Creative variant to the conventional narratives
 The latest Sinhala short story collection by Parakrama Kodituwakku,
which contains 12 narratives, each different from each other, needs
attention. This collection titled as Sulange Divu Kella (Girl Who Ran in
the Wind) (Sarasavi Publishers 2011) in the first instance is an array
of a variety of themes each different from other. But the similarity in
all the narratives is the attempt on the part of the writer to transcend
from the mundane to exaltation.
In this direction to my mind all the narratives popularly seen are
human interest stories where sometimes the protagonist is writer
himself. The best example comes from the story where a poet receives a
telephone call from an unknown young girl who goes on to ask question
and clarifies certain literary issues. Then a day comes when she
realises that she is being groomed constantly by the poet creator cum
critic whom she has not seen. On the other hand a negative reaction too
takes place. She, the caller, becomes over sensitive to the point that
when she enters the university she becomes a laughing matter to the
teachers of literature.
This point of illumination brings to the reader a sad tone, as some
of her companions try to separate her from the admirable poet. The poet
too takes a negative step where he unknowingly puts a total stop to the
continued telephone conversation.
 As the title of the story, Patakaya Me gena Sitiya Hekke Obata
Pamani, suggests the poet addresses the reader: ‘Reader it is only you
who can think of this’. As a reader I felt that both the narrative
structure and the content are presented in verve of sensitivity which in
turn is also an acid comment on the standards of literary criticism of
the contemporary levels of teaching and learning.
The stories, numbered 11 and 12, resemble in spirit to the same
thematic content, but vary in the pattern of presentation and vision.
Story number 11 titled as Sinduvakin Upan Minisek underlines the
value of living realised by a person who tried to commit suicide by
hearing a song sung by a group of people who had entered the vicinity of
the spot where he wanted to end up his life. He decides to give up his
attempt on hearing their sounds of merriment packed with a life-giving
force enveloped in moment of living. This is realised as a blissful
message of eternal value.
By and large the narrative is a variant to the normal pattern where
the innerness of the merry people versus the case of the suicide is
compared via a series of dialogues and monologues. The story number 12
titled as Ketikatavak Sedima (Making a short story) centres round the
creative thinking on the part of a writer who encounters a young woman
who has come to see him to pay respects for being a mentor.
She, who has won a state award for her collection of poems, wants to
thank him for being a teacher of creative inspiration. During the course
of their discussion quite a number of factors emerge in their respective
creative activities. The reader comes to grip with some of the literary
factors pertaining to the oriental literary scene in India. Both of them
striking and creative factors are compelled to write a short story of a
new type fused with a certain sense of humanism on coming to know two
who have been strangers but later transformed as friends.
Both of them embark on their lofty creative project, while the female
character is away, the male character who is a teacher, gradually
recalls a bitter encounter in his life. He goes on brooding about it,
and sees that he has accidentally hit at a fine story. He gets up from
his reverie and calls the female character to inform how he had moulded
a story.
Then he continued to request her to send her part of the story,
presumably to link the two episodes to a single entity. Perhaps the very
reading of Kodituwakku’s stories is a journey from known to the unknown.
But there are no artificial juggleries in terms of pseudo narrative
patterns.
The fourth story titled as Katahanda Dekak is an example of a series
of dialogues that ensue between a nephew and an uncle. The structure is
that of a radio play, where the nephew drives the car. Their voices are
interspersed with the songs that come out of the car radio. Their voices
resemble two generations.
They are critical of several social religious and political factors.
Sometimes they are silent. They don’t dispute rather discuss as
intimates. Nothing happens as a rounded tale. The experience of their
utterances narrates the tale of two different individuals who agree to
disagree.
There are a few mini narratives which are closer to prose poems than
rounded short stories in the accepted form. They include such narratives
as number 6 Amutu Satutakut nehe Amutu Dukakut nehe, Naduvak Gena
Naduvak and Muhuda, Nil. Each of these narratives possesses an upper
layer of human experience within which lies an undercurrent of piety and
terror.
These stories capture the range of emotions of our human spectrum:
tragedy, comedy, fantasy, satire, events in sexual love etc, refreshing
and resourceful as a new advent to the conventional narrative patterns.
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