Faber & Faber

A Shadow Falls: Andrew Beatty

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Synopsis:

The story of one village in the largest Muslim nation in the world.

Andrew Beatty lived with his family for two and a half years in a village in East Java. When he arrived, he was entranced by a strange and sensual way of life, an unusual tolerance of diversity.

Mysticism, Islamic piety and animism co-existed peacefully; the ancient traditions of the shadow play, of spirit beliefs and were-tigers seemed set to endure. Java appeared a model for our strife-ridden world, a recipe for multiculturalism.

But a harsh and puritanical Islamism, fed by modern uncertainties, was driving young women to wear the veil and young men to renounce the old rituals. The mosque loudspeakers grew strident, cultural boundaries sharpened. As a wave of witch-killings shook the countryside, Beatty and his family began to feel like vulnerable outsiders.

Set among Java's rice fields and volcanoes, this is the story of how one of the biggest issues of our time plays out in ordinary lives.

Tags:

Categorised as:

Non-fiction

Sub-categories:

Essays & Prose; Travel

Places:

Indonesia

Genres & Themes:

Civilisations; Diversity; Extremism; Islam; Multiculturalism; Violence