Island of Demons by Nigel Barley
Anybody who has travelled to Bali will be familiar with Balinese-style paintings and the famous Ramayana Monkey dance. In fact both of these art forms were developed by Bali's most famous expat resident: Walter Spies. In the 1920s and 30s, Walter Spies - ethnographer, choreographer, film maker, natural historian and painter - transformed the perception of Bali from that of a remote island to become the site for Western fantasies about Paradise and it underwent an influx of foreign visitors. The rich and famous flocked to Spies house in Ubud and his life and work forged a link between serious academics and the visionaries from the Golden Age of Hollywood.Charlie Chaplin, Noel Coward, Miguel Covarrubias, Vicki Baum, Barbara Hutton and many others sought to experience the vision Spies offered while Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, the foremost anthropologists of their day, attempted to capture the secret of this tantalising and enigmatic culture. Island of Demons is a fascinating and humorous historical novel about the flamboyant and homosexual life of Walter Spies in Bali.
Nigel Barley was born south of London in 1947. After taking a degree in modern languages at Cambridge, he gained a doctorate in anthropology at Oxford. Barley originally trained as an anthropologist and worked in West Africa, spending time with the Dowayo people of North Cameroon. He survived to move to the Ethnography Department of the British Museum and it was in this connection that he first travelled to Southeast Asia. After forays into Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan and Burma, Barley settled on Indonesia as his principal research interest and has worked on both the history and contemporary culture of that area. After escaping from the museum, he is now a writer and broadcaster and divides his time between London and Indonesia.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9789810823818 |
| ISBN 10 | 9810823819 |
| Title | Island of Demons |
| Author | Nigel Barley |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Monsoon Books |
| Year published | 2009-05-01 |
| Number of pages | 392 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |