Will Swarna Pusthaka Awards improve the quality of Sinhala novel?

Now the famous month of September is over and there are no more literary awards, judgments, speculations, gossips and mudslinging at least for another twelve months. Perhaps those writers who missed out must be getting their pen and papers to write their next novel, collection of poetry for the next year's events. It is very likely the writer A, B or the poet who missed out any awards (rewards) may be working hard.

The question, we need to ask is whether our literary products help us to make a mark in international literary scene beyond our little shores. Do we have talents which help us reach global literary scene? In this week's column, I want to look at some of these issues and raise one major question of whether Sri Lanka's Swarna Pusthaka award has helped and encouraged our writers to produce quality novels. Before I answer the question, I want to answer the question" 'why do people write?'

Why do people write?

Undoubtedly, writers of any culture write because they have something to tell or share. In other words, writers write as it gives them an opportunity to express themselves regardless of whether they are making a contribution to a blog, newspaper, fiction or other type of genre including drama and in the case of Sri Lanka lyrics and tele-dramas.

If one looks at great living writers today, you may find some of the experience in their work might have emerged from an urge to let something out. So, a writer of any genre could keep writing. But if this motive of writing is primarily for the sake of financial gratification, then there could be an issue.

Writing could be a soul soother or an act of catharsism. In plain English, 'catharsism' is a process of 'letting it all out' or an event or experience of an individual.

Whatever the motive of a writer of any type or of any genre, one of the normal expectations is that the output of writing whether it is a novel, short story or poetry, is intended to contribute or to enrich the medium of language in accordance with the standard rules of grammar of the chosen language.

Whether this act is taking place in contemporary Sri Lankan literary scene is questionable. In an exclusive interview to Montage, Professor Sucharitha Gamlath provided an opinion: he emphasised that "In my opinion contemporary literary scene in Sri Lanka is deplorable. This is primarily due to the general degeneration in the contemporary literary output. There are two aspects of this degeneration. First, I think, is the misunderstanding of the concept of novel. Most of the contemporary writers seem to entertain the notion that novel is a new story, somehow concocted and there is nothing beyond that. However, the novel is a serious art form which explores the reality of human life. The other factor is the language used by contemporary Sinhala literati which is devoid of classical Sinhala idiom, and therefore, insipid and dry.

When you read the literary works of Prof. Sarachchandra, Martin Wickremasinghe and Gunadasa Amerasekara, you find the kind of language they use is a direct evolution of the ancient or medieval Sinhala literature which is a very rich language. The new generation of writers has not studied or even read ancient Sinhalese literary classics such as 'Amawathura', 'Saddharma Ratnavaliya', 'Jathaka Potha' and 'Sandesha Kavyas'. Therefore, the language used by most of the contemporary Sinhalese writers is the spoken Sinhala language which is crude and not refined and not good enough as a medium of communication.

Commenting on 2008 award winning book chosen for Swarana Pusthaka Award, Professor Gamlath stated: "For instance, Sunethra Rajakarunanayake's 'Podu Purushaya' (Common Mate) … [is] written in ordinary Sinhala language. Any Nattami or street urchin can write such novels."

Similar opinions have emerged and questions have been raised in public space about triple award winning 2009 award for the novel Kandak Sema by Sumitra Rahubadda. In an interview to a Sinhala weekly, Sri Lankan novelist and short story writer, Jayathilake Kammalaweera had raised some important questions about the selection and judgment of this year's Swaran Pusthaka Award and other important questions about the judgment of literary awards.

Undoubtedly, literary judgments are very subjective whether they are evaluative or interpretative in nature. These judgments are based on a group of individuals who claim to know the medium may come to very specific and subjective.

It is pertinent to examine F. R. Leavis (1895 -1978) who not only taught and studied for nearly his entire life at Cambridge University but also was an influential literacy critic in Britain. Although some readers may disagree, in my view, Leavis's critical position with nine variables will be useful as it would help us to develop an open and transparent framework on literary judgments under three headings:

(1) Social variables

* an inherited organic community; if not, then at least a self-constituted civilized community

* sharing the values of the organic community; not necessarily through continuing inheritance or influence

* using one's own language.

(2) Personal variables

* participating in contemporary sensibility and so being representative in a rich sense of such qualities in creative work

* sharing the strength and adult or mature standards of a tradition

* Expression of individual sensibility

(3) Creative variables

* Critical discriminating intelligence

* Concrete or absolute realisation of intensity of emotion and thought in concrete terms

* Critical intelligence

Examining, the quality of the language of all books chosen for the Swarna Pusthaka Award, I am of the view that we should focus on variable of language extensively.

When examining the short history of Swarna Pusthaka Awards, it appears that some of the nominees are regular novel writers who are capable of writing something annually perhaps with the exception of Amarakeerthi Liyange.

The question remains to answer is whether the award money has lured our creative writers to publish novels annually for the sake of winning the prize money!

It is up to the readers to decide whether Swarna Pusthaka Award has become a golden literary curse which contributes to the degradation of Sinhalese literature or how far has it lived up to its noble objectives.