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Memoirs - VI: Ananda College years
Journalists of Ananda - an addendum
Premil RATNAYAKE
Sorry we missed out the names of several other giants in journalism
that Ananda had produced in our series - the reason was that they were
before our time. Yet they must be remembered and their mammoth
contribution to the world of letters be recorded not only for posterity
but also for the sake of the country’s literature.
Tarzie Virendra Vittachi, son of our teacher, the quiet introvert S.P
Perera did not take the plunge into newspaperism direct from school.
Great writer
Briefly he was engaged in the inane profession of banking (what a
profession for a creative artiste to be in!) but we took solace in the
thought that the great writer had been vulnerable too - we had to
languish 13 years in a similar monetary institution. Fortunately, his
natural impulse overtook him and Tarzie joined Lake House and rose to
the position of the most enterprising and magnificent editor of the now
defunct Ceylon Observer.
He had a racy humour and a pungent style of writing which could be as
scathy as the rapier when he decided to pulverize a politician of
sinister design. Under Tarzie’s editorship, the Observer flourished.
Like on other evening newspapers. And his editorial comment under the
column Comment drew a gigantic readership. It was a classic display of
his writing arrogance. When he simply drew a blank on the front page of
the Observer, in the space usually designated for the editorial, and ran
a mocking No Comment when the Government of the day clamped down a
devastating press censorship. I knew of several teachers of English who
advised their students to read Tarzie’s column to improve their
knowledge of the language and also as a guideline towards writing better
English. If he had known about it, Tarzie would have been greatly amused
but not flattered, for the best English editor we have known despite his
virulent writing was a shy and unpossessing man. Besides, the
“educative” Comment was Tarzie’s satire, sometimes irreverently done in
his highly explosive Fly by Night column. Perhaps Tarzie had been
unfairly prejudiced against SWRD Bandaranaike and the MEP regime of the
day.
It is easy to pass judgment now following those turbulent times.
Turbulent times maybe but in the immediate post 1956 era, these
politically motivated things did happen - ‘Sinhala Only’ syndrome; the
political lackeys ; the comedy of monocle sporting British upper lip
Finance Minister, the “Sinhala Only” speaking Education Minister such as
Sinhala Marikkar, the political buffoons ; and no good journalist could
have ignored them. And Tarzie was not just a good journalist but a
brilliant one.
He dutifully obeyed his heart maybe unreasonably at times and through
his rapier pen, gave vent to his feelings. What made the Fly by Night
column most devastating were the illustrations cartoonist Aubrey Collett
drew to add more venom to the word pouring of Tarzie.
‘Notorious’
Between them, the two most talked about (and notorious) journalists
in the country drew blood from SWRD and his men in the Government. SWRD
was done to death as it were by Fly by Night - the Oxonian and the first
people’s Prime Minister was lampooned and stripped naked and exposed
without mercy - but Solomon West Ridgeway was apparently only amused not
angered. Perhaps this negative response chagrined Tarzie, however Fly by
Night devoured with glee by the Observer readership perhaps it tickled
the vanity of Esmond Wickramasinghe more than anybody else - Esmond was
the virtual boss of Lake House and bete noire of SWRD and all Marxist
groups or in brief, also called “Progressives”.
Tarzie was genuinely depressed and so were many others - when
foolhardy anti-Tamil riots broke out in 1958. Whilst still Editor of the
Observer, Vittachi brought out his most controversial book Emergency ’58
which was printed abroad. The book spelt out the tragic-comedy of the
happenings of that year, to which we ourselves were witnesses to, the
naked thrashing of innocent Tamils in the streets of Colombo, the
inglorious tar campaign - the Sinhala mobs running berserk in the city
daubing tar on every nameboard that carried Tamil lettering. Tarzie was
brilliant in his description of the rioting mob members “sarongs raised,
displaying...” The Observer serialized the book Emergency ’58 but with a
footnote reservation that said “contents belong to the author” and not
to The Observer or Lake House.
Virulent writings
Tarzie left Lake House and took to international journalism. Any
newspaper across the world was only too glad to have his services. I met
him at the UN in 1979. He was a mellowed man. When I spoke to him, he
seemed somewhat remorseful of his virulent writings only because it did
not give those he rebuked fairly or unfairly, a chance to reply.
Regi Siriwardena was the quiet Anandian the writer par excellence and
journalist who somewhat took the entire Sinhala literati off their feet
in amazement with his brilliant screenplay of the film version of Gam
Peraliya. I have no doubt that author Martin Wickremasinghe would have
been equally amazed and of course pleased with Regi’s contribution to
the film. Regi was of course a rationalist and didn’t indulge in copius
writing. And on one occasion, was truly incensed when The Daily News
wrote a story that he had undertaken to write the screenplay for a novel
by T B Ilangaratne which Anton Wickeramasinghe was going to produce as a
film. We the Daily News had only quoted Anton W’s claim. Regi flatly
denied. Regi would not trade his art with any commercial business
enterprise. To be continued |
