The Komedie Stamboel : popular theater in colonial Indonesia, 1891-1903 /

"Originating in 1891 in the port city of Surabaya, the Komedie Stamboel, or Istanbul-style theater, toured colonial Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia by rail and steamship. The company performed musical versions of the Arabian Nights and European fairy tales and operas such as Sleeping Beauty...

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Bibliographic Details
Online Access: Full text (MCPHS users only)
Main Author: Cohen, Matthew Isaac
Format: Electronic eBook
Language:English
Published: Athens : Ohio University Press, 2006
Series:Research in international studies. Southeast Asia series ; no. 112.
Subjects:
Local Note:ProQuest Ebook Central
Description
Summary:"Originating in 1891 in the port city of Surabaya, the Komedie Stamboel, or Istanbul-style theater, toured colonial Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia by rail and steamship. The company performed musical versions of the Arabian Nights and European fairy tales and operas such as Sleeping Beauty and Aida, as well as Indian and Persian romances, Southeast Asian chronicles, true crime stories, and political allegories. The actors were primarily Eurasians, the original backers were Chinese, and audiences were made up of all races and classes. While audiences marveled at spectacles involving white-skinned actors, there were also racial frictions between actors and financiers, sex scandals, fights among actors and patrons, bankruptcies, imprisonments, and a murder. Matthew Isaac Cohen's evocative social history situates the Komedie Stamboel in the culture of empire and in late nineteenth-century itinerant entertainment. He shows how the theater was used as a symbol of cross-ethnic integration in postcolonial Indonesia and as an emblem of Eurasian cultural accomplishment by Indische Nederlanders. A pioneering study of nineteenth-century Southeast Asian popular culture, The Komedie Stamboel: Popular Theater in Colonial Indonesia, 1891-1903 gives a new picture of the region's arts and culture and explores the interplay of currents in global culture, theatrical innovation, and movement in colonial Indonesia."--Publisher's website.
Physical Description:1 online resource (xviii, 473 pages) : illustrations, maps
Format:Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002.
Bibliography:Includes bibliographical references (pages 455-459).
ISBN:9780896804500
089680450X
Reproduction Note:Electronic reproduction.
Source of Description, Etc. Note:Print version record.
Action Note:digitized