Journeys of Desire: A Study of the Balinese Text Malat

From the late seventeenth century until the Dutch conquest of the early twentieth Century Bali was ruled by a set of competing kingdoms. This study of the Balinese text Kidung Malat is the first work in Indonesian historical studies to analyse the main ideology of these Balinese kingdoms. It does so by demonstrating how the performance and presentation of the text presented an image of the ideal prince to both rulers and subjects.