‘Prema Puranaya’ : From Sinhala to French
View(s):Sunethra Rajakarunanayake’s ‘Prema Puranaya’ has become the very first contemporary Sinhalese work of fiction to be translated into French directly from the original text.
Published in 1999, the novel first captivated with its remarkably fluid, boundary-breaking format—a striking departure from the conventional local literary scene when it was released 25 years ago in Colombo by Vidarshana, an obscure yet daring young publisher.
It appeared to seamlessly blend fiction with non-fiction: carrying the expansive sweep of a novel, while hinting at an intimate touch of auto fiction—its authenticity, however, remaining ambiguous. At the same time, it could be seen as a hybrid—part novel, part collection of short stories. Both profoundly intimate and eminently sociological, the work defies easy classification, thriving in its contradictions. To tell the story of an atypical heroine, the author employed daring, disorienting techniques: ellipses in abundance; abrupt jumps in time and space while moving from one chapter to the next; barely signposted flashbacks, aligned like in a film; and moments where poetry effortlessly took the place of prose.
Sunethra Rajakarunanayake is a Sri Lankan author who has received 12 national awards, including two Golden Book Awards from the Sri Lanka Book Publishers’ Association, and four State Literary Awards, the official literary recognition of the State.
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