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| Sunday, 14 March 2004 |
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Sri Lankan expat wins Commonwealth Writers' Prize (South East Asia and South Pacific Region) Michelle de Kretser, a Sri Lankan living in Australia, has won the Best Book Prize, Commonwealth Writers' Prize (South-East Asia and South Pacific Region) for the year 2004, for her book The Hamilton case. The award was made by an international panel of judges Sanjukta Dasgupta of Calcutta University (Chairperson), Maya Jaggi (The Guardian, UK) and Fakrul Alam (Dhaka University, Bangladesh), meeting in Kolkata, India. The Best Book Award, Eurasia Region went to A Distant Shore by Caryl Phillips (published by Secker & Warburg. The Best First Book Award was awarded to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon (published by Jonathan Cape) Each wins 1,000 pounds according to a press release from the organisers. The Eurasia Panel of the Commonwealth Writers' Prize considered fiction written in English from Bangladesh, Cyprus, India, Maldives, Malta, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the United Kingdom. The winning entries from the regions are now carried forward to the final stage of the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, which will be decided in Melbourne, Australia in May 2004. They join books in each category, selected by the three other international juries, covering Africa; Canada and the Caribbean and South East Asia and the South Pacific. 10,000 pounds will then be awarded to the Overall Best Book, and 3,000 pounds to the Best First Book. Michelle de Kretser: The Hamilton Case Sydney: A. Knopf, 2003 In 2003, Rani Manicka, whose parents emigrated to Malaysia from Sri Lanka just before the Second World War, won the Best First Book Award (South-East Asia and South Pacific Region) of the 'Commonwealth Writers' Prize for The Rice Mother. Her feat has been emulated (indeed surpassed) this year by Sri Lankan-born writer Michele de Kretser who was announced the winner of the more challenging Best Book Award in the same region for The Hamilton Case. De Kretser not only becomes the first Sri Lankan expatriate to win this prize - A. Sivanandan won the Best First Book Award (CWP Eurasia) for When Memory Dies in 1999 - but has the distinction of overcoming formidable competitors, like Peter Carey, in the process. Except for a few scenes in England, The Hamilton Case, is located entirely in the island and focuses on the Sri Lankan upper class milieu from about the 1930's to 1971. O.L. de Kretser, the author's father, and a well known judge in his time, had written The Pope Murder Case on the slaying of a British planter in colonial Ceylon. Michelle's novel is to some extent based on this book. In The Hamilton Case, suspicion falls on an estate labourer but Stanley Alban Marriot Obeysekere, a lawyer, and the chief character in the novel, tries to establish that the killer was really Hamilton's guest Mr. Taylor who had suspected Hamilton of having a relationship with his wife Yvette, or of trying to molest her. What is ironic is that Obeysekere, a self-proclaimed Anglophile, is passed over for promotion at the Bar for daring to suggest that an Englishman was guilty of such a crime. De Kretser has declared at interviews that she is a great fan of Agatha Christie and readers who share her interest will be enthused by those sections that deal with the murder and the "case". Unlike in most novels that belong to the genre, however, the Hamilton Case is not solved at the end. The reader is left with unanswered questions and several versions of the "truth". Stan's version is eventually problematized when compared and contrasted with those of Shivananthan, the lawyer and former school mate through whom Stan learns about the murder, and Jaya, Stan's brother-in-law turned politician. This novel, it should be added, also has affinities with Gothic romance. The corridors of the ancient walauwes echo with ghosts and other "presences". The many suicides, infanticides, and premature deaths, too, contribute to the eerie, debilitating atmosphere that devastates the lives of the Obeysekeres. The book has much more to offer than "thriller" value, however. The Hamilton Case is an engrossing, and at times, corrosive critique of the lives and times of the Sri Lankan elite during the death throes of Empire; furthermore, like Michael Ondaatje's Running in the Family, this novel demonstrates that their lives, though grievously flawed, were nevertheless colourful and entertaining. What is especially engaging is the author's wry sense of humour that provides some relief to readers who are privy to the many horrific events that take place within the confines of this book. One of Michelle de Kretser's greatest strengths as a novelist is her ability to deal with the politics of the time in a manner that is not intrusive. This novel covers the 1950s, when S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike's socialist government swept into power, established Sinhala as the official language, and adopted several measures which eventually resulted in the Westernised elite losing its privileged position in society. Indeed, this was the climate which induced Burghers, like the de Kretsers, to emigrate. Anyone who has read R.K. Narayan's Waiting for the Mahatma will realize that even the greatest novelists face difficulties when they introduce recent, historical figures into their work. De Kretser avoids this trap with some aplomb. Jaya has traits of two Prime Ministers, S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike and Sir John Kotelawala (and perhaps other politicians of the period as well), although he is never identified as a Prime Minister in this novel. It is commonplace for many of those who left the country at that time to attributed its ills to the political agenda of the 1956 government. De Kretser eschews such a facile option for a more complex exploration of the issues. To Stanley, Jaya epitomes those who "let the side down" by shelving their aristocratic ancestry and manners for populist measures and demagoguery. He is the ultimate bounder, the "past master of the conceptual sleight of hand." To Shivananthan, Jaya's former political ally, "Jaya lived to see his theorems of national pride codified into a geometry of racial hatred." The discerning reader soon learns that both Stanley and Shivananthan are unreliable narrators whose assessments are erratic at best. Stanley for one is obviously envious of Jaya's ability to charm people, especially his sister Claudia whom he "loses" to Jaya. He also smarts at Jaya's constant jibe that Stanley Obeysekere stands for "Obey by name, Obey by nature;" in other words. Stan is described as one who is ever willing to fulfil the needs of Empire and the institutions that represent it. Jaya, on the contrary, makes use of his knowledge of these institutions to challenge their principles and change the status quo although (the author makes plain) these revolutionary transformations are accompanied by racist policies that in turn create discord of another kind. The Hamilton Case is elegantly written in flexible language that captures the cadences of the various voices found therein, and its narrative technique capable of rendering the story from multifarious perspectives. In its attitude to colonialism and the "white washed" local elite, as Jean-Paul Sartre would have described them, the novel is variously satirical, irreverent, subversive, and occasionally nostalgic. But there is a word not used so far in this review that must be employed to make it complete - compassion. De Kretser is obviously cognisant of the fact that the evil traits that some people possess are not always of their own making. While she is caustic in her treatment of characters, like Stan and Maud, she is scrupulous in showing that they are what they are because of a colonial "disease" that in some cases is incurable, or of accidents in the past which have substantially altered their personalities. As Shivananthan says of Stan, "I think he glimpsed, obscurely, that we were being written by the grand narratives of our age." Condemnation, therefore, is invariably tempered by compassion. During my stint as a judge of the Commonwealth Writers' Prize in 1999 and its Eurasia Chairperson in 2002 and 2003, I was privileged to assess novels by the likes of Austin Clark, Richard Flamagan, Michael Frayn, Nadine Gordimer, Doris Lessing, Ian McEwan, Caryl Philips, and Arundathie Roy to name just a few. Since I do not know the other novels that have won regional awards in 2004, I cannot say how de Kretser's work rites with those of her rivals for the overall Commonwealth Writers' Prize. What I do know is that it is a novel of the highest class which is on a par with the best of those that I have read as a CWP judge over the years. The Hamilton Case will surely become essential reading for the general reader, students of Sri Lankan Literature in English and specialists in Postcolonial Literatures whatever the outcome of this year's competition. Walter Perera, Professor of English University of Peradeniya ###### Dedicated research mirrors vigour of life-long achievement Rhythm of the Bharatha Dance (Indeeya Narthana Lalithya) Reviewed by Padma Edirisinghe Without any exaggeration, Indeeya Narthana Lalithya can easily be dubbed as a massive contribution to Sinhala reading material. It cosettes with its 435 large pages a labour undoubtedly resulting from painstaking and dedicated research done over the years over a very significant theme. That we hang like a drop from the vast landmass that comprises the Indian sub-continent is a geographically apparent fact. And into this seemingly physical appendage that has bravely maintained its separate identity in all other ways has flowed in almost inevitably many a spiritual and cultural treasure, the foremost being the sublime message of Buddhism. According to legend and historical annals even the beginnings of the Sinhala race are adduced to Indian origins. Subsequently followed influences on way of sustenance, language, writing, arts and crafts and many other components of culture. Into the latter falls the fantastic arena of dance which though it grew along its own indigenous lines in the highlands (Udarata natum) and even in the low lands (Pahatha rata natum) yet just could not resist being influenced by the rhythm of the Bharata dance form that boasts a universal permeation today. The book documenting the historical background ascribes the origin of this influence majority to the frequent wedlocks between the Sinhala kings and Indian princesses from South India who always came here on their bridal voyages across the straits accompanied by retinues of Indian damsels. Naturally this female trek was a rich conduit for the entry of dance practices existing in Bharatha Desha. This continuous influx of Indian dance forms according to the text is told in inscriptions, in murals, in prose literature, in sculpture, in carvings and in the Sandesha poetry of the 15th Century. Rare snippets of information are given on this aspect as extracts from travels of In Batuta (14th Century) that gives an eye-witness account of an exotic dance by 500 Hindu damsels in the court of Upulvan Devale at Devi Nuwara. Instances are further given of many groups of Indian female dancers arriving to perform in our royal courts to appease the aesthetic pleasures of our monarchs. The dance-accompanying musical instruments are mentioned in the Sandeshas and carry melodius names as Thahalam, Veena, Damaru, Maddal and the author devotes a section on elaborating this aspect too adding a rich diamension to the subject at hand. The story of the influence comes up to the advent of Rabindranath Tagore to the island and the commencement of the Sri Paale Institute of Horana. It heralded a more intensive period of contact when students of dance began an exodus to study at Shantiaikethan. This period spanned from 1935 to 1950. The main objective of this book however is not to present the influence of Indian dance traditions on our culture but to give an almost academic dissection and description of these dance traditions. The main forms of dance, i.e., Kathak, Katakhali, and Manipuri are dealt with extensively while the lesser forms as Odisi, Mohini, Chou etc. too are focused on. The book is profusely illustrated with photographs and drawings that depict the niceties, subtleties and ramifications of the dance forms under discussion. The introduction by the writer that includes the various vicissitudes she had undergone in the process of producing this work that looks as momentous as PhD thesis but is obviously not provides interesting reading. Personally I was egged on by curiosity as to a woman of our island, apparently young could research on such a wide topic and come out with a very fruitful work. The introduction almost explains in all. The work comprises five sections; pages 33 to 85 deals with the general description and historical background of the Baratha dance forms cum the music that accompany the dance traditions. Pages 87- 50 have as its main focus the dance of Shiva and the subject of Devadasees (those intriguing females who perform dances as a service to gods in their own domains i.e., Kovils). Pages 151-235 is almost a dissertation on the four main traditions of India, Bharatha, Kathakali, Manipuri and Kathak. The lesser forms and Indian folk dances too are dealt with here. Pages 236-377 deal with Abhinaya (gesture) that plays a predominant role in Indian dances making it unique among all dance forms of the world. The main forms of Abhinaya are given with meticulous detail. Pages 379-437 present the themes of Arangetram, the terminology used in Indian dances, the traditional schools of dance and the universal permeation of Indian dance forms. The book mirrors not only the vigour of the Bharatha dance that has made a global sweep but the vigour of a Sri Lankan female who has heroically achieved her life-long ambition by putting out this gigantic work. ###### Some light shed on a neglected section of society "Maddahana" The Novel, Maddahana by Bandula Abeysekera is a work that deserves serious attention, not merely because it has won the 'D.R. Wijeywardena Prize' awarded for the best work of fiction (Sinhala) for the year 2002, but also as a social document portraying life within a section of Sri Lankan society of whose life and work has been little known and about which little interest has been shown, either that of the urban conservancy labourer of South Indian origin. The author takes his readers to this unfamiliar world of the South Indian conservancy labourer who is really a part of the indentured plantation labourer whose kith and kin has been living for generations in the so-called 'Lines' which in modern terms, are really 'Ghettos' or isolated 'Enclaves', cut off from the rest of the society. The very nature of these people's work repels not only the caste-ridden Sinhalese community, but also even the other sections of Tamil society who would have nothing to do with them. In the saga of their woes the author tells us of the conditions of his life and work. Even in towns the water-sealed lavatory was not known for a long time and it seemed as if these unfortunate men and women were born for no other work than to remove the night soil from the urban homes in open buckets, to wash and keep their lavatories and drains clean and to carry their garbage in overflowing Municipal carts pushing them along public roads. The book makes it clear that no Sinhalese, not even the meanest from the so-called lowest caste could be persuaded to do this work; far from associating them, he would never like, even to be seen in the vicinity of the Conservancy labourers 'lines'; the social stigma attached was deep and permanent; two epithets had got attached to their name: the words, "Cooly" and "Sakkili". Most unfortunately ! When the Hindu religious festival time came and the "Theru" pujas were being held within the 'Kovil' the conservancy labourers were not allowed within: they had to stay outside the gate and do their obeissances and offer their gifts to the gods. But when the festival was over, it was their duty to collect the tons of garbage strewn around the Temple and the streets and clean up. And now, for the human drama in Abeysekea's book, enacted against this background. It is this background that yields credibility to his story and the rationale under which its men and women are motivated to act, as they do. If so, now the events of the human drama should fall into place, yielding meaning and credibility to it. These poverty-stricken labourers are entirely in the grasp of the officialdom of the Urban Council: the officials are the gods of their little world. Navaratne, one of the chief protagonists of the story and who is the all-powerful Superintendent of Works of the Council, manoeuvres the decisions of the chairman and manipulates the checkroll, assigns the day's work to each labourer and pays them at the end of the month; in assigning work, his favourites get the easier and less odious work; such men and women are excused when they get late for the morning roll-call and the others are punished, given harder assignments or denied any work for the day ! That is not all: young and personable women are sent to his bungalow to help his wife in the domestic chores and are paid on the checkroll. By these manipulations, when pay-day comes, the S.W. makes a couple of hundred rupees in addition to his legitimate pay. Corruption is rife in the council and the tax-payers' money is swindled with the connivance of the chairman. Exploiting the helplessness of these labourers, the officials subject them to much abuse. The story opens with an Urban Council election and, closes with another. At election time candidates promise heaven and earth to the Conservancy labourer community and get their votes; but they only ask for a stand-pipe and a lavatory and, may be a salary increase; but even by the time the next election comes, the stand-pipe and the lavatory are in the realm of dreams ! However, this deception cannot go on for long, for good reasons. The story is laid in a time-frame: starting from the days of the State Council of the 1930s and is brought up to the days of the Parliament of the 1980s; within that period, far-reaching changes have taken place when the story ends. The Conservancy-labourer community which the reader sees at the beginning of the story is not the same that he sees at the end of it now they are armed with many privileges; human rights, citizenship, franchise rights, trade unions and the right to strike. They are no longer second class citizens -- at least in theory !. The book is very handsomely produced by the publishers, printed on strong durable paper and sturdily bound with a beautiful, glossy cover, carrying a land-mark photograph of the place where the story is supposed to be laid and scene which the people who know the place would, at once, recognise. M.B. Mathmaluwe ###### Sarachchandra the philosopher and artist : Good eye-opener for the critics Continued from Books page Feb.29 Now to return to Prof. Gunaratne he says 'The beauty of Malagiya Atto is in its serenity, the quiet flow, the simple language, the almost child like characters with inner beauty....It is a lyric set in an ideal imaginary world." There you almost have the essence of Sarachchandra's novel. Let me also make a comment here on the passionate and the dispassionate artist. They could easily be judged by the metaphors and the situations they make use of. In all the works of Sarachchandra - this is true of Martin Wickramasinghe as well - never a metaphor which implies passion. Never a situation dominated by passion. Then one may ask 'What about the killings which take place in Maname and Sinhabahu?' Prof. Gunaratne provides a questioner-silencing but yet a very satisfying answer in his discussions of the two dramas Maname and Sinhabahu in sections XIV and XV respectively. Let us see how Prof. Gunaratne elucidates on the finer-most point in Maname the instantaneous and unexpected grabbing of the sword by the Veddha king from the queen and killing Prince Maname. Sarachchandra says in a preface to an edition of Maname how after the second show of the drama at Borella, the infuriated crowds were casting remarks at the queen because she had blemished her fidelity (pativata). This focal point of the drama, where the queen hesitates is to be understood very cautiously. Here Prof. Gunaratne brings in Prof. Sarachchandra's knowledge of Buddhist philosophy which was to give shape, form and prime character to his creative work. Says Prof. Gunaratne, 'One can give other interpretations for the queen's hesitation but the important point for us here is that Sarachchandra makes the fast changing nature of mental phenomena, emphasized in Buddhism, a reality in the play.' Sarachchandra had outlined the theory of moments in his doctoral thesis. What Gunaratne does here serves a dual purpose. He shows how the philosopher and the artist in Sarachchandra achieves harmony in the creative moment. This provides the reader a novel angle to look at this very subtle situation and achieve a higher level of understanding. He also throws an additional light on the drama as a whole, specifically on the central episode of the killing by comparing and contrasting it with Rashomon'. In Rashomon we do not see the killing taking place, whereas in Maname we see it. In Rashomon, the four narrators give their different versions of the incident. Physical reality is created by the narrators hence we only have a mind made illusion. This made Donald Richie write, 'Rashomon is like a vast distorting mirror or better a collection of prisms that reflect and refract reality. Thus for Kurosawa the world is an illusion you yourself make reality.' In Maname 'the physical happenings are fixed like the observational sentences of the Logical Positivist. It is the mental happenings that are in the black box....Hesitation, indecision temptation, different forces pulling her in different directions, her (Maname queen's) reality at best is momentary. Perhaps her reality is so fluid that it is never realised either covertly or overtly in mind or body.' Prof. Gunaratne also notes that 'the story of Maname has compelling room for exploiting contemporary western psychology of sex in the development of the character of the queen...Sarachchandra for to all his modernity remained traditionalist.' Let me add as an extension to Gunaratne's views. Her reality, as it is directly related to the flux of consciousness, is the reality in general. Hence it becomes the universal. Credit should go to our critic for having brought the reader/spectator of Maname adjacent to a reality discovered a new, for it results in mollification of his/her being. It is surprisingly pleasant to see how, in these short discussions, Dr. Gunaratne leads us, the 'laymen', straight away into the novel of the philosophical nexus of the creative work. In section XV the play Sinhabahu is taken up. 'The play Sinhabahu itself can be considered as a treatment of the illusive nature of life and reality.... The reality they (Sinhabahu, mother and sister, see is illusion, like the shadows thrown on the walls in Plato's allegory of the cave...The cave, and with the cave the illusion that it symbolised is shattered when Sinhabahu leaves it with his mother and the sister. 'Then Dr. Gunaratne goes on to discuss how' the illusion operates at a deeper level. To begin with let us say Reality is one thing right is another? Let us ask the question, 'who is right?' The lion and Sinhabahu from their points of view are both correct...'Reality is now created, men are killed, the lion is killed, by ignorance, due to illusion. On the other hand is so far as reality is created by illusion, how far are our acts going to be right or wrong?' After a short but meaningful discussion of Loma Hansa, Dr. Gunaratne says 'No modern psychology of sex in exaggerated form: it is a traditionalist's world. Above all Sarachchandra remains consistent in his underlying philosophy. The illusion continues.' Even in his Pematho Jayathi Soko 'the problem of illusion and reality continues. Thus we see Dr. Gunaratne, rallying all Sarachchandra's major works on the periphery of his centrifugal structure and they not only receive philosophical light emanating from the illuminated centre but also they themselves are connected by a philosophical thread, as it were, bringing a new dimension to the contemporary Sinhala literary criticism. While the majority of our literary critics have been fondling with the structural paraphernalia beyond limits. Prof. Gunaratne enters right into the should of the literary work, the hall mark of a good critic. In conclusion to his work Prof. Gunaratne says: "Although Sarachchandra was primarily an artist in his creative work, it is my surmise that the philosopher who researched into the Buddhist psychology, of perception and the Yogacara idealism has rarely if at all, been away from Sarachchandra's study and the workshop.' In conclusion to my short article let me say that both professors,to start with, indulged in academic philosophy. The elder one ended in literary creative work. The present one has just shown a readiness to fondle with literary criticism. Prof. Gunaratne's words rebounds on himself I should say, with a slight difference. "Although Prof. Gunaratne is primarily a philosopher, who has researched in the area of Western philosophy and even eastern philosophy, in his study, all the time, the literary critic had led an existence of silence. by Hemaratne Liyanarachchi |
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