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BOOKS
Desert
Despair
Fragmentary
charm of a Sri Lankan novelist
By
Anita Nair
Just
as the Indian expat authors very seldom manage to sever the umbilical
cord that binds their imagination to the land of birth, Sri Lanka too
has this tenuous hold over its authors-in-exile. In that sense, Bandula
Chandraratna is very different. Instead of seeking to explore the everyday
or the eclectic realms of the little island, he chooses to write about
a desert kingdom. (Even though unnamed, there are enough references to
suggest that this is Saudi Arabia where the author has worked.)
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AN EYE FOR AN EYE
By Bandula Chandraratna
Weidenfeld & Nicolson
Price: £ 12.99
Pages: 181
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The book begins promisingly enough: Nimal, a
Sri Lankan doctor, and David, a colleague, set out to watch an execution.
Hussein is to be beheaded for committing adultery and Latifa, the co-accused,
is to be stoned to death. Shades of The Stoning of Soraiya M. Meanwhile
Latifa's husband Sayeed becomes deranged with grief and runs away to the
desert. The executions are carried out. Sayeed recovers, thanks to the
efforts of his family and good friend Abdul Mubarak, and then plots revenge
... only to change his mind. Unfortunately, the book doesn't rise beyond
this.
The problem is not the style, which is simple
and unaffected. Nor is it the plot. The weakness lies in the treatment.
And, if I were to apportion blame, it is as much the editor's inability
to shepherd the narrative as it is the author's need to communicate several
impressions, most of them vagrant. The result is that there are too many
loose ends or things left unsaid. And no matter how hard a reader might
try to fill the gaps with his imagination, the whole process is unsatisfying
and quite often frustrating. For instance, what is Nimal's role in the
plot? Or why is Sayeed so convinced about Latifa's innocence? Or why does
the mutawah lead a false crusade against Latifa? Or where and who is the
father of Leila (Latifa's daughter)?
The book's blurb talks of Chandraratna's first
novel, Mirage, that was set in a desert kingdom too. This one seems like
a collection of several fragments from the earlier book.
While I was growing up, my mother, rather vexed
by her children's gargantuan appetites for something new at every mealtime,
would chop iddlies, sauté them and serve it up as upma. An Eye
for an Eye resembles that-leftovers garnished to seem like a whole new
dish. Which, as any child would testify, doesn't deceive beyond the first
couple of bites. In this case, the first few chapters.
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