SMA KESATRIAN 2 SEMARANG

Becoming a writer often sounds solitary from the outside. Pages, silence, doubt, revision. Yet the invitation from SMA Kesatrian 2 Semarang for a literary talk titled Bincang Sastra reminded me that writing ultimately belongs to a community of readers, especially young ones who are still shaping their intellectual and emotional landscapes.

I arrived at the high school expecting a modest discussion. What I encountered was an auditorium alive with curiosity. The students had not only heard of the books, they had read them. The conversation moved across my works with surprising agility: Melankolia: Puisi dalam Lima Bahasa, the novella Miss Gawky: Cinta Pertama Kirana, Puisi Fabel as my translation of Jean de la Fontaine, Bunga-Bunga Iblis, and the essay collection Puisi sebagai Autobiografi. Each book opened a different door into discussion.

Miss Gawky resonated strongly with them. Its theme of first love, vulnerability, and youthful self consciousness felt close to their own lived experience. They spoke about Kirana as if she were a classmate. In contrast, Melankolia sparked questions about multilingual writing and why a poet would choose to inhabit five languages at once. Some were fascinated by the idea that language itself can become a form of migration.

When we turned to Puisi Fabel, the conversation shifted toward translation. Students were intrigued that fables written centuries ago in France could speak to contemporary Indonesian readers. This led naturally to Bunga-Bunga Iblis. Translating Charles Baudelaire was, for them, both impressive and intimidating. They wanted to know how one dares to translate a canonical poet, and whether fear ever disappears in the process. I answered honestly. Fear remains. Discipline and love for the text are what carry the work forward.

What surprised me most were the pragmatic questions. Many students asked about the financial realities of becoming a writer or translator. How does one earn a living? Is it stable? Can literature sustain a future? Their questions were direct, grounded, and practical. I appreciated that. Romanticizing the profession does no one any service. I explained that writing is both vocation and labor. It requires diversification: teaching, translating, public speaking, collaborations. Literature can sustain a life, but it demands seriousness and resilience.

Others confessed that they had already begun writing but lacked confidence. They worried their work was not good enough. We spoke about insecurity as a natural stage in artistic growth. Confidence does not precede creation. It follows persistent practice. I encouraged them to read widely, revise without mercy, and allow failure to function as training rather than verdict.

The aesthetic questions were equally rich. Students asked how to build imagery, how to balance honesty with craft, how to write about personal experience without becoming self indulgent. These are not small questions. They are the foundation of literary maturity.

The event was vibrant, filled with laughter, seriousness, and unexpected depth. Becoming a writer, I realized again that day, is not only about producing books. It is about entering dialogue. In that hall, surrounded by young readers who were unafraid to ask both practical and philosophical questions, literature felt alive, urgent, and profoundly shared.