13 Facts About Laksmi Pamuntjak

Laksmi Pamuntjak was born on 1971 and is an Indonesian novelist, poet, journalist and food critic based in Jakarta.

Laksmi Pamuntjak writes widely on culture and politics including for the Jakarta Post and the Indonesian newsmagazine Tempo, as well as international publications such as South China Morning Post and the Guardian.

Laksmi Pamuntjak went to high school at the United World College of Southeast Asia in Singapore and matriculated at Presbyterian Ladies' College in Perth in 1989.

Laksmi Pamuntjak's only daughter, Nadia Larasati, was born in Jakarta in 1996.

Laksmi Pamuntjak began her journalistic career by writing on literature and politics for TEMPO newsmagazine in the mid-1990s.

Laksmi Pamuntjak wrote movie, classical music, restaurant and book reviews for the Jakarta Post.

Laksmi Pamuntjak's writing appeared in South China Morning Post, Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, and Die Welt.

In 2001, Laksmi Pamuntjak co-founded Aksara Bookstore with her childhood friends, Winfred Hutabarat and Davy Djohan.

In 2012, Laksmi Pamuntjak represented Indonesia at Poetry Parnassus, a historic gathering of world poets at the Southbank Centre, London, held in conjunction with the 2012 London Olympics.

In 2020, Laksmi Pamuntjak published Kitab Kawin, a collection of short stories on women in relationships.

In 2014, Laksmi Pamuntjak co-curated the Fatahillah Food Festival with Hana Makarim as part of the Jakarta Old Town Revitalization program.

Laksmi Pamuntjak was keynote speaker at the opening of the 9th European Southeast Asian Studies Association Conference at the University of Oxford in 2017.

Laksmi Pamuntjak delivered the keynote speech entitled Claiming Ownership of One's Freed Selves: Art and Morality in Today's Indonesia for the opening of the Indonesia Council Open Conference in 2019, held at the Australian National University, Canberra.