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| Sunday, 28 July 2002 |
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A reference - reckoner of the Dhamma "Dharma Deshana Mala - 6" Bana preachings or Dharma Deshanas (Buddhist sermons) by eminent Buddhist clergy are heard regularly over the air (SLBC), electronic media (SLRC) and at various temples, Buddhist organisations and other Institutions. But after the sermons - the essence of the Dhamma thus preached, is easily forgotten and hardly contemplated or reflected upon the listener. To fill this void the Editor of 'Budusarana' a weekly publication of ANCL has compiled the "Dharma Deshana Mala - 6" an annual Buddhist digest. This includes a series of Buddhist sermons delivered on Poya days. Commendable effort of the 'Budusarana' Editor Ruwan Arattanage, and allows readers to refresh their memories of the forgotten aspects of the Dhamma, and thus make it a reference-recknoner of the printed word. The 'Dhamma Deshana Mala - 6' runs into 224 pages with a pleasing coloured cover picture of the Buddha in the dhamma-desana pose, adding glamour to this publication. The 'gems' of thought in between the contents - pages therein, keeps the reader interested in the wide and varied aspects of the Dhamma, which can be contemplated and reflected upon at one's will. The subjects range from 'Path to Progress' to 'Atavisi Budu Guna Kavi', nicely arranged in sequence that can be contemplated and reflected upon by the Buddhists or even non-Buddhist. The galaxy of renowned preachers include Nayake Theras like Weligama Gnanaratane, Weli-Mitiyave Kusaladhamma, Arama Dhammatilleke, Pallegame Sirinivasa, Giddawe Sumanatissa, Diviyagaha Yasassi, Handapangoda Vimala, Botale Gnanissara, Pallegama Siriniwasa, Puwakpitiya Mettananda, Kamburupitiya Nandaratana, Pallattara Sumanjothi, and a host of other renowned prelates and Bana-preachers well versed in the Dhamma. The 'Dharma Deshana Mala' by the Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd. (ANCL) is not only a handy annual compendium of Buddhist thought for readers to read, re-read and digest those invaluable contents therein but also a gift of the Dhamma that excels all other gifts (Sabba Dhanam Dhamma Dhanam Jinathi). Thoughts in harmonious melody "Ma liyu kavi"
Rubbaiyant: Omar Khyyam Such was the passion for writing of the septuagenarian Mahinda Ganewatte who has contributed his literary creations to many Sinhala newspapers over the years, he has brought out a slim volume I verses running to 101 pages, closely knit under many topics of interest that impinges on the life of an individual in Ma liyu Kavi (poems of wrote) this is a rare feat of a person dabbling in figures and numbers as Ganewatte is an accountant by profession. He creates the characters of a vanished age in the first few pages of the book-focussing on the village school master Headman, carpenter, blacksmith, washer woman, exorcist and the like who were familiar figures to him being the son of a vedamahattaya (indigenous physician), in the village of Mapalagama, Galle. The author emphasise on the subjects in variety ranging from the diverse aspects of the human anatomy. Reading through this anthology, my thoughts rushed to the poetical musings of Lovada Sangarawa and Subasithaya -two of our own classical poetry books, which have given the author an impetus to give more 'light' and 'flesh' to his own renderings of poetical genre. Ganewatte's poems on village life and its people under colonial past have also been influenced by the writings of Keyes' of "Sudo Sudu" fame. He has not failed to express his gratitude and courage to the valiant men and women who fight so relentlessly in the war front of North and East of his country. I really felt for the poem 'A Letter to a Daughter' which describes vividly the loneliness and the emptiness in the minds of the parents, once the married daughter leaves parental home to build a 'nest' of her own. Being a senior citizen Mahinda Ganewatte has mirrored life in a philosophical perspective drawing susten- ance from our folk literature. He has made an indelible mark in his maiden attempt giving vicissitudes of life both pre and post independence of Sri Lanka. The author has used a simple style of writing without any over tones which benefit the reader in understanding the message. For the young readers bent on poetry writing author Ganewatte's book "Ma liyu Kavi" is a "Vade Mecum". A unique literary piece of historical works Leon Trotsky Rusiyanu Viplavaye Ithihasaya (History of the Russian Revolution), Volume I, Translated by T. Andradi (Published by the translator). During the Second World War, as a young university student, I was working for the LSSP, then proscribed by the colonial government. One of my jobs in the early months of 1941, as I have narrated in Working Underground, was to act as a courier between the party and Leslie Goonewardene who was living under cover after evading arrest. One afternoon Leslie showed me a copy of his summary in Sinhala of Trotsky's History of the Russian Revolution. It was, if memory serves me right, under a hundred pages (the original was a massive three-volume work). Inevitably, therefore, Leslie's abridgment was a bald summary of historical narrative and analysis, with nothing of the colour, the drama or the literary power of the original. If anyone had told me, then, that there would be a time when somebody would attempt a complete translation into Sinhala of this classic work, I would have been sceptical. But this has now happened: T. Andradi, a translator with several other translations of both political and fictional writing to his credit, has brought out the first volume of what is to be a full and unabridged translation of this - one of the major historical works of world literature. What wouldn't historians give to have had an account by Cromwell or Fairfax of the English Revolution, or of the French by Robespierre or Danton? But with the Russian Revolution, we do have such a narrative by one of its two principal leaders. That alone would be sufficient to make the History a precious historical document. But when we add that the author was not only armed with a theory of history that guided him in interpreting the revolution just as much as it did in helping him to make it, but was also a writer of literary genius, then we have to recognise that the History is a book that is literally unique. Yet Trotsky would probably never have had the time to write this book but for the melancholy fact that he had lost out in the post-revolutionary struggle in the Soviet Union, and had been exiled by the victor, Stalin. It was on the island of Prinkipo, off the coast of Turkey, which was his refuge in the opening years of the decade of the 1930s, that Trotsky wrote his History. I have never had access to the original Russian text of the History (which now survives only in a few specialist libraries abroad), except for some brief excerpts published in a Soviet historical journal during the Gorbachev years. Fortunately, Trotsky's book received a superb English translation at the hands of Max Eastman, and this is the text from which Andradi translates. He has approached his exacting task with great care and scrupulousness, striving to be faithful not only to the sense but even, as far as possible, to the structure of each sentence, and to approximate to the stylistic dynamism of the original. This first volume already contains an abundance of riches. The five days of the February revolution are re-enacted by Trotsky with an almost cinematic vividness: his biographer, Isaac Deutscher, has compared the technique of this account, moving between long shots of mass action and individual closeups, to that of Eisenstein's Potemkin. Or, in a different mode, the pioneering theoretical discourse on dual power that illuminates the unstable division of power, following the February Revolution, between the Soviets, the organs of people's power, and the Provisional Government. Trotsky as a Marxist, of course, saw history as determined by objective 'historical laws,' but in the book he never loses sight of the fact that it is human beings who make history. The characters who people the pages of the History - whether the anonymous masses on the street, their leaders and would-be leaders, or the representatives of the old order - are not theoretical abstractions but flesh-and-blood beings, as alive as in the pages of a good novelist. The half-chapter in which he compares the personalities of the doomed Romanov imperial couple with those of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette is a penetrating demonstration of the weave between individual character and social circumstance in the web of history. The one major actor in the events who is missing in the foreground of the narrative is Trotsky himself. Excessive modesty was never one of his failings; yet in the writing of the History, he carried impersonality to the point of referring to his own role sparingly, and then only in the third person. This was all the more striking since the Stalin regime had been engaged for several years in defacing his name in the historical record. Today, when the social order to which the Russian Revolution gave birth has passed into history, one cannot conclude a review of Trotsky's work without considering a further question: How well does the book stand up in the perspective of the seventy years since it was written? Hand book on Dambadiva Charika Veteran journalist and prolific travel writer Dharmasiri Gamage has published a comprehensive hand book giving detailed Information required for pilgrims visiting India, titled "Dambadiva Charika" for the first time in Sri Lanka. This land mark publication, the first of its kind to be published in Sri Lanka carries a plethora of information including maps, roads etc. which will come in handy for any visitor to India. Little known information on access roads to places of historical and religious importance in India, like Ajanta, Ellora Caves, Amaravati, Nagarjuna Konda, Kansambi etc. is given in greater detail in this hand book. Not only Buddhist religious places, but also many places of interest, the access to such places etc. are given in detail with maps to help the reader find his way. Every detail required by the pilgrim from the point of obtaining the passport until his return to the Katunayake is given here. |
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