Bridging Connections (An Anthology of Sri Lankan Short Stories) - Brossura

Rajiva Wijesinha

9788123750446: Bridging Connections (An Anthology of Sri Lankan Short Stories)

Brossura

ISBN 10: 8123750447 ISBN 13: 9788123750446

Casa editrice: National Book Trust, India, 2007

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Introduction
This volume is a collection of short stories from Sri Lanka that brings together writing in

all three Sri Lankan languages. It originated with my 'Anthology of Sri Lankan Short Stories

in English', which included twenty four stories by a range of writers, expanding on a

previous collection of writing by women that brought together twelve stories written

originally in English by four women writers.

Following the enthusiastic response to the recent volume, and the opportunity it

offered to review developments in that field in the last few decades, it seemed desirable

also to put together a collection that allowed readers to explore writing in Sinhala and

Tamil as well, and examine varying responses to continuing social complexities.

These complexities spring to a great extent from the compartmentalization that seems

endemic in Sri Lanka. In such a context it is not surprising, thought very sad, that the

present initiative is an unusual one. The first collection to bring together writing in at

least two Sri Lankan languages, published in Arizona in 1981, left out writing in Tamil

altogether. The editors sadly noted what they saw as a 'glaring omission', but explained

that 'Tamil Literature in Sri Lanka is terra incognita for the Sinhala or English reader in

the island. This is partly the result of shortsighted political and educational policies. It

also reflects the present realities in Sri Lanka where the two communities exist in

ever-growing isolation'.

In the early nineties there was at last a compendium that brought together writing

in all three languages, prose as well as poetry, but given 'the limitations of

trans