Disclaimer: A bit sotoy.

A couple of years ago, I found X, an emerging Indonesian historian, citing a small part of Quentin Skinner’s Vision of Politics, Volume 1: Regarding Method. X cites Skinner’s book (specifically page 57) to say something about the importance of historians to study and interprets canon classical texts. He also includes the notion of “fundamental concepts” and “abiding concepts.” I was puzzled. I was not sure if that is Skinnerian thinking. I checked the page, and turns out I’m not entirely wrong. Indeed, Skinner writes those things, but in the next paragraph (still in the same page) he writes, “These are the assumptions I wish to question, criticise and if possible discredit in what follows.” I doubt he checks the footnotes, because the part he cited is actually full of footnotes referring to other writers. X’s citation is, I’m sorry to say, a bit of sloppy. But this problem actually makes me think about an issue bigger than a mere problem of inaccuracy: it is about the way we read.

A professor once corrected me for reading a book incorrectly. She said that we, historians and scholars in training, must be careful to pass judgment with due diligence. Since then, I’ve tried to be cautious about everything I read, to not take out things from books to confirm my assumptions or opinions; to re-visit each argument and self-challenge it. Reading academic works of history this way is (exhaustingly) difficult. Yet, at this point, I appreciate her correction. It’s not that she blatantly said I’m wrong, wrong, but she wants me to be more aware and improve my sense of reading. I know I’m still a newbie in history, but from that experience and some talk sessions with my supervisor and colleagues, I currently have at least three steps of reading history books.

First, reading the content. When we read the introduction of a history book, we can find almost everything: the background, research inquiries, arguments, methods, and summary of each chapter. But sometimes, we can find along the way that the book’s purpose exposed in the introduction is not always achieved. This can mean two things: the writers cannot meet their own initial objectives or they stretch their arguments. Either way, I, as a reader, must identify the overall argument from the book, its scholarly contribution, sources and approaches the writer uses, and following questions.

Second, reading the form. In other words, it is about making assessments of the chapter/sub-chapter structure, the book cover (important!!), the layout of list and figures (is there a map? is the chart readable?), the editorial intervention, and the writing style. These elements actually push me to be more careful. For example, if the writers use a lot of passive sentences, what does it mean? Either they are bad writers with not so good editor, or the actual subjects of the actions are not easily identified; things just … happened. Another example is me and my supervisor share a view that Rudolf Mrazek’s argument on Engineers of Happy Land, regarding the experience of modernity, lies in his writing style (mosaic-like/Kafkaesque).

Third, reading the writers. This is a step that requires extra googling and reading, as I have to find their previous school, their current job, their mentor, and sometimes their personal life. This step really helps to make sense their concerns and inquiries, and leads to deeper engagement with the era they live in.

This is what I want to discuss more: how does the way we read the form of a book and the writer can actually help us to read and understand the content.

The first example is about the form of a book, in which I focus on writing style.

Skinner’s writing style in Vision of Politics Volume 1 is complicated. Thematically wise, as he deals with the methodology of intellectual history/history of ideas, he heavily engages with hermeneutics, with many touches on the theory of speech act and rationality. (It is already difficult in itself). Skinner is actually good on structuring his chapter and paragraphs, and his choices of words are not necessarily hellish. But his sentences are quite long and difficult to follow as the layers of their structure are not always smoothly bridged. He likes to make summaries of others’ arguments and, in the middle of explaining it, he intervenes.

I think a bit of awareness of Skinner’s style is important for us to read the content, and gradually understand his arguments and proposals. It is easy to slip away from Skinner’s main points if we only look for keywords and quotable sentences. Some books have great quotable sign-posts and analytical/argumentative paragraphs, which help time-bounded readers saving their reading hours. But I’m not sure if Vision of Politics Volume 1 is that kind of book. As a result, I read sentences with no pronouns more carefully and pay more attention to the middle of the paragraph.

Another example relates to the writer.

Ong Hok Ham is big. His name, at least among Indonesian(ist) academic/intellectual circle, is too big to be unknown, too influential to be ignored. But I never read his academic works until recently. (I did actually imagine some senior historians said to me that I don’t deserve doing history because I haven’t read Ong’s works. Maybe it’s just on my mind, or maybe it’s not. Overthinking alert! Wee-woo-wee-woo-wee-woo). With such ignorance, Peter Carey’s prologue and David Reeve’s essay in the translation version of Ong’s dissertation, Madiun dalam Kemelut Sejarah (Madiun in the Chaos of History), help me. They personally know Ong, his life and works. Their own academic works also, to many extents, intersect with Ong. David Reeve, with some historians, writes Ong’s biography. Goenawan Mohamad also puts some words on Ong in his collection of essays in Tempo magazine, Wahyu yang Hilang, Negeri yang Guncang (The Lost Revelation, the Shaken Land). Ong’s student, Andi Achdian, too writes a memoir of him. Danang T. P. dedicates his thesis to observe and analyzed Ong’s writings and his historical inquiries. These people definitely know Ong better. First ingredient: Ong’s biography and his personae in the eyes of their fellow historians, mentee, and another researcher.

In his book, Reeve writes, “History is about people, not structures, systems or institutions. He [Ong] said that human experience is rich, too rich to be handled by a single methodology. Increasingly he said: ‘Take a significant individual who is under stress. Follow what happens to that person. That is history.’” Second ingredient: Ong’s view on what is history.

With these, at least, two ingredients (which can be extended further), I read Madiun with caution (at one point, a bit anxiety lol). I will not repeat what others have talked about the book. I just want to add: with his strong view on human experiences, he puts labor relations in top of land relations. The book mainly covers two types of “worker”–priyayi and peasant–in which he tells the internal dynamic of each type and their cross-interactions, with Dutch colonial as the third element. Ong, in detail, explains the mobility of these groups, telling ironies and tragedies of some individuals within the continuities and changes of society. His historical people were actually “trapped” in the structure of either traditional, colonial, or the transitional system. After all, his supervisor, Harry Benda, is the one who proposed the structure of Southeast Asian history. (I wonder if, in the English version, Ong uses the word “desideratum” as many as Benda. Uehehe). Moreover, if we put Ong’s profile as an intellectual of his generation, we can see how Madiun also echoes the anxiety of his generation; a generation that went through a series of war, survived up to Soeharto’s regime and became its “critical counterpart” through their intellectual pens.

Capek uga yak ngetik beginian. Bleh.

This is only a brief example of the way of reading history books. In the end, each person has their own ways. But my final takeout: read in discipline does matter, to not only read and take things out of the books because it’s authoritative and important but also to read and treat them with care. Well, at least, when citing things, make sure we read the next paragraph. Demikian.