IMPRINTImpressionable
printed words
K. S. SIVAKUMARAN
This week I wish to draw the attention of readers of random
selections from two books by Lankan writers. Both of them are women.
This would not be a review of the books concerned but passages that
impressed this columnist. The two writers are Premala de Mel and Manuka
Wijesinnghe.
Let's take Premala de Mel's book Trapped and Other Tales first. This
book contains a novel, a novella and seven short stories. The book is
thoroughly enjoyable for the evident reason it brings t us some aspects
of style of living in India, Burma and Sri Lanka.
We shall take only excerpts from one of the short stories included.
It's called 'Poems.' The opening paragraph begins with these lines:
"It happened in Delhi. When Jonathan James was posted to Delhi as
Business Attache' at the British High Commission there, he and his wife
Jean had welcomed their first assignment in the est. they had been
warned about pollution and the climatic extremes they would encounter,
but jean, who had read everything she could find about the Moghul Empire
and the history of the Raj, looked forward to experiencing 'the
mysterious East'"
On page 92 we find this informative passage which might help visitors
to New Dilli to locate a few landmarks:
"Life within the expatriate community was a buzz of activity. Jean
went out of her way to get to know the Delhi circle. She loved exploring
the horse-shoe shaped Connaught Place, the Jana path shops and the
Central Cottage Industries Emporium. She tried out her limited Hindi on
shop-keepers, and blushed when they answered her in perfect English. She
admired the brown sandstone buildings of the systematically planned
architecture of the British-designed buildings by Sir Edward Lutyens,
especially the Rashtrapati Bhavan, the home of the president, and
Parliament House. She learned that the capital had been moved from
Calcutta to Delhi in the early 1900s, with a signed decree by King
George V."
This writer's use of language is functional and straight and
therefore effective. Let's conclude with end of the story:
"He (Alan) was in hurry to face the world again. He remained where he
was, and impatiently tore open the gift-wrapped package. Inside was a
letter-bound book. He flipped through the numerous pages, and saw poem
after poem in Jean's bold handwriting. Crouching on a step as dusk
wrapped its cloak around the enormous city, Alan read on:
"A love such as ours is a temporary gift from above
I cling helplessly to its myriad veils
With their promises, hopes and untold dreams.
Did we share such intimate and pristine moments aeons ago?
I asked my heart, and it answered affirmatively: YES" "
Theravada Man by Manuka Wijesinghe is a long novel of 362 pages. Her
style of writing too is impressionable. This is a story of a village
schoolmaster. A novelist and playwright, the writer is also a dancer and
has a family. More than the meat in the story written with satire and
humour what appealed to me is her use of language.
Her work has a Prologue and an Epilogue and a glossary. Book 1 is
titled the iskolemahaththata's story and Nadagam 1, Book 2 again
iskolehamie's story Nadagam 2 and book 3 the dawn of Saturn.
The narrative with creative description interspersed with appropriate
Lankan speech patterns make her book unique and exotic to attract
readers abroad. According to Manuka 'mother and motherland are worth
more than heaven itself' Let's take only one example of the dialogue
segment in few of the pages beginning on page 108 that is at once funny
and philosophical, if you would agree: It is an inquiry into
mathematical and numerological perceptions.
"Must there always be something on my mind?"
"If there was nothing of urgency in your mind iskolamahaththya, you
would not be here.'
"Words destroy the unity of emptiness"
"The mind has not been born for emptiness"
They went into the room and sat upon their respective chairs.
"If you do not mind destroying the unity of emptiness you may tell me
that which is bothering you."
"The number nine has been bothering me"
"The number nine?"
"Yes, the number nine. The girl in Bingriya was born on the ninth day
of the ninth month at nine o'clock in the morning, and that is not all,
the summations of the numerals of her year of birth add up to a totality
of nine. Is that not a remarkable coincidence?"
"It s as much a coincidence as you having been born on the sixth day
of the eleventh month at a quarter of an hour before midnight."
"You remember with such accuracy"
"Memory is my literacy."
"Does the repetition of nine not have any special symbolism?"
"All numbers are symbolic."
"But nine?"
"What have you deduced honourable iskolamahaththya? You are the
mathematician."
"I have discovered only the physical properties. It is the only
number amongst the single digit numbers which, when multiplied by any
number, always reproduces itself."
"You are right. It cannot be destroyed."
"How is this number connected to the girl? Is it mere coincidence?"
"There is no coincidence."
"A few minutes ago you stated that it was all a coincidence."
"In the space you were occupying a few minutes ago, there was room
for coincidence. But in the space we occupy now there is no
coincidence."
"I beg your pardon."
A little further the conversation continues in this fashion:
"Iskolamahaththya, you are asking me to explain that which is not
explicable. Cosmos is a unity. Knowledge cannot be cut up and confined
in rigid compartments. The girl and the predominant nine has to be
understood, it cannot be explained. Think of it like this honourable
sir, our mother earth, it revolves not only around its own axis, but
also around the sun...Are you listening iskolamahaththya?"
The dialogue continues.
When one finishes reading her fiction one finds that one is
transported into another reality in our own little island.
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