Poetry, Prose And Pretension
By Imaad Majeed – Photos by Pranil Abeysinghe
flickr.com/photos/pranilabeysinghe
The English Writer’s Cooperative held an Evening of Poetry, Prose and Music on November 23, at the Goethe Institut, Gregory’s Road, Colombo 7. Authors featured for the night included Gnana Moonesinghe, Faith Ratnayake, Myrle Williams, Ayesha Herath, Jayani Senanayake and Anthea Senarathna, who were coincidentally part of the organising committee. The readings were interspersed with poetry leading into prose, with interludes of music, courtesy of the heavy metal band, Tantrum. Albeit an unusual accompaniment to a rather soft-spoken night of literature, their acoustic performances were well-received by the fairly aged crowd.
“Love sings in the scented tree, it is Spring now”, Anthea Senarathne read from Yasmin Gooneratne’s poem ‘Thoughts Grow’, a short piece that made for a humble opening. Myrle Williams followed with a reading of Anne Ranasinghe’s poem “I Speak”, again concise, ending with the realisation that “it is in forgetting that we can live our daily lives, but we must survive in order to remember”. To be honest there was not much worth remembering and surviving the innumerable cliches took a little effort.
Vijitha Fernando’s prose piece titled “April” followed, read by Ayesha Herath, perhaps a little too enunciated on the word ‘nidikumba’. I “shuddered at the very thought” of being stuck in an elocution class again. There were seven other authors reading prose for the evening, with varying writing styles and a myriad of accents, all seeming to suit the Colombo Seven faces in attendance.
Anthea Senarathne read a rather emotive piece titled “The Mango Tree”, with an Eastern aesthetic to the storytelling that was much easier to stomach. Sita sits in her wheelchair looking out of the window at the mango tree that is being invaded by the tree next to it. She asks Mala to have the intruder felled, but Mala insists the mango tree must be cut down as it has not borne fruit. Sita cries out “you must never cut my mango tree”. The mango tree is spared. With the intruding tree chopped down, the mango tree sprouts new branches and fresh leaves. “Mala, I have to speak to you”, Sita calls as the story comes to a close.
Sakuntala Sachithananda was also pleasant to hear from, both her pieces “All is Burning” and “On The Streets” reflected Sri Lankan culture, even mentioning ‘cheetu’ that is a common practice among Tamils. The words familiar and the emotion credible, her last lines “doused the raging fire within, by lighting up with kerosene”. Faith Jeanne Ratnayaka followed, waxing lyrical on the intricacies of wine and conversation, a rather niche tradition not too familiar to most Sri Lankans, yet seemingly suited to the audience that were caught to every word, flipping the pages of their handouts in unison.
As for the poetry, apart from Yasmin Goonerathne and Punyakante Wijenaike, most were mediocre. A casual browse through the Sri Lankan blogosphere would find better writing, and for free too. Apart from the few exceptions, pretensions ran high at the evening of poetry and prose, as Myrle Williams read her piece on “Investigative Journalism”. What was immediately noticeable, apart from her high-headed accent, was the difference in the text on our handouts and the words she chose to read out. Dumbing down words to suit the audience, she went on with her excerpt about a journalist that comes across the opportunity to go abroad. Oy vey.
While there were enunciation’s Wendy Whatmore would be proud of, a few O’s as Aw’s were to be heard when Ayesha Herath took to the microphone. If cringefest were a word, she would find it somewhere in the “parch-land of [her] heart” to use big enough words to sound sophisticated. But apart from all the dictionary references, her story was forgettable. M. T. L. Ebell’s piece “Shadows” was read by Chitra Premaratne-Stuiver as it should be heard, going so far as to adjust her vocalisations to suit the tone of the dialogue. Hers was the closest to a performance, her deep voice sounding like the kind of bedtime story you want to hear every night.
It seemed that the best were saved for last, and in retrospect and suppressed memories, it was a fairly interesting evening. However, it must be noted that the long-haired guitarists of Tantrum were the only male presence on stage throughout the evening. Some audience members went so far as to call it “feminine tosh”. The evening, as the audience member quoted from William McAdoo, “left the impression of an army of pompous phrases moving over the landscape in search of an idea”.
