“One thing worth mentioning is Karunathilaka’s experiments in language. Perhaps it is for this reason that Karunathilaka became a recognized voice in world literature.” Jose Varghese writes regarding this year’s Booker Prize-winning author and work
Shehan Karunathilaka is one of the rare Sri Lankan writers who entered the English literature. His first novel ‘Chinaman’ was internationally acclaimed and won many awards. It was a political piece with a cricket background. I feel fortunate to have met Karunathilaka, who received the DSC Sahitya Puraskar at the Jaipur Literature Festival in 2012, and read the book not too long ago.
Karunatilaka was a celebrated writer along with the new generation of writers like Pakistani writer Muhammad Hanif, Kashmiri writers Mirza Wahid, Basharat Peer etc. After the first book, it took a long time for the novel ‘Chats with the Dead’ to be published. The UK version of the same book is ‘The Seven Moons of Mali Almeida’. There are no major differences between these two books, except that a little explanation is given within the novel itself for readers who do not understand the political conditions and views on the followinglife in Asian countries.
The theme is the death and life of Mali Almeida. The difference is that the story begins following Mali’s death and his spirit tells the story. We are familiar with such narratives through Elif Shafak and George Saunders. But Karunatilaka’s story world, as the cover of the book makes clear, is rich in intense colors and life situations filled with fear, excitement and celebration.
This novel deals with the political imbalance that exists in Sri Lanka since the nineteen eighties, the interventions of countries like India and Norway and international organizations, and how the resulting ethnic conflicts and terrorist movements affect public life.
The story begins where Mali’s spirit reaches the world of the dead in a state of near loss of life. The Seven Moons are the conditions he must pass through to enter the light following death. This was only possible through long lines or inspections, which he hated when he was alive. But he wants to find out how his life ended. He tries to do that when he knows that he can remember or understand things through someone he loved or was a part of his life.
Mali realizes through the special knowledge provided by the followinglife that the ruling class, the police and the movements mercilessly exploit his country and its people and sometimes eliminate them through violence.
Along with the political atmosphere full of violence, the confusion and exploitation of personal lives and the unexpected sightings in the ghost world are available to us here in a big canvas world. The world of the living is first shown as something that is closed to Mali’s soul, but as he gets multiple perspectives there through many doors and windows, the atmosphere of the story develops greatly and the reader’s eagerness to understand the secrets increases moment by moment.
One thing worth mentioning is Karunatilaka’s experiments in language. Decades ago, Salman Rushdie surprised English readers with ‘Midnight’s Children’. Perhaps it is for this reason that Karunathilaka becomes a recognized voice in world literature.
This year’s Booker shortlist was a revelation of human rights abuses in various forms in many parts of the world. Percival Everett’s ‘The Trees’, which deals with the lynching of a black boy in Mississippi and other similar events in American history; Claire Keegan’s ‘Small Things Like This’, which exposes an anti-human movement in Ireland by the Catholic Church and the state authorities; Nature and history have existed for millennia around our imperfect and irrelevant lives and try to interact with us. Allan Garner’s ‘Treacle Walkers’, Elizabeth Strout’s ‘Oh William!’, which investigates whether there should be size reductions in human relations in the context of micro-level casteism, and ‘Glory’ by Noviolate Bulawayo, which creates an Orwellian universe with humans as animal characters in the totalitarian political background of Zimbabwe, are must-reads in various ways and in various periods.
But it was clear from the first reading that Karunatilaka’s ‘The Seven Moons of Mali Almeda’ was one step ahead of them in terms of narrative, characterization and storytelling. Therefore, this year’s announcement of Booker Prize results was without much controversy.
