Book Review: Sam’s Story by Elmo Jayawardene

(First published in The New Indian Express, 02 August 2009.)
Sam is poor, Sinhalese, and a servant in the Master’s River House. His only best friend is the owners’ dog Brutus. Sam is someone who can never figure out what a problem is, someone who doesn’t know why people cry. He has never learnt anything, not [...]

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Genuineness IS NOT EQUAL TO Authenticity

And this is something I had to relearn from ELT. Soon, I think I will even be capable of telling apart midnight from 12.00 a.m. and so on. In the past 24 hours, I have slept for some 10 hours. And in he remaining time, read 4 books. Where I pick up such absolutely true, [...]

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Some poetry news in an otherwise impossible world

What’s happening in the Vanni is becoming more atrocious by the day: we earlier mourned for the hundreds dead each day, now it is into the thousands. Reading any news simply sends me spiralling into depression. Wanted to sort of take stock of what is going on with my life. Blog posts here shall become [...]

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Opinion piece in today’s Deccan Chronicle

STATE PARTIES TO GAIN POLL MILEAGE FROM LANKAN ISSUE
WITH ELECTIONS in Tamil Nadu just a month away, the Central government seems to have realised that it can no longer keep up its pretence that the Lankan Tamils problem does not exist. Home minister P.Chidambaram said on Sunday that India had pressurised the Sri Lankan government [...]

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What’s kept me busy…

I have managed to sail through the past few days with my health mostly intact. Ever since the wounds healed, I have got going. . . Mostly running around. First, on Wednesday there was this documentary Pottu getting launched at the Vis. Com. department at Loyola College. Produced by the Kalangarai Trust, it deals with the [...]

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Interview with Siritunga Jayasuriya

(First published in Countercurrents.org)
SIRITUNGA JAYASURIYA, a trade unionist and leader of the United Socialist Party is best-known for being a high-profile Sinhala dissenter against the war on the Tamils in Sri Lanka. A fierce critic of the current regime and an ex-Presidential candidate, Jayasuriya has survived several attempts on his life. His unwavering voice of [...]

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An Indian writes about his government

I don’t publish letters that friends write me, but I am making an exception this time. Manoj, who wrote me this letter is a nice friend of mine and we have talked about all topics under the sun. Of course, we spoke in times of peace, and I don’t remember discussing the Sri Lankan situation [...]

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Hitting below the belt

Yesterday I went to the black flag rally organized by the Lankan Tamils Protection Movement under ayya Nedumaran. I also stayed back for the public meeting that followed. And there were certain things that did not escape my notice: 
I am really scared that this Eelam Tamils protection movement, in spite of its noblest goals, is being [...]

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martyr muthukumar

I went to Muthukumar’s funeral saturday, and though I paid my homage, I never had the courage to look at his face. It was not because I am against curiousity of any kind, it is just that, I couldn’t get the nerve. Since Thursday, I must have read his last letter at least ten times, [...]

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In which the Poetess becomes a Terroristress

तमिल ईलम संघर्ष के पिछले ४० बरस से मुख्य स्वर रहे, क्रांतिकारी-लिरिकल कवि कासी आनंदन से युवा दलित अंग्रेज़ी कवि मीना कंदसामी की बातचीत और उनकी कुछ कविताओं के अंग्रेज़ी एवं हिन्दी अनुवाद. मूल से अंग्रेज़ी में लाने का काम मीना कंदसामी ने किया है और अंग्रेज़ी से हिन्दी अनुवाद गिरिराज किराडू ने. राजनितिक कविता [...]

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