Stirring family chronicle

Reviewed by Kalakeerthi Dr. Edwin Ariyadasa

"A happy family is but an earlier heaven."

George Bernard Shaw, drmatist (1856-1950)

The most wholesome human unit that has emerged from the prolonged process of evolution is the family. It sustains life. It is the focus of the warmth of affection. Man has a haven in the family, when pitilessly ravaged by the ups and downs of fluctuating fates. It endows upon an individual a name and a place.

The right kind of family, provides a person with a built-in position and privilege. At times, the family enables the individual member to project a pride, a nobility and an honour. Situations occur in some instances.

Fortunes

When a member feels achingly obliged to conceal scars and skeletons, that the family has to harbour he does go to keep the family prestige untarnished.

The long history of our island citadel, spanning several centuries, has proved an ultra-fertile soil to yield a bumper harvest of influential families, with a past stretching far back in time.

Chronicling their veneer fortunes is undoubtedly a considerably challenging exercise to the historian and to the consientious writer of fiction.

A widely-known Sri Lankan writer who has earned a well-deserved reputation for his exceptional works of fiction, has made a thorough and scrupulous effort at recording the story of an elitist rural family that flourished in the plantation sector, in the North-West, displaying an aristocratic aplomb.

The writer is Dr. Nihal Ranjit Jayatilaka.

His fictional product is Amaragiri. The title of the work is derived from the name of the mansion the family resided in.

In his prefatory note the author assures us that the theme of his work is derived from a 'true story' relating to 'a middle-class family.'

True story

As for me, the writer may have been moved to some limited extent perhaps by what he describes as the "true story". But, with the fictional "flesh and blood" he has lavished upon the story-skeleton, he has succeeded in conjuring up a gallery of characters that is alive and kicking.

Surprisingly, he opens his work with an exceptionally detailed account of a funeral. The deceased person is the mother of the protagonist Amila, the youngest in the prime family of Amaragiri.

To initiate a narration, with a funeral as the opening episode, one would have thought, was not quite the right thing to do. This may instil a morbid feeling, that may put off readers, most of whom are likely to opt for happy beginnings and happy endings.

But, the writer's daring stroke pays off. The meticulously dwelt upon details of the funeral arrangements are utilised as a strategy to recount the family history, in snippets of flashbacks. The reader concentrates on this narration with a sustained attention, as the chronicling possesses a compelling human element.

The family history is fairly short. It begins with references to the passage of the head of the family-father of the protagonist. The narrator, looks upon his family fortunes, from the perspective of an individual living in the early 2000s.

Minor saga

The prime family that forms the pith of this minor saga, consists of the parents, three elder daughters and the youngest child - the protagonist son. The maternal grand household affairs, directing the lives of the younger members, with a marked affection, while being scrupulously conscious of the family prestige.

At this stage, I deem it seemly, to provide the would be reader a restrained guidance. The person who approaches the work, should go through it at least twice, to appreciate fully the direction and the inner-spirit of the narration.

Amila, who views the family history, in a reflective hindsight, reveals his own personal dilemma.

Early on, he falls in love with the daughter of a family friend-uncle Milinda.

But, he is oppressed by a profound sense of family disapproval, which he could not fathom, at that time.

Family possessions

In much of the fiction, centering upon the histories of families, the narration is objective. The chronicling is done by an observer, who is not involved personally, in the fluctuating for tunes of the family.

In Amaragiri, the narrator Amila, is the inheritor of the family possessions, and is the legatee - proper and legal. At first, he is persuaded by the nation, that he has to uphold the prestige and the honour of the family, as the most responsible heir to at all. But, the disturbing denouement awakens him to the shocking realties of his family honour and prestige.

His grandmother, just before she passed away, unburderns her conscience, by revealing the family secrets, she was in a way, party to. The reader, who invariably goes along, living the protagonist's life vicariously, through his first person singular narration, begins to feel the deadening impact of the burden Amila has to bear.

Purity

Amila is a distinguished character-creation by the author, who has quite obviously, spent strenuous years researching the material that has incarnated in the form of a rare work of fiction.

The family secrets have to be kept away from the world outside, that has bathed Amaragiri, in a pristine halo of purity.

The final outcome, as implied in the end-section of the work, is a surprising secret, that the reader, will of course, unravel.

The total work, is a rare product of creative fiction, that will have a profound appeal for intelligent and discriminate Sinhala reader.

The elegant typographical personality of the publication, is to my mind, a fitting tribute to the praiseworthy effort of the writer. The cover-art is compellingly creative.