Friday 17 November 2017

පොර මීගොන් - සේන තෝරදෙනිය





   උක්ත කෙටි කතා සංග්‍රහය කතුවරයාගේ මා කියවූ දෙවැන්නයි. කෙටි කතා දොළසකින් පෝෂිත, 2002 හි නිකුත් ව ඇති සංග්‍රහයේ කෙටි කතා තුනක් කතුවරයාගේ ලේඛණ දිවියේ මුල් යුගයේ යැයි පැහැදිලිය.

මෙහි එන මා වඩාත් සිත් ගත් කෙටි කතා කිහිපයක් ගැන ලුහුඬින් අදහස් පහත දක්වමි.

"මිතුරුලඳ", 1961 දී ය. කතුවරයා පේරදෙනිය සරසවියේ සිප් හදාරණ කල්හි හෝ ඊට ආස්‍රිත කලෙක ලියැවෙන්නක් යයි සිතමි. සරසවි සිසුන් කෙරෙහි ආශ්‍රිත ජනයා දක්වන සැලකිල්ල පිළිබඳ හොඳ කියවීමකි. වරෙක අමරසේකරුන්ගේ ජීවන සුවඳ හෝ රතු රෝස මල මතකයට නැගෙයි.
"සියළු සාරය උකහාගෙන තැන්පත් කොට ඇති තැන එතැන වේයයි අප සිතූ නමුත් එහි සත්‍යය අබබෝධ කර ගැනීමට පේරාදෙණියට පැමිණ වැඩි කලක් ගත කිරීමට අවශ්‍යැ නොවීය. මෙහි දේශපාලන කටයුතු ද රටේ පවතින දේශපාලනය නොවන බැව් ප්‍රත්‍යක්ෂ විය."

1962 දී ලියැවී ඇති "මුළුතැන්", සරසවි දිවිය හා බැඳුන ද, ප්‍රේමය මුල් කොට ගත්තකි. වරෙක ප්‍රේමය යැයි "පෙම් කරන්නී" සිතුව ද, ඒ පෙම නොවේ.
"ඇය තුළ සැඟවී තිබුණු ආසාවන් ප්‍රේමයේ ව්‍යාජයෙන් තමා වෙතට එන්ට ඇතැයි රූපදේව සිතුවේය...සැඟවුණු, යටගිය, ඉටුවිය යුතු අවශ්‍යතාවයි. මුළුතැන්ගෙය අසළත කපුටුවා ගෙන්වූයේ අරක්කැමියා නොවේ. මුළුතැන්හි සුවඳයි. කපුටුවාගේ මුළුතැන් සොරා ගැනීමේ ආසාවයි."

"කරත්තයකින් ගිය ගමනක්" කෙටි කතාවත් මා සිත් ගත්තෙකි. ලේඛණ විසතරය උක්ත පුත්තලම ප්‍රදේශය ගිණි කාෂ්ඨකේ පාඨකයා ට ගෙනෙ එන්නකි. මෙහි එක් වැදගත් කරුණක් දිටිමි. ඒ කාලය ගත කිරීම යන්නය.  කල් මැරීම යන්න නැතිනං නිකං සිටීම අද වන විට මහා අපරාධයකි. කාලය රන් හා වටි යන්න කොයි කාලේ ගොඩ නැඟුනක් දැයි නොදනිමි.
"කාලය ගත කිරීමට අපහසු තමා වැනි අයට වේ යයි 'ඔහු' සිතුවේය. මහල්ලාට එහි දුෂ්කර බවක් නොපෙනේ. මහල්ලා තුළ වෙහෙසකර බවක්, නොඉවිසිලිබවක්, අපේක්ෂාවක් නොපෙනේ."
"බේරා" ගැනීම සාපේක්ෂ ද? ගොදුර ට බේරෙන්න අවශ්‍ය නොවුණු විට බේරා නොගත යුතු ද ?
"අම්ම අප්ප් නැතුව අසරණ වෙච්චි මේ ගෑණිට පිහිටට හිටියේ මං විතරයි. උන්දැගෙ මිනිහ දැදුරු ඔයේ ගිලිල මරෙන කොටත් බඩැත මාස තුනයි. මරණෙ දා ඉඳලම ගමේ කොල්ලොයි, බැඳපු උනුයි ඔක්කොම වැලගෙඩියට එන කපුටො රැළ වගේ ගේ වටේ කර්‍ඇකෙන්ට උණා. මං ( මහල්ලා) කපුටොන්ගෙන් වැලගෙඩිය බේරන් මයෙ ගෙට ගෙනාවා."
"මං දැක්කා උඹ බස්සෙකෙන් බැහැල එනකොටත් හැට්ටෙ කිරිවලින් තෙමිල. මහත්තය හිටියටැ කමක් නෑ. කිරි ටිකක් දීහන්...
'ඔහු' යළිත් ඇය දෙස බැලුවේය. ඇය කෝල ලෙසින් සිනාසි පියයුරට  යටින් අත ගසා එසවුවාය....
'මහත්තයට නවතින්ට තැනක් හොයා ගන්ට අමාරු වෙයි. හොඳ තැනක් හොයා ගන්න කල් අපේ ගෙදර නවතිමු.'"




මෙහි එන සමහර කෙටි කතා පසූව පූර්ණ සාර්ථක නවකතාවන්ට පාදක වූ බිජ අවස්තාවෝ වෙතැයි සිතේ. දෙමාපියන්ගෙන් ආදරය සහ තම ජයග්‍රහණ කෙරෙහි වෙසෙස් අවදානය නොලැබීම යන කරුණ මෙහි "මිතුරුළඳ" කෙටිකතාවේ දැක්වේ. එය පසු කලෙක බණ්ඩර මැරූ උන් හී දක්වා ඇත. නෑ පරපුරෙන් සිදුවන වෙනස්කම් පිළිබඳ කරුණ "උන්මාදචිත්‍රාවන්ගේ දියණියෝ"  කෙටිකතාවේ කියවේ. සදත් විල මහා සුභද්‍රාවෝ හි මේ කරුණ විස්තීර්ණව නවකතාවට බද්ධ කොට තිබුණි. සප්ත අපදාන වස්තුවෙ හි මේ අවස්තාවන් මතු වේ දැයි එය කියවූ කලෙක කිව හැක.



මෙහි එන 'ප්‍රිය ප්‍රයාන' කෙටිකතාවද මා සිත් ගත්තෙකි. මත්පැන්හලෙක අයෙක් වටපිටාවේ  සිදුවීම් ඔස්සේ තම දිවිය ආවර්ජනය කරයි. කරදර සමස්ත වශයෙන් සැමට පොදුය යන්න ඉතා නිර්මාණාත්මක ලෙස ත්, මත්පැන්හලෙක අඳුරත් පාඨක මනසේ ජනිත කරමින් සාර්ථක ව නිර්මාණය වී ඇත.

සංග්‍රහයට නම් දුන් පොර මිගොන් කෙටිකතාව පිටු 41ක් පුරා දිවෙන තරමක් දීර්ඝ කෙටිකතාවකි. රාජ්‍ය ආයතනයක ඉහළ නිල දරණ්නක් දෙදෙනෙකු අතර ගැටුමකි. වසර ගණනවාක් පුරා ඇදෙන්නකි. සමස්ත වශයෙන් වරද කරුවෙකු හා නිවැරදි කරුවකු පොරයන් ආරම්භයේදී අඳුනාගත හැකි වුව ද, ගැටුම උඩු දුවද්දි හා නිමා වෙද්දි ජයග්‍රාහකයකු නැත. ඇත්තෙන්ම ජය ගත්ත ද අපතේ ගිය කාල හා සසඳද්දි නිවැරදි කරු වුව ද පරාජයක් ලබා ඇත. මට නලින් ද සිල්වා සහ ජී.ඇල්. පීරිස් නඩු හබය මතක් විණ. මෙහි එන "මාතලීගෙන් ( කළමනාකරණා නායකත්ව පාඩමක්" කෙටිකතාව ද රැකියා ආයතනයක් හා බැඳී ඇති හෙයින් යම් සමාන කමක් තිබුන් ද, නිල අතර වෙනස අති මහත්ය. එය ද රසවත් කතාවකි.

තෝරදෙනිය  ගේ කෙටි කතා සංග්‍රහයන් තුල ගුණාත්මකව සංඝතබවේ අඩුවක් තිබීමට පුළුවන. එහෙත් එහි ඇති රස මුසු අවස්තා දුර්වල තැන්  අබිබවා මතුවෙත නිසා දෝ ඒ කෙටි කතා කියවීමට මා ප්‍රිය කරමි.




Saturday 11 November 2017

Selected Stories from Anton Chekhov ( Translated by Richard Pevear and Larrisa Volokhonsky )


"His characters are not monumental personalities dramatically portrayed, like heroes of Dostoevsky or Tolstoy, they are sharply  observed types." ( From the Introduction)

"Thus the real, the only hero of Chekhov, is the hopeless man. He has absolutely no action left for him in life, save to beat his head against the stones..... He has nothing, he must create everything for himself. And this 'creation out of the void,' or more truly the possibility of this creation, is the only problem which can occupy and inspire Chekhov." This is a quote from Shestov, which Pervear has included in the introduction. The moment I read this I couldn't help remembering, possibly my favourite author (alongside Dostoevsky), Albert Camus. It is a point to ponder as to what influence Camus may have had from Chekov.

Then we turn to what Chekov thought was the writer's job ( in a letter to Alexei Suvorin in 1888);
"An artist must pass judgment only on what he understands; his range is limited as that of any other specialist... Anyone who says that the artist's field is all answers and no questions has neither done any writing or had any dealings with imagery. The artist observes, selects, guesses and synthesizes... two concepts: answering the questions and formulating them correctly. Only the latter is required of an author." ( This too is from the long introduction by Richard Pevear)

This introduction by itself makes this book worth having. And it has thirty short stories  They have intentionally left out the "novelized stories" of 80-100 pages. The stories are from a very early period in which the brevity of his creations was a characteristic. The earliest short story we have is from 1883 and the first few short stories are from that period 1883 - 1886. Some are so heart rendering that you feel like as if your heart is weighted down with a kilo or two of iron. There is no point in trying to summarise or write short introductions about a master like Chekhov. Anyone who calls himself or herself has read Chekhov at some point. Hence I will limit this to a a small portion of a short story called "Vanka" - Vanka is an orphan who has been packed off to a shoemaker, He finds life so unbearable that he finally writes to his grandfather.

"'Come, dear grandpa,' Vanka went on with his letter. 'by Christ God I  beg you, take me awayfrom here. Have pity on me, a wretched orphan, because everybody beats me, and I'm so hungry, and it's so dreary I can't tell you, I just cry all the time. And the other day the master hit me on the head with a last, so that I fell down and barely recoverd. My life is going bad, worse than any dog's... And I also send greetings to Alyona, to one-eyed Yegorka, and to the coachman, and don't give my harmonica away to anybody. I remain, your grandson, Ivan Zhukov. Dear grandpa come.'

Vanka folded the  written sheet in four, and put it into an envelope he had bought the day before for a kopeck. . . . After thinking a little, he dipped his pen and wrote the address:


To grandpa in the village."

Then there are parts that hit you like a hammer right between your eyes:
"At the door of every contented, happy man somebody should stand with a little hammer, constantly tapping , to remind him that unhappy people exist, that however happy he may be, sooner or later life will show him its claws, some calamity will befall him - illness, poverty, loss - an nobody will hear or see, just as he doesn't hear or see others now" ( from "Gooseberries" )

I will not even try to implore others to read this, for the obviousness in that statement borders on an absurd suggestion. Am just sorry that I had to wait till now to read as comprehensive a collection as this ( my previous Chekhov "experiences" are limited to a short story picked from here and there).


Monday 6 November 2017

(Sri Lanka: The Years of Terror) The JVP Insurrection 1987-1989 - C.A. Chandraprema

I stumbled upon this book while skimming through the newly returned books in the Sinhala section, at the public library. Although I have some regard for Chandraprema as a political columnist, by reading his weekly column to the Sunday Island, I had not quite decided to read this when I brought this home - the main reason being that I possessed some idea about his political ideology back then. Upon checking with some of my friends and associates, well read on the times in focus, I found out that it was an important book - hence my decision to read it, although it was not in any plan I had for this year.

Few things need to be set an outset. While the writer is not overwhelmingly critical of the then UNP government, he had not attempted to keep them out of their share of the blame for the atrocities that took place. In comparison, he is highly critical of the JVP, especially of its higher leadership - especially Wijeweera. More importantly the book gives  an overall picture of the terror that reigned the country, the terror which I had only heard of from friends and relatives, for I had the good fortunate of never setting my eyes on pyres of tires that was supposedly a common sight.

Chandraprema's  area of academic focus is social sciences, and there are many a place where this insight is given prominence,  beside the political turmoil and terror that reigned. It is indeed a shame that this book is no longer in print, for it is a book that a student of recent Sri Lankan political history would love to use as a reference. I have a copy of Dharman Wickramarathne's book on the subject which am yet to read, and hopefully that will serve as a sufficient historical reference.

A few comments with reference to selected quotes from here on:

"Bizzare though it is, what Wijeweera was grappling with at that young stage of his life was one of the most vexatious problems in the theory of revolution. The existential basis for revolutionary motivation is one aspect of social psychology very few people have dared to venture into. It is to Wijeweera's credit that he could exercise his mind on this matter even when he was barely in his mid-twenties... The basic premises on which the psychological balance of an individual rests, differs from society to society and within the various societies, from one social group to another. The desire for change comes when it enters one's consciousness that what is deserved has not been received."  (page 25 ) - One of the  two or three instances  (if that ) where Wijeweera is commended in the whole of the book. In most other parts, he is shown as one who doesn't worry too much about the deaths of his party men and one who is first to blame others when things go wrong.  Two unflattering comments about Wijeweera and the other leaders is as follows:
"..he ( Col. Janaka Perera) had cocked his pistol, put it to 'Attanayake's' head and asked 'Oya Wijeweerada?' 'Attanyaka' fearing that the Colonel would pull the trigger, had admitted that he was Wijeweera and said 'I will come with you, but please don't harm my family'. There were two women 'servants' in the house other than Wijeweera's wife, and all the women had started wailing as Wijeweera was led out." ( page 305)
"Commenting on the capture of the JVP leaders, Vartharaja Perumal the chief minister of the Nothern and Eastern Provinces had said in his heavy  Jaffna drawl 'I say, Prabhakaran wouldn't have died like that. He would have died fighting. If he was in a tight spot he would take cyanide. But he would never be taken alive to be spat upon by his enemies!' A large number of Sinhalese were bitterly disappointed with the JVP leadership."( page 307)
This book was written in 1991, when Prabhakaran was very active and thought to be invincible. Enough said.

There are few who are held in some esteem in this book. Although from the "enemy's camp"  D. M. Ananda is given reluctant recognition for his commitment. "D.M. Ananda was functionally the No.1 in the JVP...It was Ananda who conveyed decisions  decisions from one group to another. This when combined with his other functions  as the political cum military leader of the Bhikku front, women's' and workers' front and the leader of the Jathika  Kammkaru Satan Madyasthanaya, made him the single most powerful person in the organization. This is not to say that Wijeweera was superseded as the charismatic leader of the movement. But Ananda's sphere of responsibility in the organization was much larger than Wijeweera's. A hardworking man, Ananda had slaved indefatigably to build up the movement. Many of the other appear to have grown fat and lazy with the influx of money into the movement.  And their grip on the organization had also loosened , giving rise to a kind of anarchy within the their own ranks" (pages 302-303)

Probably no one else is held in as much high esteem as Ravi Jayawardena - even more than Chandraperma's then hero, Ranasinghe Premadasa.
"He is a man of contrasts, at one and the same time a firearms expert and a meditation enthusiast given to long bouts of meditation in various hideouts here and abroad.
    At no point during his father's tenure of office did Ravi J allow his photograph to appear anywhere. Nor was he seen at any public function with is father or hold any position of responsibility except that of security advisor to the President, the duties of which he dispensed in his characteristic anonymity. The only section of the general public accustomed to seeing him regularly were the Padaviya peasants!" ( page 226 ) There are at least 3-4 pages worth of material which portray Ravi J, as unassuming person who had not seen eye to eye with his father on the Indo-Lanka Peace accord; he had also gone out of his way yo extend his arm to the JVP, to come to the negotiating table, make use of their commitment in a more meaningful manner. However the JVP had never been genuine.

The battles between the University Student Unions during this time was at their most terrifyingly stage. The ISU was hunted down by the IUSF and Dharmasiri of the ISU was the outspoken leader  ( successor to Pathirana ) who stressed that the JVP will be and need to be destroyed one day.
"Nobody  in this country ever thought in their wildest dreams that the JVP could ever be so totally smashed up at the end of 1989, But the ISU leadership, primarily K.L. Dharmasiri foresaw it. They paid for their prophetic albeit somewhat blood spattered vision with their lives." (page 208)
"On August 19, the leader of the Independent Student's Union K.L. Dharmasiri was gunned down at Kotahena. His funeral was held at Kanatte. Delivering the funeral oration, Dr. Rajitha Senaratne, a leading left-wing politician invited all the left leaders to follow in the footsteps of K.L. Dharmasiri. Many people present felt that the only practical person in the left was now gone for good. PRRA was also present at this funeral. They had come with an expensive wreath for Dharmasiri. Before the pyre was lit, there was a gun salute for the fallen student leader. For several minutes live ammunition from weapons of all kinds were fired into the air."
Note that this was at a funeral of a student leader. The incidents described is a picture of the kind of anarchy that the country had slid into.

Other societal  factors that favoured the JVP, The caste factor too had a role to play. "It was also seen that the JVP had a considerable amount if support from the other underprivileged castes like the Batgam, Wahampura and Rada in 1971. ...Because of the long drawn out nature of the struggle in 1987-1989, the caste factor was more visibly seen unlike in 1971... Castes like the Wahampura's (hakuru) and Batgam (padu) are the most numerous after the Govigama's. But they are sorely under-represented in business, education and general economic prosperity. This oppression is never discussed or acknowledged in any way" ( page 129)


There are historical tit bits which makes interesting reading and is copied here in verbatim."The rift between the JC ( Jathika Chintana) student unions and the JVP first arose over the question of Mrs. Bandarananaike's candidacy at the presidential elections held in December 1988. The IUSF was one of the negotiating parties in the talks that were held between various political groupings to decide on this matter. The IUSF delegation to the six party alliance of the SLFP, MEP, DWC, LP, SLMC and JVP was led by one Champika - a Jathika Chinthanaya student leader from the University of Moratuwa. Following these negotiations, the JC and SLFP student unions which were at that time represented within the IUSF decided to support Mrs. Bandaranaike. But the JVP decided to withdraw their support from all candidates at the elections, and they issued an order for the boycott of the election." ( page 117)

At times there are home truths which are very valid even today,  decades after the JVP has managed to re-incarnate themselves, which I doubt the author could predict at the time this book was written.
"The JVP has never owed allegiance to anything but itself. And as far as the JVP was concerned, it was more advantageous to have the UNP remain in power. Had the SLFP won, this would have been a complete political change and would have retarded the anti-government momentum that the JVP had built up by several years" ( page 249)

In essence this is a book that every student of recent political history should read. It may not be flawless, and the author is sure to have had his interests and inclinations when writing it, if what we too have heard from the grapevine, is even  partially to go by. Yet it is a recorded history of events, written importantly soon after the events. And frankly I felt it was more unbiased than I initially feared when I was hesitant to read it. It carries the politics and the events in some detail, and the sociological insights added by Chandraprema are a possible advantage, missing in other works on the subject.

 How I wish I could lay my hands on my own copy of this book, for further reference and comparison when I do read Dharman's book one of these days!