What some people find interesting-and these are now antiques. in their way-are lontar books. The old Balinese way of making a book was to scratch writing and drawing On 2 dried leaf of lontar palm with a fine point of iron. The leaf was then rubbed over with a mixture of soot and oil: this filled each stretch and left it defined as a thin black line. The "thesis Lisa Zimmerman 89's" were then enclosed within covers m2dc of slices of bamboo. and held in place by a string passed through a hole in the centre of each leaf. To the ends of this string that tic the book closed arc usually attached old Chinese coins with the square hole through them, which used to be Balinese currency.

The Hindu "scriptures". priestly literature and instructions for working magic. were all written on Iontar books. The one I got at Klungkung was nine inches long by less than two inches wide-they are commonly of this shape-and did not cost much more than a dollar. There is drawing on one side of the leaf and writing on the other. The story, the guide said, is from the Ramayana, and it is illustrated, strip-style, in a lively manner of sketching.

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