Pursuit of an extraordinary theme

Senkottan
Author: Mahinda Prasad
Masimbula
A Santhava Publication

Reviewed by Padma Edirisinghe

Senkottan is an unusual word among the urban readership for it is the name of a seed used to etch dhoby marks in bygone days. Even then, it was not a common practice in the whole island and according to the contents of the book was limited to the areas of Embilipitiya, Pallebadde and Godakawela villages that were and are sited on the periphery of the Sabaragamuwa province. “Hadda goday” villages, some may lisp, more in contempt unaware that the hardcore of indigenous values lay embedded in them resonating with native fragrance.

Anyway let us get down to basics first ie.basics of novel writing. That the novel is not an indigenous feature of our literature defies reiteration. One could say almost that it is an import. W.A. Silva, the well-known novelist of times gone by was the first to try his hands at the serious novel.

He ended up by writing historical novels such as Vijayaba Kollaya.

Christian fathers too played their roles by producing instructional novels, mostly dabbling in “Family ethics”, of course to suit good Christian morals. Piyadasa Sirisena picked up the threads from there, and produced many a novel that camouflaged the message on how to live a good “Sinhala Buddhist” life. Since then the novel emerged in varied forms, of which the most remarkable and socially bubbling were the novels by Martin Wickremesinghe.

Experiment

Now many a youth, male and female have taken to experiment with varied themes and produce umpteen novels. Masimbula’s Senkottan, an award winning novel, stands out among these by pursuing an extraordinary theme. It traces the emergence of a family that can be classed into the capitalist genre, but whose beginnings are embroiled in poverty and ignorance and also downtrodden by the upper and middle classes due to the social stigma inflicted by caste.

In short the efflorescence of Babahenaya (of the dhoby or Rada community) to Victor Suratissa, a flourishing businessman doing the rounds in the capital and linking up with international spots is the strand that runs through the book.

Granddaughter of Suratissa, Fredrica voyaged so far as to end up as a student at Oxford University and by coincidence or otherwise takes to researching on the caste system in Sri Lanka. Arriving in the island, she cajoles her grandfather Suratissa (one time Babahenaya) to take her to the area that he grew up. She wishes to have an insight into this rural society perhaps her youthful mind churned by the accounts related by Seeya. It transpires not only the workings of a downtrodden society in a particular class and caste, but such workings in any discriminated society.

Today such conditions are almost non–existent and one would even scoff at the author’s created society as fabricated.

Flanking the main story is a powerful inkling of what may be called a mini–renaissance of thought. The theme that has become the patrimony of the educated intelligentsia now (via this novel) falls into the hands of a youth sensitive to such socially sizzling and intellectual dramas. In fact even the educated intelligentsia failed to touch on how this flame was energising some segments of the masses led by free thinkers like Gune master. N.M. Perera, Sagara Palansuriya now come to the forefront though a doubt arises as to the synchronisation of these with the background time phase. It detracts the authenticity of the tale, which lapses however only a very observant reader would notice. That the main character, Victor Suratissa enters the last phase of the story as an 80-year-old, adds to this anomaly.

The reviewer in the aftermath of reading a novel encasing slum life in a Mexican city wondered at the crudeness of it all. Here was life at its most basic and vilest when lads and lasses just met, enter into marriage bonds and go on to breed “Warrens” of children.

Here is a similar tale, in fact more embellished with raw sex. It does not take many minutes to a doyen of the upper class to rip the jacket off a “Dhoby” woman with full breasts (and there are plenty of them) and force her into a bestial relationship. Sometimes such a woman even hankers after the rapist. That is raw sex just cooked with body flavour.

Higher ideals

In the lowly mosaic of such characters, spring some personnel imbued with higher ideals as respect for learning. Babahenaya’s grandfather falls into this category. He is humiliated by the cold shoulder treatment his grandson suffers from, when he is admitted to the school in the village. Govigama parents refuse to send their children to an institution that hosts a dhoby child till the grandfather is forced to take the child away.

Then a miracle happens. A grandson of his, who bears a semblance to an Udarata Nilame by his gorgeous physique who had made it to the city develops a romance with a high-pedigreed woman and marries her. He still mindful of his duties, sends word to his relatives, to send the brat, Babahenaya spurned from school education, to him which unfolds the life story of Suratissa.

The story would have been more dramatic had it begun from the end which is the visit of Frederica with her grandfather to the village. Arriving from Oxford University and doing research on the bygone caste system in the island! She could not have found a more resourceful background, her own roots enmeshed and embroidered there with the fragile threads of social discrimination which luckily are almost exterminated now except in the marriage advertisement columns.