The Rose of Cikembang

First published in 1927, Kwee Tek Hoay’s The Rose of Cikembang is an excellent example of the peranakan literature of the Netherlands East Indies that flourished between the 1900s and 1942 when the Japanese occupation in Indonesia began. Highly sentimental, the novel is rich in many of the controversial themes that Kwee was famous for: interracial love and the lives of its offspring, fate and karma, mysticism and reincarnation. In pre-war Indonesia, Kwee Tek Hoay’s novels were loved by urban readers. The Rose of Tjikembang, his most popular novel, was filmed twice, first in the early 1930s and again in the 1970s.