The British film director Peter Greenaway once produced and directed the film The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover as the era of Margaret Thatcher came to a close.

The film told the story of the ill-fated encounter between a cultured and mild-mannered intellectual and the crass and brutish thug-turned-businessman, Mr Spinker.

The The British audience was appalled by the violence and obscenity in the film, but Greenaway's excuse was simple: His film was meant to reflect the decline of Britain at the end of nearly two decades of Thatcher's rule, and if the film was obscene and revolting it was simply because life in Thatcher's Britain was just as bad.

The weakest point of Greenaway's film was that it went over-the-top as usual. Both intellectually and aesthetically, the film tried to do and say too much and what eventually spilled forth was a overblown caricature of life in Britain at the time.

Greenaway's failure lay in his lack of economy and subtlety. As a result the message that was delivered failed to reflect the reality of things. The audience left the cinemas thinking 'he's gone mad, he has'.

Maverick artistes and intellectuals are not confined to Britain only. Here in Malaysia we have an abundant supply of them as well, except that some have become more prominent and influential than others.

One example of a prominent and highly respected intellectual who has recently taken a turn for the worse is the celebrated sasterawan negara, Shahnon Ahmad.

Controversial works

Shahnon Ahmad is a familiar figure with those of us who have studied and read contemporary Malay literature. Practically every student of Malay literature in both local and foreign universities and colleges has heard of Shahnon and read his works like Ranjau Sepanjang Jalan and Rentung.

During the late 1970s and 1980s, Shahnon was also one of the pioneers of another genre of Malay writing: the Islamist or dakwah novel that became the fad of those times.

Of late, however, Shahnon has produced works of controversial if not questionable quality to say the least. Not too long ago the attention of the Malaysian public was grabbed thanks to the controversy that raged on about his infamous book, SHIT.

Shahnon's SHIT was written as the 'Anwar Ibrahim crisis' reached its peak and the Malay community in particular found itself split between two mutually antagonistic and irreconcilable camps - the Islamist-reformists who were supporting the ex-deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim and the conservative-nationalists who stood behind the government of Dr Mahathir Mohamad and the Umno party.

Shahnon identified himself with the former and cast his lot accordingly.

Coming at a time when the prime minister's and the government's credentials were at their lowest, Shahnon's SHIT was a intestinal broadside designed to smear the name and reputation of both the leaders of the country and the ruling establishment at the same time.

Bad taste

Though he maintained throughout that the work was a piece of fiction, the fact that the central character in the novel (a lump of excrement, no less) was called PM @ Pukimak left his readers with little room to doubt who he was referring to.

The problem with Shahnon's SHIT, however, was that it literally hit the fan and ended up going everywhere and nowhere at the same time. A rambling, confused and seemingly endless narrative of more than 200 pages, it was an exercise in bad taste of unprecedented proportions.

The book was a great hit and it sold thousands of copies, but in the end many of those who actually had the stomach to read the thing to its final unsavoury conclusion could only ask aloud 'what was it all about?'

Many of those who read Shahnon's malodorous 'masterpiece' could not even make sense of it. This was for the simple reason that it was, in the final analysis, a bad novel.

Shahnon's artistic and literary capabilities could not save him from the fact that he had written something which in the end made little sense and shed little, if any, light on the subject of the crisis in the Malaysian political system.

Marble palace

Shahnon's fans may have been happy to join him in his faecal assault, they may have shared his sense of toilet humour, but SHIT remained a poor substitute for intelligent (or at least intelligible) political analysis and it was a weak foundation for any sort of political critique.

Now the Malaysian public is told to brace itself for another offering, expelled from the bowels of Shahnon's imagination. Shahnon's latest work is called Muntah (Vomit) and defies our expectations by being even worse than the earlier works.

Muntah, thankfully, is not a long drawn-out narrative about vomit. It is, however, a long drawn-out narrative about a certain political leader who happens to be named Paduka Maha @ PM who leads the 'Amanu' party.

The narrative covers a day in the life of the PM who resides in a magnificent marble palace in a city called Putra Tak Jaya. Coming close to the end of his life, PM reflects upon all that he has done and rests upon the laurels of his own (now-faded) glory.

The picture of the PM that Shahnon draws is an explicit, repulsive and gory one. Shahnon has the PM whiling away his hours in a private chamber where he stands naked by himself, surrounded by mirrors so that he can admire his own body.

Here in his private chamber the PM laughs, cries, screams, dreams and pines for a future where all his wishes and dreams are fulfilled. In between his pathological fits of madness and delirium, his mind passes over other subjects such as his domination of the people, his persecution of his enemies and his relationship with his wife.

PM urinating

Shahnon does not spare the PM or his readers. His description of the PM is about as explicit and crude as anything that we can expect from the author of SHIT.

Shahnon seems to relish describing the withered and wrinkly body of the PM in particular. At one point he even describes, in excruciating detail, the PM trying to urinate in his private toilet:

'Dia (PM) ketawa riuh-rendah seorang diri sehingga terasa nak kencing puas-puas. Lalu kemaluannya dijelirkan keluar sepanjang yang terdaya dan dihulur ke tandas yang berlantai batu marmar serta yang berwarna-warni dengan lukisan-lukisan berbagai bunga. Air kancing dari kemaluannya melilih keluar dengan lambat sekali walaupun diterannya penuh kekuatan, hampir sama lambat dan sama sesak nafasnya yang keluar masuk melalui kerungkungannya yang berbalutkan kulit-kulit seribu keredutan itu'. (page 19)

The PM, for Shahnon, is a figure of decay and decadence. The narrative is littered with (somewhat repetitious and lengthy) descriptions of the PM's ailing and decrepit body which he tries to hold up with all his strength.

Shahnon's PM is a man who is about to meet his destiny, aware of the fact that he is no longer loved by the people. Yet in the course of the narrative Shahnon has the PM surrounded by his loyal army of cronies and retainers: ministers, Ulama, academics, writers and journalists who slavishly do his bidding and cater to his schizophrenic whims.

The narrative finally ends with the PM reflecting on his life, achievements and fate. Aware of the fact that he is now free to do as he pleases after he has eliminated all opposition in the country, Shahnon's PM breathes a sigh of relief and self-satisfaction.

His eyes blind to the realities around him, the PM is satisfied that he is indeed good, just and kind to all. As Shahnon puts it: 'Dadanya tetap lapang'.

Problematic work

To enumerate the weaknesses and faults of the book would take too long. As a work of literature the novel fails on many counts. Shahnon himself points out in his introduction that writing is no easy task and spontaneous writing is even more difficult.

At one point he notes that most of his ideas come to him in the morning after the daily jog; to which one can only add that perhaps he should have jogged a bit longer.

Muntah remains as repetitive, self-referential, poorly-structured and clumsily written as the earlier SHIT. Its main weakness is that it is not an interesting book to read - surely a major fault in any work that aims to be a parody, aimed at lampooning those in power.

But apart from its artistic and aesthetic failures, there are many other reasons why the book is problematic.

For a start, in Muntah we find Shahnon going back to his earlier theme of the betrayal of the Malay race.

Those who have read his earlier works like Ranjau and Rentung will know that Shahnon was one of those Malay writers who blamed the non-Malays in the country for the marginalisation of the Malay race.

For many of the writers of this generation in particular, the theme of the Malays in 'danger' has been a recurrent motif in their writings. Here in Muntah, Shahnon once again returns to his pet theme of the Malays being betrayed by external foes and enemies - except in this case the enemy without happens to be none other than the PM himself.

Rabid soliloquies

Apart from lengthy descriptions of the rotting body of the PM, Shahnon also describes him as an outsider who is not 'really Malay' and whose main political agenda was to enter the Malay community so that he could eventually rise to the top and dominate it.

At one point Shahnon has the PM saying thus:

'He! Aku bukan Melayulah. Bagaimana aku boleh menjadi wira Melayu yang ultra kerana aku bukan berbenih Melayu. Dia (PM) hanya menjadi Melayu, jadi ultra Melayu, jadi pelampau Melayu kerana memang agendanya selama ini pun hanya untuk memperalatkan bangsa yang keparat ini. Hanya untuk memperkakaskan bangsa ini. Hanya untuk mengerbaukan dan melembukan bangsa yang kononnya digah dan dislogankan sendiri sebagai bangsa yang tidak akan hilang di dunia ini'. (page 21-22)

Here it is difficult to see how Shahnon, the author who once pioneered the so-called Islamist or dakwah literature of the country could reconcile his universalist faith with the narrow racial chauvinism that is so clearly evident in the book.

Couched as it is in terms of an essentialist understanding of Malayness and Malay identity, Shahnon's discourse of racial purity based on blood and belonging clearly excludes the PM from the Malay fold.

To hammer the point home, Shahnon has the PM do the speaking for him in one of his rabid soliloquies:

'Aku (PM) bukan dari keturunan bangsa ini. Darahku bukan sama dengan darah mereka. Keturunanku bukan sama dengan keturunan mereka. Kononnya aku ini keturunan Kerala yang hanya layak menjual nasi kandar di simpang-simpang jalan. Bukan aku sudah lupa cacimaki dan cacihamun mereka dengan carutan yang berbagai menghina keturunan mamakku ini, tapi kini sedarlah mereka bahawa yang memimpin dan sekaligus menjajah uratsaraf, jiwa dan roh bangsa mereka ini hanya seorang anak keling yang pada suatu masa ketika dulu pernah tebar roti canai di simpang jalan raya'. (page 28)

Just how the so-called 'mamaks' and 'anak kelings' would react to Shahnon's writings is anyone's guess. It is clear however that Shahnon's Islamist orientation clearly stops at the borders of the Malay race.

Gullible, emotional, weak,

Apart from his negative depiction of the PM as the racial outsider who has come to colonise and dominate the Malay people, Shahnon also seems to be equally contemptuous of the Malays themselves.

If such a leader like the PM could come to power in the country, he argues that it is due to the weakness of the Malays themselves who were willing to be ruled by others.

Here lies the other major problem with the book, namely the evident self-loathing and contempt that Shahnon directs towards himself and the Malays in general.

Shahnon presents a bleak and depressing picture of the Malays as a race that is gullible, emotional, weak and easily domesticated. In his own words:

'Begitu mudah PM songlap bangsa ini melalui kepimpinan mereka yang begitu mudah diliukkan oleh pujian demi pujian.' (page 87)

'Dalam detik-detik yang indah ini jugalah PM terasa amat bertuah kerana dia dijadikan PM kepada satu bangsa yang mudah diternak. PM cukup yakin bahawa dia akan jadi PM sampai bila-bila walau seluruh rakyat bencikannya'. (page 103)

'Sememangnya aku (PM) telah mengkaji mentaliti mereka semenjak dahulu lagi. Dan bangsa keparat yang kononnya tak akan hilang di dunia ini bersedia menelan dan mengunyah apa saja maklumat tak kira yang palsu atau yang karut. Setiap maklumat ditelan dan kemudian diberak-berakkan begitu sahaja. Memang benar selama ini aku mengunta, mengkerbau, menglembu dan mengkeldai bangsa yang keparat ini. Begitu mudah menjajah bangsa yang keparat ini. Bangsa ini bukan tahu mengikut telunjuk sendiri. Bangsa ini hanya tahu ikut telunjuk orang lain'. (page 108)

It is sad to see how the author who was once regarded as one of the clearest voices in the Malay milieu has turned against his own people, culture and history in a fit of hysterical anxiety.

Shahnon's condemnation of the Malays as a race of blind and thoughtless followers also rings hollow considering the man's own affiliation to a religious cult (now proscribed) that preached total obedience and blind reverence to its spiritual leader.

Narcissistic ranting

Yet Shahnon sees fit to condemn the Malay race in toto in this narrative of his, which speaks volumes about the man himself and where his career is heading.

Reading Shahnon's SHIT and Muntah reminds one of the late Harold Pinter, who during the final months of his life became increasingly paranoid, depressive and pessimistic.

Pinter's final works were travesties of his earlier writings and they painted a sad and miserable picture of an artiste who had lost his skill, desperately lashing out at the world around him while indulging in fits of self-pity and self-loathing at the same time.

Shahnon too seems to have lost his skill and is desperately hitting out at all the things that he feels are wrong with the country - real or imagined - with everything he has left. Ironically, Shahnon himself has lost his sight on things and the realities around him, very much like the PM he derides in his narrative.

In summing up, one could only say that Muntah is a fitting follow-up to Shahnon's earlier SHIT. Both works deserve the titles given to them, an anomaly during these days of false advertising.

Those who choose to read SHIT and Muntah will get precisely that, nothing more and nothing less. Sadly for the rest of us who have to live in the real world, political, economic and social problems still require practical and realistic solutions.

'Artistic' diatribes against the evils of the world, be they crude or sophisticated, often miss the mark for the simple reason that artistes end up talking about their own problems and insecurities rather than the problem at hand.

Shahnon's latest writings clearly fall into this category of paranoid, self-referential, narcissistic ranting where the reader is invited into the private hell of the author.

Dressed-up satire

Unfortunately many of us would probably prefer to stay out of Shahnon's ethnocentric and exclusivist private world and fight our battles in the real world outside.

This is perhaps where Shahnon has failed us the most. Having written so much about the plight of the Malays over the years, his latest works have been a betrayal of the Malays of the highest order.

Coming at a time when the Malays are in need for a clear voice and practical solutions, Shahnon has offered them only contempt and abuse dressed-up as parody and satire.

That SHIT and Muntah have appeared on the Malaysian literary scene tells us a lot about the state of affairs in the country and where we have got to. But surely the people deserve better.

Muntah is, and remains, sad and pathetic.