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or to one’s will, B. M. Matilal proposes that Krishna is saying ‘one should try always to be
one’s own self, not somebody else’ (Matilal, 52).
The ambiguous nature of dharma and its influence on mankind’s thought and action is
dealt with in chapter 8, “The ‘Divinisation of History’ and the Duality of Justice”. Here, it
should suffice to be said that ‘be oneself’ is the message C. J. Koch has adopted. Breaking
caste, when it denies this principle, is shown to be the flaw in the major players like Sukarno,
but the problem is writ large on Billy Kwan, the dwarf who wants to be anyone other than
himself. He would join Sukarno and play the role of Krishna, or personify the wise-fool
qualities as Semar, or vicariously experience life as a tall, handsome, successful and loved man
through Guy Hamilton, even while his indecision on how to act makes him resemble Prince
Arjuna more. Billy is a half-caste Chinese angry at an Australian society which wants to
pigeonhole him into the ‘restaurant or fruit-shop business’ (YLD, 19). He is continually trying
to cross over the established social barriers, whether with so-called progressive members of
society who he wishes to bait (YLD, 66), or as a cameraman posing a journalist’s question at a
Presidential press conference (YLD, 265), or as an applicant for a secondary school teacher job
who is refused due to an inappropriate ‘appearance’ (YLD, 18). He wavers from one ideology
to another, is Sukarno’s most fervent supporter early in the book and his most committed
opponent at the end, and by wreaking all of his so carefully wrought contacts and friendships
he seems almost intent on succeeding as a social failure. Of all the characters in The Year of
Living Dangerously who are based on characters in Alice in Wonderland or the Hindu epics,
Billy Kwan is the only one who seems designed after several—if not all—of them at various
times.
This does not mean that switching vocations or aspects of personality is not desirable;
indeed, the Gita sanctions it. An important part of the sense of reconciliation in the Bhagavad
Gita is set at the individual level. One might be predisposed to one element of personality,
either to extrovert action, to inner contemplation, or to effusion of feelings and emotions, yet
not be completely lacking in the other elements, for the ‘personality hankers after the
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