Marjie Suanda came to Indonesia in 1976 with a scholarship from the Center for World Music in Berkeley, California to further her studies of Javanese traditional dance. Marjie has a master’s degree in English from the University of Washington, and over the years has taught and been an examiner of academic English.
During the period of Reformasi, following the fall of former president, Soehart, she became deeply involved in civil society and worked as a program officer for Ashoka Indonesia for ten years. She began translating essays for visual artists in 1997 and now keeps busy translating articles for Tempo English, as well as short stories, poetry, and novels for Lontar, Gramedia, and other Indonesian publishers. Marjie lives in Bandung with her husband, ethnomusicologist Endo Suanda.
