Nyonya The Tiang Ek, whose real name was Lie Djien Nio, was a

Chinese Indonesian Chinese Indonesians ( id, Orang Tionghoa Indonesia) and colloquially Chindo or just Tionghoa are Indonesians whose ancestors arrived from China at some stage in the last eight centuries. Chinese people and their Indonesian descendants have ...

journalist, writer, and translator who was active in the late colonial period in the

Dutch East Indies The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies ( nl, Nederlands(ch)-Indië; ), was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised trading posts of the Dutch East India Company, which ...

. She was part of a small cohort of Chinese Indonesian women novelists and short story writers publishing during that time which included Khoe Trima Nio, Tan Lam Nio and Yang Lioe, and translators such as Lie Loan Lian Nio. She was known for translating detective and cloak-and-dagger stories and was interested in women's liberation and increased freedom for Chinese Indonesian women in particular. She was one of only a handful of documented Chinese Indonesian women translators in the Indies.

Biography

Lie Djien Nio was born in

Cianjur Cianjur ( su, ᮎᮤᮃᮔ᮪ᮏᮥᮁ) is a town and district in the West Java province of Indonesia, and is the seat of Cianjur Regency. The district of Cianjur is located along one of the main roads between Jakarta (120 km to the northwe ...

, West Java, Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia) at around the turn of the twentieth century. Her father, Lie Swi Gwan, was a translator of Chinese novels into Malay. She became editor of a monthly magazine named which was published by an association named . She regularly published short stories and articles dealing with women's situations and problems in this and other publications including ''Sin Bin'', ''Panorama'', and ''Liberty'', occasionally using the

Pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

Mrs. Leader, or Njonja The Tiang Ek which was her husband's name with Nyonya (mrs.) added. Her translations appeared in the 1920s in such literary magazines as ''

Penghidoepan Penghidoepan (meaning "life" in Malay language, Malay; Perfected Spelling ''Penghidupan'') was a monthly Peranakans, Peranakan Chinese, Malay-language literary magazine published in the Dutch East Indies from 1925 to 1942. It was one of the most s ...

'', '' Tjerita Roman'' and ''Tjerita Pilian''. She also translated at least a handful of detective of cloak-and-dagger novels from Chinese into Malay. Her original 1925 novel ("To be haunted by one's passions") described two Chinese sisters who had received Dutch educations in the Indies and become writers and whose lives had taken different paths. Another of her short stories concerned the life of Chinese people in the United States. Her 1933 novel depicted the life of a female journalist who was neglected and abandoned by her husband. The date and circumstances of her death are unknown.

Selected publications

* (serialized 1924–5, translation of a Chinese

Cloak and dagger "Cloak and dagger" was a fighting style common in the Renaissance involving a knife hidden beneath a cloak. The term later came into use as a metaphor, referring to situations involving intrigue, secrecy, espionage, or mystery. Overview In "The ...

novel) * : , (1925, translation of a detective novel serialized in ''Penghidoepan'') * , (1925, serialized in ''Penghidoepan'')) * (1933, published as Mrs. Leader)

References

{{Reflist Indonesian people of Chinese descent Date of birth unknown Date of death unknown 20th-century Indonesian women writers 20th-century Dutch East Indies people Indonesian journalists People from Cianjur Indonesian translators 20th-century Chinese women writers 20th-century Chinese translators Journalists from the Dutch East Indies