The Liep Nio

The Liep Nio was a Chinese Indonesian writer and playwright active in the 1930s in the Dutch East Indies. Little is known about her life aside from the fact that she was a Peranakan Chinese woman from Purbalingga in Central Java; she was probably born in the early twentieth century. The Liep Nio published poems, novels, plays, and short stories in literary magazines such as Tjerita Roman, Liberty, and Djawa Tengah Review. The novel was a moralistic story about a Peranakan couple who married without the approval of their parents, which caused their downfall. They move to Surakarta and then to Surabaya and are unable to make any connections in Chinese business communities and Liang Nio supports them by baking cakes and sewing. Eventually Siok Tjawn sells Liang Nio to a rich merchant who mistreats her; their daughter Liesje becomes a sex worker and outcast from polite society.

Selected publications (1931, short story printed in Liberty) (1931, novel printed in ) , (1934, a play serialized in Djawa Tengah Review)