It is with sadness that the Sunday Observer records the passing away (aged 87), of Rosemary Rogers the ex-wife of one of Ceylon’s most prominent sports persons of yesteryear, Summa Navaratnam.
Although ‘Summa’ was one of Ceylon’s best known sports personalities, his ex-wife Rosemary Rogers overshadowed him as far as fame and fortune were concerned, becoming a ‘dollar millionaires’ in her own right, a best-selling novelist whose books sold by the millions, and a resident of an upmarket suburb of California. According to Wikipedia– “Her first three novels sold a combined 10 million copies. The fourth, Wicked Loving Lies sold three million copies in its first month.”
Summa Navaratnam himself ranks alongside Olympic hurdler Duncan White, Olympian sprinter Susanthika Jayasinghe, boxer Malcolm Bulner (who later became a boxing referee and even refereed one of Mike Tyson’s heavyweight title defenses), Michael Tissera and Mahadevan Sathasivam. My thanks are due to Summa for informing me of her sad demise.
But this note is not about Navaratnam and mainly about the inimitable Rosemary Rogers, who featured in my series of articles on American Fiction writers in the Sunday Observer –Youth section just recently.
Rosemary came from a prominent Ceylonese family and schooled at St John’s College Panadura, which is now renamed in memory of Rosemary’s father, Cyril Jansz who founded the school.
Born on December 7, 1932 in Panadura, Rosemary’s parents were Barbara (Allan) and Cyril Jansz, Dutch Burghers who owned several private schools. Rosemary attended the University of Ceylon as it was then known.
Following her first divorce (she married three times) she moved to London where she worked as a typist supporting herself and her family and parents who had by then joined her following the Sri Lankan insurgency.
There she met her second husband, an American, and moved to the USA.
Prompted by her teenage daughter she sent the manuscript of her first novel Sweet Savage Love, to Avon publishers who instantly bought it. Sweet Savage Love, rocketed to the top of bestseller lists bringing Rosemary fame and fortune and taking her almost overnight from rags to riches.
Until her death she continued to write her raunchy novels turning out one best seller after another, some of which were described by the critics, (who cares!) as pornographic. I’m told by a reliable source, that she was a ‘night bird’ who did her work late into the night and slept during most of the day.
Sympathies go to her family and children and all those who loved Rosemary Rogers and her “penwomanship”. She will go down as one of Sri Lanka’s most famous writers of English fiction.