Sinhala writing in Tamil
 This
columnist is happy to read many works written Sinhala through the Tamil
medium. More and more Sinhala books are being translated into Tamil. I
wish that Lankan Tamil Writing is translated into Sinhala and English. A
few books by Lankan Tamil writers are available in Sinhala, but what we
need is more translations into Sinhala and Tamil so that the respective
communities that form a Lanka Nation understand each other for communal
harmony, unity, patriotism and function as one nation and progress
towards that reality.
Recently I read five books of stories and memoirs by writers in
Sinhala made available in Tamil. They were by the late Martin
Wickremasinghe, Sybil Wettasinghe, Kamal Perera, Sydney Marcus Dias and
Nihal Kumara.
Understandably the writing is varied and had their individual stamps.
Martin Wickremasinghe was undoubtedly an Icon in Lankan writing
specially in his language, Sinhala. What was translated was the great
writer’s early short stories I have read these stories in English
translation as well and therefore the freshness imbibed was not great as
years went rolling.
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Sybil Wettasinghe |
The translator, Prof Saba Jeyarasa, an educationist and an
intellectual thinker has read the Sinhala and English versions and
rendered them into Tamil in a readable manner.
I must confess that I didn’t much enjoy Nihal Kumara’s ghost fiction
as that kind of genre doesn’t attract me now as it did when I was a
teenager. A Jeyasingh had translated this into Tamil.
However, I was overjoyed reading talented writer Sybil Wettasinghe’s
second memoir of her days in past decades for two reasons: the lively
style of her first person account telling us so many things which we
from the north and east didn’t know much about the lifestyles in the
southern region of Lanka. And the other reason was the excellent
transcreation of Sybil’s writing by Sarojini Arunachalam, a lady well
versed in Tamil, Sanskrit and English.
The remaining two writers’ short stories are remarkably realistic and
contemporary. The predicaments of characters in difficult situations are
interestingly portrayed. Both Kamal Perera and Sydney Marcus Diaz are
well known writers in Sinhala. But critics in English do not seem to
have evaluated their writing to the satisfaction of readers in English
is my view.
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Martin Wickremasinghe |
Between these two writers Sydney Marcus Dias seems to be a shade
better writer as far as the rendition in Thamil was concerned. Both
books were translated by Dickwella Kamal, an educationist, writer and
one of the pioneer writers of free verse in Tamil in the 1970s.
After reading Lankan writing in English and Tamil and Sinhala writing
via English, I notice that writers in Sinhala and Tamil are more social
conscious and portray realistic stories than writers in English,
although writers in English have a better grip of handling language to
effective use.
This may be due to the fact that most writers are Colombo centred and
lack experiences of life of ordinary people like you and me. The elitism
in their writing displays a wider knowledge of the world because of
their proficiency in English and this is a plus point for them. On the
other hand the swabasha writers lack the understanding of the craft of
writing.
However, I discovered that many writers from the interior in the
western province and from the Deep South are writing readable and good
stories and poems when I was compiling and editing the short story and
poetry pages of the Daily News.
Amongst us there are many translators to render into English works in
Sinhala. Academics and writers in the caliber of Prof Ashley Halpe, Dr
Lakshmi de Silva, Vijita Fernando, Ranga Chandraratne have done a good
job. There may be others too. Ariyawansa Ranaweera has done some
excellent translations from foreign literature into Sinhala, which fact
is widely known in literary circles.
Unfortunately there is hardly any Lankan Tamils to translate Lankan
Tamil Writing into English. The late A J Canagaratna and S Sivanayagam
used to translate Lankan Tamil short stories into English in the 1960s.
But there aren’t regular translators of Lankan Tamil creative writing
into English. There are a handful of collections that include in English
the translations of Lankan writers in Tamil. Lankan Mosaic and Building
Bridges are two such collections which include English translations of
Lankan Tamil short stories. I hope it wouldn’t be impertinent to say
these two volumes included a few translations by yours truly.
A few Muslim writers living in the south of the country had
translated Sinhala stories into Tamil and vice versa. T Kanagaratnam and
Sarojini Aunachalam are two people who have translated from Sinhala to
Tamil. The late M M Uwise, Ravi Ratnavelone and an academic from the
University of Yaalpaanam (Jaffna) are other names that come to mind, but
they have done these from Sinhala to Tamil and had not attempted to
translate Tamil books into English.
It is high time that the Department of Culture appoints capable
translators of creative writing from various languages in a permanent
capacity and sponsored or assisted by foreign aid.
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