...Judith Becker Listening to an Earlier Java: Aesthetics, Gender, and the Music of the Wayang in Central Java . By Sarah Weiss . 2006 . Leiden : KITLV Press. viii , 187 pp., CD-ROM. $35.00 (paper). Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2008 2008 The title...

...Matthew Isaac Cohen Voices of the Puppet Masters: The Wayang Golek Theater of Indonesia . By Mimi Herbert . Jakarta : Lontar Foundation ; Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2002 . 254 pp. $49.00 (cloth). Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2002 2002 1436...

...A. C. Scott Wayang Purwa: Shadows of the Past . By H. Ulbricht . Kuala Lumpur : Oxford University Press , 1970 . xvi, 120 pp. Illustrations, Sources, Bibliography, Glossary. $7.75. Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1971 1971 BOOK REVIEWS 919 Commander...

...Bethany J. Collier Malone Power Plays: Wayang Golek Puppet Theater of West Java . By Andrew N. Weintraub . Athens : Ohio University Press , 2004 . 295 pp. $30.00 (paper). Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2008 2008 Power Plays examines the development...

... Malay Shadow Puppets: The Wayang Siam of Kelantan. BY AMIN SWEENEY. London: British Museum. 83 pp. Bibliographical Note, Glossary, Illustrations, n.p.l. Persons interested in Asian theatre will welcome this introductory work by Amin Sweeney, a graduate of SOAS and now a teacher of Malaysian literature...

...Amin Sweeney Javanese Shadow Theatre: Movement and Characterization in Ngayogyakarta Wayang Kulit . By Roger Long . Ann Arbor, Mich. : UMI Research Press (Theater and Dramatic Studies, no. 11), 1982 . xi, 195 pp. Notes, Appendixes, Glossary, Bibliography, Bibliographic Notes, Index...

... orally “that we begin to glimpse the complexity of the problem” (1991, 31). Similarly, what should we do about traditions such as Javanese wayang in which oral performances are based on stories in texts, even though few puppeteers own, consult, or have even seen the written texts (Sears 1996...

... the Malay shadow play (wayang), and especially about its main repertoire, the Ramayana. He has furthered a cross-culturally comparative understanding of Southeast Asia's single most widely known myth, not as it was sculpted or written down long ago but as it lives today. He has also shown us how...

... to elicit. Laurie Sears, in this original and intriguing account, traces the history of that conventional wisdom about wayang and its current manifestations. A great virtue of the book is that Sears seeks to find no single "meaning" to wayang. This enables her to make the very fruitful move of asking what...

... a place in a civilization as the puppet shadow play {wayang kulii) of the Javanese. Even casual observers have noted the pervasive influence of wayang kulit in Javanese life, and scholars of Java have lavished attention on it from many perspectives. Dutch and Indonesian tomes have described the puppets...

... points and causes a certain degree of unease. An argument that does run throughout the book is that Islam has been inappropriately, and in many cases deliberately, minimized in both Western and elite Javanese approaches to Javanese culture. This point is applied to wayang to make two claims: first...

... be a firm command of Javanese and a close familiarity with other aspects of the wayang, in particular, the dramatic structure and music. The subsequent study of movement would then allow a much richer interpretation: certain recurring patterns would be noticed on various levels of the performance...

..., Index. $15.00. Despite their dramaturgical sophistication, aesthetic complexity, and philosophical subdety, Javanese shadow puppet plays have been almost totally neglected by students of comparative drama and spoken literature. The barriers have been great. In the first place, the wayang is essentially...

... wisdom about wayang and its current manifestations. A great virtue of the book is that Sears seeks to find no single "meaning" to wayang. This enables her to make the very fruitful move of asking what goals various commentators Dutchmen, Javanese, and a few other Westerners have pursued in putting forth...

.... $32.50 (cloth); $14.95 (paper). Few if any art forms have been accorded so central a place in a civilization as the puppet shadow play {wayang kulii) of the Javanese. Even casual observers have noted the pervasive influence of wayang kulit in Javanese life, and scholars of Java have lavished attention...

...Bryan K. Ritchie 1438 THE JOURNAL OF ASIAN STUDIES Herbert has a sharp eye regarding visual aspects of wayang golek, but is not skilled in performance analysis; she describes, for example, the musical tuning of slendro as "roughly equivalent to the key of A or the soprano voice in Western music...

... but seemingly unaimed and often chimerical social critiques that leave the reader or listener nodding in agreement but also guessing what exactly has been agreed to. This seems to be the element that ties Putu most closely to traditional performance, especially the Wayang theater. How, for example, are we...

... Malaysian Shadow Play and Music: Continuity of an Oral Tradition. By PATRICIA M A T U S K Y . Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1994. xiv, 149 pp- $49.95. It's good to see this first ethnomusicological study of Malay wayang kulit finally appear in print. Based on her 1980 dissertation and the result...

... Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2003 2003 Communications to the Editor M I M I H E R B E R T responds to M A T T H E W ISAAC C O H E N ' S review of Voices ofthePuppet Masters: The Wayang Gokk Theater of Indonesia,]AS 6l(4):l436-38. I appreciate some of the very nice...

...-defined, but fluid musical and social system. H. Susilo's contribution, "Wayang Wong Panggung," provides an excellent introduction to wayang wong dance-drama, and his descriptions of troupe organization and performance training and technique contain valuable additions to English-language literature...