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Aung San Suu Kyi between Biographical Myth and Hard Realities

Many books have been devoted to Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of Burma’s democracy movement. Particularly two books have been instrumental in establishing her image as a high-principled, spiritually guided and charismatic opposition leader, Freedom from Fear edited and compiled by her husband Michael Aris (1991), and The Voice of Hope edited by former Buddhist monk and activist Alan Clements (1997). With the exceptions of The Perfect Hostage by Justin Wintle (2007) and the French biography Aung San Suu Kyi. Le Jasmin ou La Lune by Thierry Falise (2008), which are balanced and well-researched biographies, most other books on her life tend to be emotive and often sketchy portraits. While Aung San Suu Kyi’s husband, journalists and activists have thus shaped her image outside her home country, scholars of the contemporary politics of Burma have so far been reluctant to contribute to a better understanding of her life and activism. Gustaaf Houtman’s Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics. Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy (1999), published over a decade ago, is still the only thorough academic analysis, albeit from a cultural-religious and overly sympathetic perspective. This yawning gap can be blamed on the lack of access to first-hand information during the past two decades, but also on the highly charged political situation and ever-growing international celebrity status of Aung San Suu Kyi, which may have deterred scholars from approaching her life in an academic study. The research gap will eventually narrow as soon as scholars are able to gather more reliable data. For now, however, those interested in her life and political struggle against Burma’s military regime have to rely on depictions from journalists and non-academic writers. This article reviews the latest English-language biographical accounts on Aung San Suu Kyi, each authored by a journalist who has a long-term interest in Burma’s politics. Bertil Lintner (2011), an author and former correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review, has published Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma’s Struggle for Democracy; a foreign correspondent for The Independent, Peter Popham’s (2012) contribution is The Lady and the Peacock. The