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Between Eroticism And Social Criticism; The Literariness Of Shahnon Ahmad's "Terdedah" (1965), Mohd Zariat Abdul Rani

Wacana, Journal of the Humanities of Indonesia

In the history of modern Malay literature, the 1960s are labelled by many literary critics as era picisan (the age of dime fiction) because of the flood of karya picisan (dime fiction) in the local market. Karya picisan here refers to works that clearly manipulate sexual themes, with the intent of conjuring an atmosphere of eroticism to attract readers. Critics generally do not consider these works to be karya sastra (literary works) because they do not fulfil two important criteria that commonly classify the term 'literature', namely bahasa yang indah (aesthetic language) and isi yang berfaedah (beneficial content). In the …