Tjalie Robinson

Infobox Writer
name = Jan Johannes Theodorus Boon


image size = 275*350
caption = Jan Boon also known as Tjalie Robinson or Vincent Mahieu, champion of Indo culture.
birthdate = birth date|1911|1|10|mf=y
birthplace = Nijmegen, The Netherlands
deathdate = death date and age|1974|4|22|1911|1|10|mf=y
deathplace = The Hague, The Netherlands
nationality = Dutch
occupation = Writer, journalist

Tjalie Robinson is the main alias of the Eurasian intellectual and writer Jan Boon (born Nijmegen, 10 January 1911; died The Hague, 22 April 1974) also known as Vincent Mahieu. His father was Dutch and his Indo-European mother was half English and Javanese.

He is considered to be the publisher of unique Indo literature. Tjalie Robinson became the most influential post war Indo activist of his generation and the most important promoter of Indo culture anywhere. His aim as cultural guardian was to preserve Indo culture for the future.

Life and times of Tjalie in a nutshell

Born in the Netherlands he spent the first 44 years of his life in the Dutch East Indies. Before World War II he was a teacher and contributing editor for a newspaper. During the war he was interned in various Japanese concentration camps such as Tjimahi and the infamous Changi. After the war he survived the bedlam of the Bersiap period and even worked as a journalist.

In 1955 however he had to leave for the Netherlands where he became a zealous activist for the preservation of Indo culture. He started the magazine ‘Tong Tong’ that lives on to this day under the name ‘Moesson’. [ [http://www.moesson.com/ Tjalie Robinsons 'Moesson' magazine] ] The magazines main target audience was the Indo community in diaspora. Another living monument of his achievements is the annual Pasar Malam Besar which he co-founded in 1959. [ [http://www.pasarmalambesar.nl/english/whatis.htm Tjalie Robinsons ‘Pasar Malam Besar’] ] Part of his literary legacy is the fact that he wrote much of his work in the Indo mix language called Petjok, also known as petjo or pecuk, providing academic linguistic research a substantial database. His work varies between the melancholy reminiscence of the Indos in diaspora, caught in the term Tempo Dulu, and study of a global Eurasian cultural domain.

In search of this global vision on Indo culture and in a continued effort to resist assimilation Tjalie Robinson traveled to South America where he compared the Indo community with the racially mixed people of that continent. In 1961 he even considered establishing an Indo enclave in Spain. Later he moved to the USA (1963-1968) and lived in California where he founded the American ‘Tong Tong’.

The final years of his life the avant garde visionary returned to the Netherlands where he died in 1974. His ashes however were scattered in the Bay of Jakarta.

References

Books

* Tjies (Alias Vincent Mahieu) (1960)
* Tjoek (Alias Vincent Mahieu) (1961)
* Piekerans van een straatslijper (1965)

Bibliography

*Paasman, Bert ‘Tjalie Robinson, de stem van Indisch Nederland’ (Publisher Stichting Tong Tong) ISBN 90-801433-3-2

External links

* [http://www.tjalie.nl/ Website of Tjalie Robinsons Dutch biographer]
* [http://cip.cornell.edu/Dienst/UI/1.0/Summarize/seap.indo/1106966123 English translation of Tjalie Robinsons short story ‘Vivere Pericolosamente’]
* [http://www2.fmg.uva.nl/imes/research/tjalie_robinson.html Research programme Amsterdam University]

Notes