ABSTRACT
This essay discusses the effort to create comfort and defend the colonies by European women living in the colony. Convenience was a key element in the colonial discourse in the Netherlands, represented by the concept of HBB, huisje-boompje-beestje, a discourse that was inseparable from the women’s life. Marie van Zeggelen’s masterpiece, Indrukken van een zwervelinge. De Hollandse vrouw in Indië (1911), written during the era of Ethical Policy, was intensely discussed in the Netherlands and the colonies. In this paper Van Zeggelen’s works are assessed to show how deep the concepts of ethics and morals were present in the creation of comfort in the Indies. Critiques of colonial representation by Meijer (2005) and Huigen (1996) are combined with an analysis of the three elements of the ideology huisje-boompje-beestje in the Indies. In the intersection of cultures through various contact zones (Pratt, 1991, 2002) the construction of colonial space that reflects the attitudes of women writers on contemporary issues is examined. In the space of colonial patriarchy, Van Zeggelen was strongly motivated to look at the colonial space in order to reveal the existing ethical and moral values of life in the colony, yet she hardly ever commented on the concubinage practice which also existed there.
