Chairil Anwar

He married Hapsah Wiraredja in August, 1946, and fathered a daughter, Evawami Alissa. However, the marriage did not last long and ended in a divorce in 1948.

Apparently due to his hectic schedule, he got physically weak and fell ill with several diseases. He died on April 28, 1949 in a CBZ Hospital (now R.S. Ciptomangunkusomo), Jakarta.

He was buried at Karet Bivak Cemetery, Jakarta, on April 29. The cause of death was uncertain, with some hinting tuberculosis, some typhus, and others suggesting syphilis.

Chairil Anwar was born on July 26, 1922 in Medan, North Sumatra, as the only child of Toeloes and Saleha, both residents of Lima Puluh Kota district, West Sumatra.

As a child, he went to Dutch elementary school for indigenous people, Hollandsch-Inlandsche School (HIS), and later attended Dutch junior high school, Meer Uitgebreid Lager Onderwijs, but dropped out at the age of 18.

He moved to Batavia (now Jakarta) with his mother in 1941, after his parents divorced, where he was introduced to the world of literature.

With a dream to become an artist since childhood, he started reading books of international authors, like WH Auden, Hendrik Marsman, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Edgar du Perron, which became his inspiration and influenced his works.

In 1942, he apparently wrote his first poem ‘Nisan’ (Gravestone), drawn by the shocking death of his grandmother, which brought him into limelight. Since then, he wrote numerous poems that referred to the awareness of death.

Hoping to get his poems published, he went to Pandji Pustaka magazine in 1943, only to get most of his works rejected on the ground that they were too individualistic and not following the spirit of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.

He worked as a broadcaster in Japanese Radio, in Jakarta. Eventually, he went on to launch his own magazine, Gema Gelanggang.

His inspiration from European authors offered a fresh dose of poetry and verses to the ‘1945 Generation’ group, which contrasted with the traditional ‘New Authors Generation’ of the 1930s, whose work was more nationalist-based.

He released ‘Aku’ (Me) in 1943, at the Jakarta Cultural Centre, which came to be known as his most notable poem, reflecting his vitality and individualistic writing theme.