreviated to the implied form dengan

nama); and in figure 3c (appendix 1) twice in the first stretch of lyrics. See also figure 4a

(nasib verse) where the actor repeated motifs A and C (dari Geresik [from Geresik] and daun

kecapa [cassava leaves]) respectively three times each in a single couplet. The recycling of

certain motifs (including the recurrence of whole stretches of lyrics as in figure 4c) was

unmistakeable.24

23 Note that in order to accommodate syllabic and caesural fluctuations, mendu instrumentalists, in turn, made regular adjustments to their musical parts. 24 “Phonic organisation” and “phonic parallelisms” in text-based pantun is emphasised not only by rhyme, but numerous instances of alliteration, and rhyme or assonance between pairs of words, and word repetition generally (Braginsky 2004: 494).


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Just as traditional Malay story-tellers worked with an array of formulas and fillers in

live performance and with high levels of dexterity, mendu actors similarly employed poetics

in skilful and complex ways. They paid close attention to embellishments or linguistic sounds

as, for example, in the alliteration of the letters “a” and “l” throughout figures 3b and 3c,

and also “j” (jikalu, jugalah, jangan, and jangan repeated) in figure 3b; or the internal rhyme

(of lalang ke pantailah lalang…malang ku badan hai malang) in figure 4a; or indeed the

frequent use of parallelisms (see the ladun couplets of figures 3a, 3b, and 3c that closely

mirrored-or rather echoed-each other in form, word choice, and syllabic sounds).

At a more micro level, actors had the option of introducing word pairs and their

related 3-4 word motifs in their parallelisms. The following show instances of actors joining

nouns with adjectives, conjunctions, or exclamations/interjections;

badan malang (figures 4a, 4c),

pantai lalang (figures 4a, 4b, 4c),

sudahlah nasib (figures 4a, 4b), and

aduhailah nasib (figure 4c).

They also combined active verbs (using the prefix me- ) with nouns (e.g. mengurai pantun

(figure 3a); menanak nasi, memulai lakon (figure 3b). At yet other times, they juxtaposed

passive verbs (using the prefix di- or ter-) with imperatives or conjunctions as in, dikepallah

jangan, dikesallah jangan, kalau termentah, and jika tersalah (also figures 3a, b and c).

Actors then generated three- or four-word motifs (mentioned earlier) by selecting a

common pair appropriate to the scene’s lyrics, and placing one of its words either in the

initial- or the last position, as in the following:

kepal janganlah dikepal, figure 3b,

jangan dikesallah jangan, figures 3b, 3c,

mandi ku basahlah mandi, figure 4b, and

lagi ku kesallah lagi, figure 4c.

In addition, actors juggled a variety of fillers (F) for further embellishment. Uttered

frequently in everyday spoken Malay, the affix –lah was similarly attached to certain nouns,

verbs, adjectives, conjunctions and adverbs of the lyrics (see table 1); while other fillers

comprising exclamations or interjections were commonly employed, sometimes paired with

–lah as in amboilah and aduhailah:


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Table 1: Fillers: the affix -lah and exclamations/interjections

Nouns, verbs etc with -lah attached

daunlah (oh leaf)

dikesallah (oh regret it)

besahlah (oh wet)

jikalulah (oh if)

jugalah (oh also)

Exclamations with or without –lah attached

amboilah (oh ah it’s too bad)

aduhailah (oh hey)

amboi sayang (ah dear/ ah it’s too bad)

hai (hey)

ya Illahi (oh Lord)

Fillers such as ya illahi, jugalah, amboi sayang and hai were widely interspersed among the

A, B, C, and D motifs of every couplet, as evident in figures 3a and 4a (and the other

versions, appendix 1). 25

While actors often used fillers as a way of “formula searching” (Sweeney 1994: 39) or

as aids to help them work out their lyrics as they sang, they equally employed them to add

another layer of complexity to their lyrics. Consciously inserting fillers within, and around,

motifs enabled actors to segment clusters of words. Fillers functioned as splitters or

separators - either they split a motif into two halves or separated one motif from the other

often in the same couplet or stretch of lyrics:

Sudahlah nasib (A) sudahlah nasib (A repeated) malang ku badan hai (F) malang (B)

Hai padalah siapa (C) amboi sayang (F) padalah siapa (C) lagi kusesallah lag (figure 4a,

and

Jikalulah jugalah (F) tersalah (C) ya Illahi (F) jangan dikesallah jangan (D) (figure 3b).

In the couplet above (from figure 4a), the actor chose to insert hai in the middle of motif B

(malang ku badan malang) before adding amboi sayang in this instance between (the same)

two motifs (C repeated, padalah siapa). Similarly, in the second example (from figure 3b), ie

the stretch of lyrics above, the actor uttered the filler jugalah to split motif C in half and ya

Illahi to separate motifs C and D. Fillers such as these augmented the linguistic sounds

produced by a verse’s alliteration, internal rhyme, word pairs, and parallel structures, and

played a role in contributing to the aural unity of mendu lyrics.

Conclusion

An understanding of the main poetics of mendu verses as they were performed in different

ways, sheds light on the theatre’s fundamental oral/aural patternings. With an array of

25 Sweeney examines epithets, runs, repetition, formulas, schemata, and topoi in Wayang Siam, Pak Pandir tales and other forms (1994: xii-xiii, 9-41; see also 1987: 272). Koster analyses syllabic content in the Syair Ken Tambuhan (1993: 41, 530); see Bowen (1991: 140) for analyses of other poetic devices.


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poetics at hand, actors selected from them, modified them, and were highly proficient at

juggling them as they generated their respective parts. Actors repeatedly extended motifs

with fillers or cut them short, and segmented stretches of lyrics thereby bringing about

fluctuations in the syllabic count, and by extension, the caesural count per stretch of lyrics.

Poetics were chosen not only for emphasis and to convey a character’s emotions (of sorrow,

fear, anger, joy, or surprise), but to ensure fluency through spontaneity of expression. In the

context of the relationship between mendu theatre and the oral tradition, poetics provided

an aural unity and a continuous flow of sound (together with the vocal melody) that live

audiences of the theatre enjoyed and expected to hear.

While the sample ladun and nasib verses in this study were collected over a period of

nearly thirty years from 1984 to 2013, a comparison between them found few, if any,

differences in the poetics and the compositional methods employed. Indeed, the poetics

themselves, and equally importantly, the skilful juggling of these poetics in and around the

building-blocks of motifs, have remained almost identical since 1984. As has occurred for

generations, actors strove (and continued to strive) not to express their lyrics verbatim, but

to master the complex micro-level devices and processes of their craft, a technique that

they inherited from their forebears and which remains integral to the actors’ creative,

generative process.


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Appendix 1. Ladun and nasib lyrics showing motifs A, B, C, D and F (fillers)

Figure 3a. Ladun verse, recorded in Ranai (1984).

Dengan nama bismillahah (A) dengan nama bismillah (A) ya Illahi (F) dengan nama (A

implied) menanak nasi (B)

Jikalulah jugalah termentah (C) ya Illahi (F) kepal janganlah dikepal (D

Dengan nama bismillah (A) dengan nama bismillah (A) ya Illahi (F) mengurai pantun dan

nyanyi (B)

Jikalulah jugalah tersalah (C) ya Illahi (F) jangan dikesallah jangan (D)

In the name of the Lord, in the name of the Lord, oh Lord, in the name boil rice

Oh if it is still oh raw, oh Lord, oh eat it by the handful oh don’t eat it by the handful

In the name of the Lord, in the name of the Lord, oh Lord, string together pantun and sing

Oh when mistakes are oh also made, oh Lord, (please) don’t regret it oh don’t

Figure 3b. Ladun verse, recorded in Ranai. In Ismail (1992:67)

Dengan nama bismillah (A) menanak nasi (B)

Kalau termentah (C) dikepallah jangan (D)

Dengan bismillah (A implied) memulai lakon dan menyanyi (B)

Jika tersalah (C) dikesallah jangan (D)

In the name of the Lord, boil rice

If it is raw, oh eat it by the handful, don’t

In the Lord (we) begin the story and sing

When mistakes are made, oh (please) regret it, don’t

Figure 3c. Ladun verse, Sedenau style, documented in Tanjungpinang. In Bakar (2010: 11)

Dengan nama bismillah (A) dengan nama bismillah (A) sayang (F) menanak nasi (B) sayang

(F) menanak nasi (B)

Jikalulah termentah (C) ya Ilahi (F) jangan dikepallah jangan (D)

Dengan nama bismillah (A) dengan nama bismillah (A) mengurai pantun dan nyanyi (B)

mengurai pantun dan nyanyi (B)

Jikalulah tersalah (C) ya Ilahi (F) jangan dikesallah jangan (D)


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In the name of the Lord, in the name of the Lord, dear, boil rice, dear, boil rice

Oh if its raw, oh Lord, don’t eat it by the handful oh don’t

In the name of the Lord, in the name of the Lord, string together pantun and sing

Oh when mistakes are made, oh Lord, (please) don’t regret it oh don’t

Figure 4a. Nasib verse, 1980s version recorded in Sedenau (2013).

Dari Geresik (A) dari Geresik (A) darilah Geresik (A) lalang ke pantailah lalang (B)

Hai daun kecapa (C) amboi sayang (F) amboi sayang (F), daunlah kecapa (C) mandi ku

besahlah mandi (D)

Sudahlah nasib (A) sudahlah nasib (A) malang ku badan hai (split by F) malang (B)

Hai padalah siapa (C) amboi sayang (F), padalah siapa (C) lagi kusesallah lagi (D)

From Geresik, from Geresik and from Geresik, grass to the oh grassy beach

Hey cassava leaves, ah dear, ah dear, cassava leaves, bathing I get wet oh bathing

Enough oh fate, enough oh fate, the ill fortune of my body, hey ill fortune

Hey, oh to whomever, ah dear, oh to whomever, again I regret it oh again

Figure 4b. Nasib verse, recorded in Sedenau. In Syafaruddin (2002:73).

Darilah Geresik (A) darilah Geresik (A) lalang ke pantailah lalang (B)

Daunlah kecapa (C) daunlah kecapa (C) mandi ku besahlah mandi (D)

Sudahlah nasib (A) sudahlah nasib (A) badanlah untung di badan (B)

Pada siapa (C) pada siapa (C) lagi ku kesalkan lagi (D)

Oh from Geresik, oh from Geresik, grass to the beach oh grass

Oh cassava leaves, oh cassava leaves, bathing I get wet oh bathing

Enough oh fate, enough of fate, oh (my) body (the) fortune of (my) body

To whomever, to whomever, again I regret it again

Figure 4c. Nasib verse, documented in Sedenau. In Bakar (2010: 79).

Dari Geresik (A) dari Geresik (A) lalang ke pantailah lalang (B)

Dari Geresik (A) dari Geresik (A) lalang ke pantailah lalang (B)


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Daunlah kecapa (C) amboilah sayang (F) daun kecapa (C) mandi ku besahlah mandi (D)

Daunlah kecapa (C) amboilah sayang (F) daun kecapa (C) amboilah sayang (F) daun kecapa

ku besahlah mandi (D)

Aduhailah nasib (A) aduahilah nasib (A) malang dirikulah malang (B)

Aduhailah nasib (A) aduahilah nasib (A) dirikulah malang (B implied)

Kepada siapa (C) amboilah sayang (F) kepada siapa (C) ku kesallah lagi (B implied)

Kepada siapa (C) amboilah sayang (F) kepada siapa (C) lagi ku kesallah lagi (B)

From Geresik, from Geresik, grass to the beach oh grass

From Geresik, from Geresik, grass to the beach oh grass

Cassava leaves, oh ah dear, cassava leaves, bathing I get wet oh bathing

Cassava leaves, oh ah dear, cassava leaves, oh ah dear, cassava leaves I get wet oh bathing

Oh hey fate, oh hey fate, ill fortune, oh my ill fortune

Oh hey fate, oh hey fate, oh my ill fortune

To whom ever, oh ah dear, to whomever, I regret (it) oh again

To whomever, oh ah dear, to whomever, again I regret (it) oh again


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