'My neighbour's blooming flower garden': the image of the British in modern Malay writing

Abstract

This article discusses works of four Malay authors who deal with Malaya's colonial past through parody, and expressions of admiration and disillusion when portraying British characters or describing travel to Britain. It seems that only a few Malay authors have tried to 'write off' their colonial past in the very obvious way of depicting and subverting colonial masters and systems. This may be due to the use of the Malay language, which provides the authors with an 'easy way out' of tackling the perhaps sensitive issue head-on - a similar suggestion has been made in relation to Indonesia.