Singapura Dilanggar Todak !!! LARI ~

This play seemed easy to read but trust me; it is definitely not as easy when I was trying to interpret its underlying meaning. Unlike Oedipus Rex, this play is an intellectual play where it provokes our thoughts about the local political scenario which I am not familiar with, and therefore, I am having a much harder time to digest this compared to Oedipus Rex.

The prologue of the play is about a covenant between God and human. Although the characters in prologue do no reappear in the rest of the play, they are actually significant characters that influence the development of the entire play. It is because the breaking of this covenant, the kingdom was destroyed. This reminds me of Shakespeare’s “King Lear” when Lear forfeited his responsibilities as a King to rule on Earth (he broke the covenant with God) and in the end, he became a mad man as his own retribution. Again, my insights on power from the above deepen because play after play, it had proven to me that God’s power is unchallengeable and human can never outwit God.

Besides this, there is nothing that surprised me in the storyline as I am quite familiar with it, since I had read “Sejarah Melayu” when I was in secondary school. The only surprising element I found in here was the character of Ris Kaw and Logod. These two characters seemed to act like outsiders that view the development of this play in a different perspective. This had ringed a bell in me of a Chinese proverb that says that “an outsider can see a matter more clearly than those who are involved in that matter”. I see Ris Kaw and Logod playing that role because, as discussed in previous lectures, they are the contemporary voices that alert us. They let us see between the lines of what is happening and they are our own voice of conscience.

Lastly, I liked the way Kee Thuan Chye wrote this play because it is rather humorous. It seemed easy to read, but for literature students like me who have to always read between the lines, it had really given me a headache. Many of us tend to forget what we as a literature students should do (interpret underlying meaning and the message in the play) when reading this play because the entire play is funny and the language is rather easy. Therefore it had definitely increased the difficulty level of this play, and in my opinion, more difficult than the text “Oedipus Rex”.