Channelling the power of poetry

Channels Volume 13 Number 2. Published by the English Writers’ Cooperative of Sri Lanka. Edited by Lilamani Ebell. Price : Rs. 275

Albert On Page Four….read the title. Intrigued I continued reading. And was moved, shocked and humbled by the power of the thought, not just the words. Shelton W.P. Amarasuriya’s poem of an ordinary man whose only claim to fame is when he is killed in a road accident and makes it to the newspapers… “Dead in five lines on page four”.

Elsewhere in different vein is Ramya Chamalie Jirasinghe’s thoughts on the unwritten, but oh so important ‘colour’ barrier…the advantage in society accorded by a ‘bit of creamy skin’.

What struck me most in this latest edition of Channels was the poetry. Powerful and eloquent whether it was the poems mentioned earlier, Carl Muller’s “Requiem for Nihal’, Prathibha Dissanayake’s ‘The Dead Trees’ or Vivimarie VanderPoorten’s ‘Suddenly In a Public Place’.

Yet one should not be surprised for this slim edition represents the best efforts of the country’s growing community of creative writers. An English Writers Cooperative (EWC) publication which usually comes out twice a year, this latest volume edited by Lilamani Ebell is a commendable effort, which maintains a high standard of professionalism throughout, in both content and presentation.

In her Editorial, Ebell sheds some light on how the contributions were viewed and what the Editorial Board looked for in making their choice: “The crux of creative writing is the creation of something. It is not a mere relating of the facts, or the description, accurate to the last detail, of an occurrence or a series of events. The creative writer takes an event, an idea or an object and is inspired to make countless combinations and permutations with words, technique, imagery to produce something unique,” she writes.

The writers chosen, she says, included well known names as well as several new entrants…which gives this volume a freshness and vibrancy, no doubt serving as a tremendous encouragement to the latter category as well.

The short stories saw entries by many recognized writers like Gratiaen nominee Lal Medawattegedera whose poignant ‘Can You Hear Me Running’ won first prize in the EWC’s short story competition. Medawattegedera’s crisp prose, short, staccato sentences bring home the experience of this young commando who cannot escape from the past.

If the ethnic conflict, insurgencies and the horrible wounds, violence inflicts on the psyche do tend to occupy most of the younger writers published here, as evinced in the other two stories that were placed second and third, Aditha Dissanayake and Abbasally Rozais, there is also other varied material. Anthea Senaratne’s story Laura will resonate with a different generation who have known the experience of seeing their parents grow old and feeble and the responsibility of caring for them, while Nanda Pethiyagoda’s insightful ‘Plenty Fish To Be Hooked’ captures well a young woman’s allure and the games of courtship, before the startling denouement.

More description would be to give too much away of a volume that deserves to find a place in the bookshelves of all those who feel that creative writing should be nurtured.

Divided into three sections, Channels contains the winning entries in the poetry and short story competition conducted in 2006 and in its second section the chosen entries selected by the Channels Editorial Board which apart from Lilamani Ebell, comprised Faith Ratnayake and Anne Ranasinghe.

The third section coming at the end, was where this reviewer felt the volume lost a degree of momentum with the reader, by setting out some of the EWC activities in the past year. While the average reader would be interested in reading about the short story seminar conducted by the EWC, whether that same interest could be sustained when perusing descriptions of the programme or the musical compositions played at a book launch is a moot point. Perhaps this space could have been used to accommodate more contributions from writers, of whom, as this volume clearly shows, we seem to have an abundance.

All things said, however, this volume of Channels succeeds amply. And it is now upto readers to support the EWC’s efforts and as Editor Lilamani Ebell puts it, to enable the writers to reach a wide discriminating readership and grow thereby. R.S.
Channels, Volume 13, Number 2 is now available at Lake House, Vijitha Yapa, Barefoot and Sarasavi bookshops.