A 150-year-old French literary connection to Central Java is being put back to work. France and Indonesia have launched the Rimbaud Residency, their first bilateral and reciprocal literary residency programme, beginning with a three-month stay in Semarang by French-language writer Louis-Philippe Dalembert before an Indonesian writer heads to France in early 2027.
The programme was announced in Jakarta on 10 September 2026 by the Embassy of France in Indonesia – Institut français d’Indonésie (IFI), in partnership with the City of Semarang. Its starting point is the brief but curious passage of French poet Arthur Rimbaud through Java in 1876, with Semarang chosen as the first host city.
That history returned to public view earlier this year through the exhibition Arthur Rimbaud: A Journey through Java, inaugurated in Semarang on 6 August by French Ambassador to Indonesia, Timor-Leste and ASEAN Fabien Penone and Semarang Mayor Agustina Wilujeng Pramestuti.
Rimbaud arrived in Semarang in July 1876 after enlisting in the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army for financial reasons. He travelled by train through Kedungjati and Tuntang before reaching Salatiga, where he deserted only days later. His time in Java left little documentation behind, though the route has since become an unusual meeting point between French literary history and Central Java.
The new residency gives that connection a contemporary role, where writers will be given time to develop their own work while meeting local authors, students, researchers and readers through workshops, discussions and other public programmes.
Louis-Philippe Dalembert takes the first residency from September to November 2026. Born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and based in Paris, the novelist and poet writes in French and Haitian Creole, frequently exploring migration, identity, memory, exile and cultural encounters.
His books include Avant que les ombres s’effacent, winner of the Prix Orange du Livre 2017, and Mur Méditerranée, recipient of the Prix de la Langue française 2019 and Choix Goncourt awards in Switzerland and Poland. His novel Milwaukee Blues was also shortlisted for the Prix Goncourt in 2021.
In Semarang, Dalembert will work from Lawang Sewu while meeting Indonesian writers, students and researchers through a programme organised with the City of Semarang, Alliance Française Semarang and Universitas Negeri Semarang. His stay places a working contemporary writer inside a city usually connected to Rimbaud through history, giving the literary link a decidedly current form.
The exchange will reverse direction in early 2027, when an Indonesian writer is due to spend three months at the Cité internationale de la langue française in France. Based at the Château de Villers-Cotterêts, the institution was inaugurated by President Emmanuel Macron in 2023 and hosts writers, researchers and other French-speaking creators. This two-way structure is central to the residency. Each writer receives the same opportunity to work inside a different literary environment, meet local communities and develop new material over an extended stay.
The launch also arrives during a broader period of French-Indonesian cultural cooperation. Presidents Emmanuel Macron and Prabowo Subianto adopted the Borobudur Declaration on a Joint Cultural Strategy in May 2025, followed by the launch of Choix Goncourt Indonesia in May 2026. French literary figures also participated in the Makassar International Writers Festival this year.
The Rimbaud Residency is planned as the beginning of a longer programme. The Embassy of France – IFI intends to develop additional residencies for literary creation and translation in different parts of Indonesia before June 2027, alongside future editions of the Rimbaud Residency and the existing multidisciplinary KOTA programme developed with the Cité internationale des arts in Paris.
Rimbaud’s Java journey lasted only briefly. The programme carrying his name is designed with a longer horizon, placing contemporary writers, reciprocal exchange and sustained literary contact at the centre of the next phase of cultural cooperation between France and Indonesia.
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