Chats with the Dead - Shehan Karunatilaka

 After reading Chinaman, there was no way that I'd pass Chats with the dead. However it took longer than it should've for me to start on it.

I will write this in two parts. Part one will be a review of the book, and can safely be read by those who consider reading this.

Part two, primarily will be a personal note (although now published), on how I feel about the happenings disclosed in this book, on how it could be related to public figures of yesteryear, and how it sit besides other reports that am aware of. It is best that this part is not read by those who aim to read this book.

Part 1: Review

"At Borella junction, a woman in white walks the edge of your periphery and disappears when you focus; a demon toddler squats in a corner and hisses at the young girls waiting for buses; a cloven-hoofed ghoul stands at the headlights looking for a motorcyclist to impale. It appears that too many in Colombo have died unwillingly and too few are ready to leave"

    Shehan Karunatilaka (SK) has opted for a loose styled  narration, broadly enclosed in eight sections - one each for seven moons, and then one for "The Light". These seven moons could be thought of as the duration of the  immediate seven days upon the passing of a person, for the protagonist is dead ( and the chats are his, with other persons that he meets, "there" ), and he spends these days in the in-between; in limbo; undecided. It is clear that SK has put local Buddhist beliefs to very good use, to come with this fiction, with the whole host of mythical after life beings beings parading within the  story ( pretas, ghouls, undecided spirits, those who find their time has elapsed etc.). I am not aware of any book that has used these rich mythical stand points to such literary use even in the vernacular (although I could be mistaken on this regard), and this is a good area for new vernacular fiction.

 SK's writing is colorful, enriched with generous use of vernacular expletives to give the book a natural setting, although an international reader would need some assistance here, to glean the most from this book. Its flow is with darting off like tendency to digress, but returns to its origin soon. Its amazing wit will keep you entertained - this is the main characteristic of SK no doubt, as he used so successfully in Chinaman. Here's an excerpt:

"'I'll talk to the big boss,' says Kottu.'Can't break the laws when doing murders, no?'"

                                        The sad part is, the above quote is more inclined towards truth in our corrupt society, than towards sounding oxymoronic. All dialogues carry the everyday Sri Lankan English dialect, which too attract it to the local readers, for one can even picture the highest society carrying on with  such use of the language.

At over 400 pages, an editor could've made it an ever better book, with 30-50 pages less (I run the risk of being pedantic, by suggesting so).

For those who are aware of the dark gory 80s, it is clear that the protagonist is a remodeling of a much loved media personality, an activist who transcended the language barrier between the vernacular, and the much awed English speaking society. Some of the other characters could be imagined from their real life roles, as enough snippets have been dropped. All these make it a good political revelation of sorts, although the author has fictionalized it to such a degree, that any attempts at concrete pronouncements would be imprudent.

All in all, this is not a book that English fiction readers from Sri Lanka should miss out on. It takes swipes at our collective faults, almost emanates the stench of the political hell hole which we still suffer from more than 30 years later to the times referred in this book ( and collectively pay a heavy price at present), and wit that makes us laugh as well as take a closer cynical look at ourselves. I just hope that at some point it carries references for it be more accessible to an international readership (maybe that's already underway if the title of his next announced book is anything to go by.)  Plus, it is interspersed with enough philosophical garnish, which end up being more than just that. The beauty is that it doesn't influence the taste of the overall "dish" too much. I have very little to complain about this book, although a comparison with Chinaman may see this a few steps behind, more so due to the political weight that this carries ( I feel).

Rating: ****

Part II: A Personal Stitch to see things better ( includes spoilers - so keep away, future readers of this book)

It is clear who SK had in mind when he created the fictitious character, Malinda Albert Almeida Kabalana, with one more professional capacity added than "he had". That professional role gives SK, the space to give birth to a plot, in which our character has served many masters. Besides this, this fictional character gambles, and is gay, a point ooked down upon more so then, than now (even world famous music stars were reluctant to come out in the 80s). The matter that most troubled me was that the murder of "Maali" is instigated by political might ( as we all believed), but for personal reasons. In this fictional work, his sexual relations are decisive for his death. In the real life equal of this death,  the only close reasoning that could be thought of as aligning to this, is that this death was one of the last deaths of prominent persons by the then active government death squads. There is even a line of thought that the then president, used this death to call for a halt for the killings. There is a police officer called Ranchagoda, in this book, and we see a police officer with the same name as one of the main men mentioned, even serving a brief term in prision, in real life.  SK's overall stance appears to have been to portray that in spite of the many political camps, and the warring fractions that were active then, each was corrupt in its own way, each was guilty of grave crimes, and that the public at large too were unconcerned - or more accurately, could not afford to be concerned, as things stood. For, protests as we see it today, were unimaginable back then ( and today too, only because the whole world hears of it in a matter of seconds - even then we saw what happened on May 9th). The fact that disclosing photographs, Maali's life's work, for which he took many a risk, with which he thought many would be exposed, fell through, suggested exactly this).

What of the characters I think I can recognize ? Rajini Thiranagama, Ranjan Wijeratne, ASP Ranchagoda, and Daya Pathirana, definitely. Stanley is someone I couldn't, and I don't think there is a real life character, that could be compared with him.

Am in two minds whether to read Rajiva Wijesinghe's book, or the book edited by Prabath Chinthaka Meegodage. However I will read again the last known essay that he wrote, that was published in the Sunday Island one week prior his death. In it, his argues for a secular nation, arguing against some of the claims by Reggie Siriwardena, as well as the stances of Gunadasa Amarasekara, and Nalin de Silva; and he  finds the actions of Anagarika Dharmapala to have been heavily influenced by the Victorian Culture that he was confronting - he calls the Anagarika a great rationalist, and a great humbug.

In summary, I think the main character lived his life, as he thought best he should, committed to a cause, and taking pleasure as it served him. In that sense, it is a life that needs celebrating than those who live for three score years and more, with nothing to show, and being hypocrites to themselves.