From the legendary island to the coveted island
His name has probably been forgotten by history, but the one he wrote about the travels of Alexander the Great was a milestone. Onesicritus, a Greek philosopher of the 4th century, accompanied the sovereign on his expedition to India and then reconstructed his adventures in seven volumes in which fiction sometimes caught up with reality and in which, above all, a succession of inaccuracies gave rise to one of the greatest geographical discrepancies referenced to this day. Thus, by mentioning an island of 5,000 stadia - without indicating whether it was its length or width - and by locating it 20 days' sailing from the mainland - without mentioning its point of departure - he left room for a doubt that agitated cartographers in the Middle Ages: was Taprobane not Sumatra after all, and not Ceylon as had been thought until then? It is finally astronomy - and there again its subtleties because the stars have changed, at least in name, since Antiquity - that will confirm the first version, leading one to believe that Ceylon is indeed the island that appears in many texts - including The Journey of the Eritrean Sea - and has inspired many authors, up to Pliny the Elder and Ptolemy.
The Sinhala language, now used by 70% of the population, can claim an equally ancient origin, and some even mention a Sinhala chief who imported it as early as the 6th century BC. Nevertheless, inscriptions dating back to 300 B.C. have been found in Sri Lanka and some texts - notably the collection of Buddhist stories Dhammapadathakatha - have been dated to the 2nd century. In addition to this mainly religious literature, there were poems with more or less rigorous metrics(kavya, gi), most of which have certainly been lost because they were written on " ôles ". However, these palm leaves, which were used for so long as supports in India and South-East Asia, certainly had good preservation capacities but remained nevertheless sensitive to the damage of time... and to insect attacks! However, where writing proved to be ephemeral, speech proved to be perennial. Proof of this is the survival of the Kandy dances - originating from the legend of a king miraculously cured by three Indian shamans and which still today guarantee abundance to those who command them - and that of the rūkada nātya, the traditional string puppet theater now belonging to the intangible cultural heritage of humanity listed by UNESCO. The plays performed, which drew their themes from both folk tales and stories from Buddhism, were intended to entertain, of course, but they also served to dispense advice and other morals that enabled the community to iron out differences and remain united. Finally, we should mention the historical chronicles which have retained immense interest because they describe events of the past as well as the origins of Theravāda Buddhism which is said to have been born in Sri Lanka. The oldest of these documents is certainly the Dipavamsa, which is estimated to date back to the 4th century. This text, so precious, would have moreover inspired the monk Mahānāma the compilation that he initiated in the following century. Indeed, he summarized, in a set called Mahavamsa, the dynasties of the Sinhalese and Tamil kings of Ceylon, from the middle of the sixth century BC to the very beginning of the fourth century AD. The information contained in this genealogy is all the more invaluable as it helps to measure the influence of the Indian continent on the fate of the island. These links were strong until unexpected guests arrived there by chance and took over Sri Lanka: the Portuguese who were trading in cinnamon and allowed themselves a stopover that would last.
The second birth
The Portuguese arrived at the beginning of the 16th century, followed by the Dutch until the end of the 18th century, and then the British who finally granted independence in 1948 (within the framework of the Commonwealth). These successive conquests undoubtedly generated their own works, written in particular by the colonists, and one should not neglect their contribution to music, which in Sri Lanka is inseparable from literature. Thus, poetry - in fixed or improvised form - often becomes song(Jana Kavi, Virindu). However, it was not until the 19th century that native writers were born who were the first to reconcile the different influences, European and Sri Lankan, by offering them a universal scope. We must mention C. Don Bastian (1852-1921) and John de Silva (1857-1922), two eminent personalities of their time. The former is known for having given a new twist to musical theater(Nadagam) following the arrival in Colombo of the Indian Elphinstone Dramatic Company in the 1880s. The second, in his lineage, also contributed to the art of theatre with plays that were either satirical(Parabhava Natakaya) or inspired by historical or religious legends(Siri Sangabo, Sri Vickrama Rajasingha, Dutugemunu, etc.). John da Silva's legacy is such that he has been the subject of numerous commemorations and a statue has been dedicated to him in the Sri Lankan capital.
As for Piyadasa Sirisena, the "father of the Sri Lankan novel", he was born in 1875 near Induruwa, which he left as a teenager to work in Colombo. It was through journalism that he entered literature, quickly becoming editor of the Sinhala Jathiya and taking a particular interest in the question of Buddhist nationalism. His commitment to independence earned him several prison sentences... His fiction is inextricably linked to his profession and his political opinions, and it was in the newspaper Sarasavi Sandarasa that he began to publish serialized stories from 1904. But the link is especially to be made in the very vocation of his works with an almost pedagogical scope, through which he will seek to restore the lost glory of a people oppressed for so long. A tireless worker - it is said that he slept only four hours a night - he published 22 novels and short stories before his death in 1946. His biggest success was Jayatissa saha Roslin, which sold 25,000 copies upon its release, a record rarely equaled in Sri Lanka. Possessing a real sense of suspense, he also wrote detective novels and one of them, Dingiri Menika, was adapted into a film in the 1950s. Sirisena undoubtedly contributed to the revival of reading and paved the way for many writers, among whom at least should be mentioned WA Silva (1890-1957) who completed his first novel(Siriyalatha) at the age of 16 and enjoyed a wide audience thanks to two of his works(Kalae Handa and Hingana Kolla) being made into films, and especially Martin Wickramasinghe, also born in 1890, who was perhaps the first to see his writings translated internationally. His book Viragaya ou le Non-attachement, which like so many of his works testifies to his attachment to Buddhism, is now available in French from L'Harmattan.
XXth century and expansion
Throughout the twentieth century, literature and politics would continue to travel together, the former turning to realism and turning language upside down, the latter responding to the noxious atmosphere. Born in 1923, Ambalabvaner Sivanandan is a novelist and activist, winner of the 1998 Commonwealth Writers' Prize for When Memory Dies, and editor of the journal Race & Class, which, as its title suggests, focuses on the issue of racism. His younger son, Siri Gunasinghe, will pursue other struggles, revolutionizing poetry by introducing free verse in Mas Lea Nati Ata, and favoring orality over formal rigor in his novel Hevanälla, where he explores the flow of consciousness. Sybil Wettasinghe (1927-2020) invested herself in children's literature, of which she is still considered the doyenne with the 200 titles she published (the best known being Child In Me and Eternally Yours), which have been translated extensively. After her, Chitra Fernando, for example, will take up the torch. Finally, Gunadasa Amarasekara was one of the founders of the eminent Peradeniya school of literature.
On the women's side, Jean Arasanayagam was born in 1931 in Kandy into a family of multiple origins, which made her especially attentive to ethnic issues that would feed her poetic work written in English. These themes will also appeal to Carl Müller (1935-2019), to whom we owe a trilogy on the Burghers (the descendants of the colonists) - The Jam Fruit Tree, Yakada Yaka and Once Upon A Tender Time - and at least one historical novel, Children of the Lion. Although he has received international recognition and numerous awards, it is nevertheless another writer who will definitely introduce Sri Lankan literature to France: Michael Ondaatje, the author of the famous English Patient, whose film adaptation won all the acclaim. He lived only ten years in Sri Lanka, where he was born in 1943, because his family went into exile in England and he chose to settle in Canada, where he became a citizen. Yet his novels are also steeped in multiculturalism and violence, two subjects that inspire his peers. Twice winner of the Governor General's Award and winner of the Prix Médicis étranger for Le Fantôme d'Anil, his abundant work is available at Points(Ombres sur la tamise, La Table des autres, La Peau d'un lion...). Little by little, it is becoming more frequent to meet Sri Lankan writers on the shelves of our bookstores, such as Romesh Gunesekera with Lisière du paradis (Gallimard), Shyam Selvadurai with Jardins de cannelle and Drôle de garçon published by 10-18, the young Anuk Arudpragasam whose Un bref mariage was unanimously acclaimed by the critics, and of course Antonythasan Jesuthasan, translated by the beautiful Zulma publishing house(La Sterne rouge).
