Coming to Jakarta: A Poem about Terror

by Peter Dale Scott

Book Overview

A devastating revelation of violence, exploitation, and corrupt politics, Coming to Jakarta derives its title from the role played by the CIA, banks, and oil companies in the 1965 slaughter of more than half a million Indonesians. A former Canadian diplomat and now a scholar at the University of California, Peter Dale Scott has said that the poem is triggered by what we know of the bloody Indonesian massacre... However it is not so much a narrative...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0811210952
• ISBN13: 9780811210959
• Release Date: April 1989
• Publisher: New Directions Publishing Corporation
• Length: 164 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.4" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

The Poetry of Terror

Peter Dale Scott is a modern American hero. His forays into the dark world of deep politics and the functions of the Uber-State are extraordinary contributions to our understanding of how US hegemony has developed in the post war period, and particularly since the 1960s. The persuasive power of that writing is, apart from the argument, derived from meticulous research, the rechecking of sources and corroboration of factual claims by ample foot-noting (there were, for example, 117 pages of footnotes in The Road to 9/11). Coming to Jakarta is a poetic re-telling of Scott's personal, intellectual journey through the world of international political terror and complements his other body of work. It's a long poem, and much of it may prove inaccessible to readers unfamiliar with Scott's political writing or the historical subjects alluded to. That should not deter, but be accepted as an invitation to commune with one of the great political analysts of our time.