This is one hell of a play! Pardon my language. The play ‘The Swordfish, Then the Concubine’ by Kee Thian Chye has successfully converted my perception towards plays. I have always had this notion about plays that they are always categorized as tragic, comedy or romantic. This play shocked me and confirmed my ignorance. How can I live for almost 22 years not knowing how brilliant a Brechtian play can be?
I enjoyed reading the play. Wait, I think “enjoy” is an understatement. To me, this play is an eye opener. And boy, I begin to dislike the common Aristotelian plays. I like the fact that the play is thought provoking. It makes me rethink about issues that seem trivial for me before. For example, I never knew that such covenant exists in Malaysia. I thought that it was merely a tale.
The story begins with a scene that shows us about the covenant between Sri Tri Buana and Demang Lebar Daun. According to this covenant, the Sultan must never disgrace His subjects no matter how grave their offence may be. In the play, we can see that Iskandar’s favourite concubine, Nurhalisa is sentenced to death by impalement after found guilty participating in a deviationist sect and also found guilty to the accusation that she attempts to kill the Sultan’s consort, Tun Dara. Another element in the covenant is that the subjects must never be disloyal towards the Sultan. In the play, Nurhalisa’s parents, Sang Ranjuna Tapa and Kesuma, betray the Sultan by teaming up with the enemy Majapahit to create a war with Singapura. The covenant also states that if the Sultan disgraces the subjects, his kingdom will be destroyed by Almighty God. In the play, we can see that several events led to Majapahit destroying the kingdom.
Throughout the story, several issues have been brought up. Mostly are about politics. An issue that I would like to talk about is Awang. He is the chosen winner of The P.F. Show. The people voted for his religious kampong values instead on how well he can sing. Sultan Iskandar gets mad at the people for being so backward in thinking. But then, he uses Awang to give the people hope when they the country is threaten by Majapahit. Towards the end, Awang is killed by the people after knowing that his presence is to avert the people’s attention from their current problems. Based on this event, I conclude that the writer is trying to tell us about the government or lawmakers. The lawmakers try to bring up an event or issue to ward off the people’s attention. In other words, new events are brought up to shut the prolonged current events. This tells me that the higher authorities are trying to fool the people to cover up something scandalous.
I was laughing like hell after finished reading this play. It was kind of political satire which I found interesting to read regarding to our political climate nowadays. Kee Thuan Chye was able to combine with historical event with contemporary setting which indulge me to read it until the end. The characters were very strong especially Iskandar and his dumb and dumberer ministers Nurhalisa and Hang Nadim. All of the characters reflect with the individual and some of well-known figures in Malaysia. The storyline was quite heavy, however the writer manage to soften it by putting jokes and some cynical dialogues. This parody had entertained me so much since the issue that had been raised up was relevant and engaged to our society.
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