Buah Rindu

Boeah Rindoe (Perfected Spelling: Buah Rindu, Indonesian for Fruits of Longing) is a 1941 poetry collection by Amir Hamzah. The poems date to Amir's first years in Java, between 1928 and 1935. According to Anthony Johns of Australia National University, the poems are arranged chronologically, as indicated by Amir's increasing maturity as a writer while developing the poems. The collection includes twenty-three titled poems and two untitled pieces. Ten of the poems had previously been published, including Amir's first published works (both from 1932), "Mabuk..." and "Sunyi". In Buah Rindu, Amir shows an affinity for using traditional Malay poetic forms such as the quatrain, but unlike the highly fixed traditional forms, he mixes the rhyming patterns. The text is dominated by terms related to love and searching, and according to Dutch scholar of Indonesian literature A. Teeuw the collection is united by a theme of longing. Johns states that the imagery in Buah Rindu is dependent on traditional Malay literature, and that Amir's terminology is heavily influenced by classical Malay poetry. The author's use of language is also notably coloured by Javanese terms and ideas, and another source of influence appears to be Indian literature, with references to Hindu gods and goddesses. Buah Rindu was published in its entirety in the June 1941 edition of Poedjangga Baroe, a magazine Amir had helped establish in 1933. It was later republished as a stand-alone book by Poestaka Rakjat in Jakarta.