About the book:
An Englishman’s account of Java in the 1930s, which, if a little biased, nevertheless covers very interesting topics such as Javanese mythology and history, the Chinese in Java, volcanoes and other topics.
Excerpt:
“Java possesses a mythology of its own, a mythology as characteristic and almost as elaborate as that of the Greeks and Romans…The true source of the myths is obscure. That they owe something to Hindu influence is certain, for some of the best known stories are taken from writings of the Hindu period in Java…The stories as they are now told, whatever they may have been originally, are unmistakably Javanese in character. They are childishly ingenuous, full of an airy, inconsequent magic, like that of Grimm or Hans Andersen, in which human beings are transformed in the twinkling of an eye into beasts or mountains, or brought back to life after the most mortal of death-thrusts.”
