This book is based on my doctoral thesis written at the Australian National University (ANU) several years ago, about the life of Hamengku Buwono IX of Yogyakarta, who was long prominent in Indonesian affairs but had not attracted much scholarly interest from foreigners.

I would like to thank the supervising panel for their care and attention, especially my supervisor Ann Kumar, and the other panel members Virginia Hooker and the late and much-missed Ian Proudfoot. At ANU, I am indebted to various colleagues for much useful advice and dialogue, including my fellow PhD students at the time, Mary Kilcline Cody, Peter Quinn and Mark Emmanuel. David MacRae provided me with a useful information statement for informants, which I used virtually verbatim.

I would also especially like to thank David Reeve, Shigeru Sato, David Jenkins, McComas Taylor, Liudmila Mangos, and Chris Manning and the Indonesia Project. I appreciate the help of Oliver Mann, then of the National Library, and others there, as well as Mrs Betty Feith for permission to examine her late husband's private papers in the Library. My thanks go to Monash University, especially Brenda Le Grand, for access to Herb Feith's public archives in the library there. Particularly warm thanks are due to my wife, Isti Monfries, who helped and supported me in a wide variety of ways.

In Yogyakarta, I have to thank H.H. Hamengku Buwono X for his help and reminiscences of his father, as well as that of several family members, especially G.B.P.H. Prabukusumo, Romo Noordi Pakuningrat and K.R.T. Jatiningrat, Pak Suwignyo and staffers at the Kraton Archives, as well as personnel of the Yogyakarta Special Region Archives, such as Bu Ikrar and Pak Hardo.

In Jakarta, the large numbers of necessary acknowledgements make it difficult to single anyone out, but I should particularly mention the late (and also much missed) Geoffrey Forrester and his partner Peter Kelly, Nono Anwar Makarim, G.B.P.H. Pakuningrat, and Princess Nindyokirono. My research afforded me the unique opportunity to meet and converse with a number of distinguished older-generation Indonesians, some of whom are now alas deceased. It was a real privilege to meet and interview such figures as the late Sudarpo Sastrosatomo, Rosihan Anwar, Radius Prawiro, Frans Seda and Wijoyo Nitisastro.