new keris magazine

[A. G. Maisey]

I read the new edition of "KERIS", I think, two weeks ago.

My opinion remains unaltered.

Regarding the possibility of an English edition of The Big Keris Book.

Nobody I have spoken with in Solo has heard of this possibility, and one person amongst these people is in a position where he should have known if an English edition was on the program.

What I did hear was that there is a desire to publish similar books to "Keris Jawa" that would deal with Balinese, Bugis, Sumatran, and other keris. The problem seems to be that the collectors who own the necessary top drawer examples of these other keris have been less than cooperative in promises to make pieces from their collections available for photographs.

One very high level collector was mentioned as being quite willing to allow his collection pieces to be photographed, provided he recieved an (apparently) extortionate level of royalties.

I feel that bearing in mind all factors, the Indonesian language edition of "Keris Jawa" may be all we will ever see. I hope I'm wrong, but that's the way I read it.