Jayathilaka Kammallaweera, one of the leading short story writers in Sri Lanka who began his journey writing short stories to Rasa Katha and poems to Geethanjalee; weekly papers of Dawasa newspapers, published his first short story collection Kalu Sapaththu, which won the State Literary Award in 1985, at the age of 40. After taking off as a full time political activist, Kammallaweera continued his work as a writer mainly focusing his work on problems of the working class. So far he has published 24 books including seven novels and ten short story collections. Five books are among the State Literary Award winners
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| Pic by Chanadana Wijesinghe |
“The
prize for a person who comes first in a reality show, singing someone else’s
songs on stage exceeds 17,000,000 rupees. But the person who wins the State
Literary Awards, receives only 55,000 rupees. That is the status of literature
in Sri Lanka.
How would you expect a progress in the field?” Jayathilaka Kammallaweera raised
a question. Kammallaweera pointed out that the department of Cultural Affairs
can find more than enough willing sponsors for the prizes. “That is not a difficult
task. Over two million is spent on the ceremony of Swarna Pustaka Awards and the prize
also exceeds Rs 500,000. Sri Lanka Book Publishers Association knows that they
can earn a great deal from the nominated books and that they won’t lose by spending
on the award ceremony. Similarly, Cultural Affairs Department could also treat
the artistes better if they make an attempt,” he explained.
According
to him this unwillingness of the ruling classes plays a big role in the fall of
the interest in literature which would severely damage society in the long run.
“Literature disciplines people. Look at a child reading a book. He cannot
engage with anything else when he is occupied with reading. Reading a book for
an hour equals an hour of meditation. Apart from that the child learns to
identify human emotions and start empathizing. This gives him the ability to become
a good human being,” Kammallaweera pointed out.
Decrease in book sales indicates less number of readers and
decreased reading point to lack of discipline and good qualities in society.
Kammallaweera believes that neglecting humanities also aggravates the issue. “Humanities
studies in the university syllabuses are on the ledge and will be discarded very soon. It is true
that science subjects are important. We need good hearted citizens as badly as
we need doctors and engineers,” he said. “Look
at the doctors today. They treat hundreds of patients a day apart from the
service at the government hospitals. They charge their private patients over 1,000
rupees per session. Look how money centers around one level of the society.
There is no need for them to charge so much if they get such a large number of
patients. They won’t do that since they are incapable of harboring such
sentiments. Their brains are nurtured with science but their hearts are not
nurtured with humanity. That is why an aesthetic subject is essential in higher
education,” he elaborated.
Kammallaweera supposes that a transformation in the current
education system would resolve this issue. “Regardless the government in power,
they should accept that the development of the country cannot be measured only
by its physical advancement. Spiritual growth should also be a measurement,” he
said. “For this, literature should become a mandatory subject which is not
limited to a few questions on an exam paper. As the first step, all the
teachers should be educated on teaching student how to grasp art,” he suggested.
‘They are not interested in books or reading as we were’, is
a common complaint against youth today. Kammallaweera identified the fact that
children are not taught to grasp the ideas in literary work, as the major
reason for this. “This also reasons out the decrease in book sales and in printing,”
he reiterated. “When you look at the crowds at the annual book fair, you might
think that the sales are relatively high. But it is the other way around.” He
explained that a couple of decades ago an amateur writer would also print over
2,000 copies in first print. Now it has come down to 500 copies, he complained.
Another writers’ woe is that book publishers are reluctant to
accept short story collections. Kammallaweera believes that this reluctance is
a negative trend. “Not only the short story, poems are also given step motherly
treatment by publishers. This happens because it is hard to make profit from
short stories and poetry collections. These collections don’t contain many
pages therefore can’t be prized more than 200 rupees. The publisher could profit
only if they manage to sell all 1,000 copies and have to go for a reprint.
Earlier they accepted short stories, but now it has also fallen from grace,” he
lamented.
He
continued to speak about the Swarna Pusthaka Award ceremony organized by the Sri
Lanka Book Publishers Association. “They have the ability to reestablish the
interest in literature through this although they are more concerned about
sales.” However Kammallaweera reiterated that the organizers should also
consider the appreciation of the short story and poem. “They have overlooked this.
I know they have had this discussion within the association, but many are
against it.”
Kammallaweera compared the novel and the short story. “There
are novels written for different levels or readership depending on the degree
of understanding. There are some novels which are not rich in language or story
value, but records high sales. So anyone can choose the novel which suits his
or her level. But not everyone can read and grasp the message of a short
story,” he pointed out. “A short story is tender than a novel. A high level of
maturity is required to understand it. An in-depth understanding of life,
society as well as language and literature is required. The short story could
be re-promoted if the reader could be made to reach that level of maturity from
school going age,” he restated.
Most of Kammallaweera’s work revolve around the labor party
of society; in other words people who work. According to him most of his work
is inspired by his experiences with the laborers during his political career.
“Over 90 percent of my work is based on true experiences I gained over 12 years
of labor politics. That is why it’s all about the working class.” According to
him, his efforts are to retell the stories that occurred during a bygone era
with different political settings. “Time goes by and people tend to forget,” he
reasoned.
Comparing his earlier literature he said that now he is
focusing more on the literary skills rather than the content. “I’m aware of this
change. Take my first short story collection, Kalu Sapaththu, for
example; the literature in that is not aesthetic, but very promotional.” He
explained that he now focuses more on the artistic quality of a story, which is
essential improvement if the Sri Lankan Short Story is to be taken to the universal
level. “But you have to see that you build a readership around this or else all
the effort will be in vain,” he iterated. “Writers romanticize these working
class characters. This is a marked negative feature in populist story writing
which was fashionable at the time I wrote Kalu Sapaththu,” he added.
Thaththalage
Kawathawa which was selected as one of the Excellent Novels in 1991 by
the State Literary Panel is a story of three children of a leftist
political leader who cared only about making a better society and a country and
neglected his own children. “I wanted to express my great distress over some
incidents that took place during 1988 and 1989. There was a group of
people in the socialists’ movement who worked towards building a better society
with fullest commitment. It is true that they couldn’t come in to power, but
they succeeded in instilling a sense of caste, class and gender issues and the
need for equality in society. At the time, the Samasamajakaaraya (leftist) was considered a
hero in the village as he was bold, fearless and always ready to criticize bad
and support good. Twenty-three people like this, whom I worked with very
closely, were murdered branded as traitors. I am still shocked that this
happened.”
He explained that this situation occurred due to a
theoretical mistake socialists made. “They joined the Samagi Peramuna to
establish a coalition government. For example after Dr. NM Perera became the
Minister of Finance he placed many financial sanctions. He had a great plan for
developing the country; in fact he succeeded in making Sri Lanka a debt-free country. But
on the other hand there were all sorts of barriers like Haal Polu and Miris Polu, restrictions
on individual quota. A government like that, established with no effort could
not take decisions as a government established by a revolution. That is what
went wrong. It gave JVP an opportunity to brand them ‘traitors’ and kill them,”
he said. “They weren’t just people; they were extraordinary human beings even
though they could not fulfill their dream.”
Characters like the father in Thaththalage Kathawa are real
characters according to him. “Their aim was to build a nation with equal rights
and they believed that the success of their family would follow the success of
the country,” he added.
Kammallaweera’s latest contribution; Prince is a story of
a young man of a wealthy family. He is a mixture of both reckless qualities of
his wealthy family and the influence of leftists. This influence of leftists’
politics makes him different from his brothers and also brings him closer to
the reader. Prince never engages in an occupation but spends all the money he
inherited. He respects equality and wishes women to have their freedom. He is
even ready to grant sexual freedom to his wife. “I wanted to create a character
like this along with a slight criticism of politics in the country,” he
explained how he developed the story of Prince. “The Buddhist monk who preaches
to us to renounce all mundane things wants to expand the temple grounds. Raja;
a Tamil who has converted to a Sinhala man, gets killed by racists and Moorthi,
a Tamil who has never set foot in Jaffna, born and raised in England cannot forsake
his inherent Tamil culture when it comes to his dowry. That is how people truly
are,” Kammallaweera scoffed at society.
He has also tried to discuss the cultural aspects that were
neglected by the leftists. Similar to the father in Thaththalage Kathawa, many
revolutionary characters in his stories, are failures in their personal lives.
As Kammallaweera explained, it happened because they had only one goal; making
the society better with equality. “Look at Trotsky’s life. His wife and
children were abandoned. That should not be made the ideal,” he said. At one
point in the novel, Prince
says that a new left should be created if the country needs uplifting.
“This is my personal opinion coming out in Prince’s words.
Indeed we need a new left but that doesn’t mean it should come in all red. What
we need are people with morals. I have demonstrated how this should be done with
the character of Prince,” he said. “We have only taken the mechanical aspect of
Marxism. It taught us that everyone in the ruling class is heartless and it
showed us the difference between the laborers and the rulers; not the similarities.
Not all rulers are evil, there are people with compassion and empathy among
them too,” Kammallaweera pointed out.
“An ideal human being should respect others’ point of view,
recognize his faults and welcome change. Socialism and communism only focused
on the class diversity. They protested to change the society but not the minds
of the people living in it. The society cannot be changed without changing their
thought patterns,” he opined.
“The artiste has a great deal of responsibility towards change.
They could use their work to discuss socially sensitive topics like caste,
abortions or gender issues. The artistes could become activists,” he said.
“When we were young we talked about the country and its
future whenever we got together. Look at the topics of today’s youth. Reality
shows and soppy meaningless topics. Not only the manner in which TV and radio
program presenters present the shows but the way people respond to these shows are
pathetic. It’s no surprise when leaders of this country take front row seats in
these shows,” he lamented.
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