Learn Hardcore Indonesian: Menurut editor, yang penting adalah bagaimana karakter utama berubah, bukan seberapa panjang cerpen. - According to the editor, what matters is how the main character changes, not how long the short story is.

Menurut editor = According to the editor / In the editor’s opinion
Pattern: menurut + person/source
Examples:
- Menurut saya = in my opinion
- Menurut guru saya = according to my teacher
- Menurut berita di TV = according to the news on TV

It introduces whose viewpoint you are reporting. Grammatically it’s a preposition-like word followed by a noun/noun phrase.

Can Menurut editor be placed at the end of the sentence instead of the beginning?

Yes, but it sounds more natural at the beginning.

Original:

Menurut editor, yang penting adalah bagaimana karakter utama berubah, bukan seberapa panjang cerpen.

Possible but less common:

Yang penting adalah bagaimana karakter utama berubah, bukan seberapa panjang cerpen, menurut editor.

Putting Menurut editor first clearly frames the whole sentence as the editor’s opinion. At the end, it feels like an afterthought or clarification: “…, according to the editor.” Both are grammatical.

What is the function of yang in yang penting adalah …?

Here yang turns the adjective penting (important) into a noun phrase yang penting (literally that which is important / what is important).

penting = important (adjective)
yang penting = the important thing / what matters (noun phrase)

In Indonesian, yang + adjective often means the thing that is [adjective]. For example:

yang sulit = the difficult (thing/part)
yang benar = the correct one / what is correct

So Yang penting adalah … = What is important is … / What matters is …

Is adalah necessary in yang penting adalah bagaimana …? Could we drop it?

You can drop adalah, and the sentence is still grammatical and natural:

Menurut editor, yang penting (adalah) bagaimana karakter utama berubah, bukan seberapa panjang cerpen.

Adalah works like a linking verb (similar to “is” in English) in formal or careful Indonesian, especially when linking two noun-like phrases or clauses. Omitting it makes the sentence sound a bit more casual, but still standard.

What kind of structure is bagaimana karakter utama berubah? It looks like a question, but the sentence is not a question.

Bagaimana karakter utama berubah is an embedded question clause (a noun clause), similar to English “how the main character changes.”

bagaimana = how
karakter utama = the main character
berubah = changes

Even though it uses bagaimana, it doesn’t form a full question here. Instead, the whole clause acts as a thing (a noun phrase) after adalah:

yang penting adalah [bagaimana karakter utama berubah]
= what matters is [how the main character changes]

Same pattern with others:

Saya ingin tahu bagaimana dia menjawab.
= I want to know how he/she answered.

Why is berubah used here and not something like mengubah or perubahan?

All three relate to change, but they differ in grammar and meaning:

berubah = to change (intransitive, subject undergoes change)
- karakter utama berubah = the main character changes
mengubah = to change something (transitive, takes an object)
- pengalaman itu mengubah karakter utama = that experience changes the main character
perubahan = a change, change (noun)
- perubahan karakter utama = the main character’s change

In the given sentence, we focus on the process of the main character changing, so the intransitive berubah is the most natural:

bagaimana karakter utama berubah = how the main character changes

You could rewrite the idea using perubahan:

yang penting adalah perubahan pada karakter utama
but that slightly shifts the focus to the change as a thing, not the way it happens.

What is the difference between bukan and tidak here, in bukan seberapa panjang cerpen?

Bukan is used to negate nouns or noun-like phrases, while tidak negates verbs, adjectives, and some adverbs.

Here, seberapa panjang cerpen is a noun-like phrase (an embedded question clause, “how long the short story is”), so bukan is correct.

bukan seberapa panjang cerpen
= not how long the short story is

Compare:

Itu bukan cerpen. (noun) = That is not a short story.
Cerpen itu tidak panjang. (adjective) = The short story is not long.

So you cannot say tidak seberapa panjang cerpen in this structure; it would be wrong here.

What does seberapa add in seberapa panjang cerpen? Why not just berapa panjang?

Seberapa literally means how (to what extent) and often emphasizes degree/extent, especially with adjectives.

seberapa panjang cerpen ≈ how long (to what extent) the short story is

Berapa panjang cerpen is understood, but seberapa panjang sounds more natural when talking about extent of an adjective, especially in a contrast like this.

Patterns:

seberapa + adjective
- seberapa sulit tugas ini = how difficult this assignment is
- seberapa penting hal itu = how important that is

It often appears in indirect clauses (as here) or in questions:

Seberapa penting panjang cerpen bagi editor itu?
= How important is the short story’s length to that editor?

Why is panjang after seberapa, and not before, like in English “how long”?

In Indonesian, the pattern is:

seberapa + adjective + noun

So:

seberapa panjang cerpen
= literally “how-long short story”

This matches normal Indonesian noun phrase order:

cerpen panjang = long short story
rumah besar = big house

When using seberapa:

seberapa jauh kota itu = how far that city is
seberapa tinggi gedung ini = how tall this building is

What does cerpen stand for, and is it formal enough?

Cerpen is an abbreviation of cerita pendek, which literally means short story.

cerita = story
pendek = short
cerpen = short story

Cerpen is widely used and accepted in both spoken and written Indonesian, including in newspapers, literary criticism, and academic contexts. It is completely fine and natural here; it does not feel overly informal.

Could the sentence be written with tokoh utama instead of karakter utama? Is there any difference?

Yes, you could say:

… bagaimana tokoh utama berubah …

Tokoh utama and karakter utama overlap but have slightly different nuances:

tokoh utama = the main character (as a character/role in the story)
karakter utama = the main character, but karakter also strongly evokes personality/character traits

In literary contexts:

tokoh focuses on the role in the narrative
karakter can hint more at the inner character/personality

In this sentence, both are understandable and acceptable. Karakter utama berubah emphasizes the main character’s personality/inner character changing, which fits the context well.

How does bukan seberapa panjang cerpen connect grammatically to the rest of the sentence? Is something omitted?

The structure is a contrast between two things that matter:

yang penting adalah bagaimana karakter utama berubah,
bukan seberapa panjang cerpen.

Fully spelled out (more literal) it could be:

Yang penting adalah bagaimana karakter utama berubah, (yang penting) bukan seberapa panjang cerpen itu.

The second yang penting and itu are omitted because they are understood from context. Indonesian very often omits repeated elements when the meaning is clear.

So we have this contrast:

What matters is how the main character changes,
not (what matters is) how long the short story is.

Could we rewrite the sentence more simply while keeping the same meaning?

Yes. Here are a couple of simpler but natural alternatives:

- Menurut editor, yang penting adalah perubahan karakter utama, bukan panjang cerpen.
  (According to the editor, what matters is the main character’s change, not the short story’s length.)
- Menurut editor, yang lebih penting adalah perubahan karakter utama daripada panjang cerpen.
  (According to the editor, the main character’s change is more important than the short story’s length.)

These keep the core meaning but avoid the embedded bagaimana/seberapa clauses.