The death occurred in Canada of Prof Emeritus Siri Gunasinghe on May 25. He was 92. Born on February 18, 1925 in Galle Prof. Gunasinghe was renowned as a Sinhala author, Poet, Novelist, Art historian, and Critic. He pioneered the introduction of simple spoken words into Sinhala Grammar.
Late Gunasinghe who learnt letters at the Sinhala school in his village run by a Bhikkhu and a bilingual school in Ruwanwella later entered Mahinda College, Galle for his secondary education. Prof. Winnie Vitharana, Prof. Sirimal Ranawella and Dharmasena Arampatta and Veteran Journalist Dr Edwin Ariyadasa were his contemporaries at Mahinda College. In 1970, he moved residence to Canada and served as Arts and History Professor at the Victoria University. ‘Abinikmana’ and Rathu kekula are considered gems among the books authored by him.
Siri Gunasinghe is credited with introducing, in the late fifties when he was a Professor at the University of Peradeniya in Sri Lanka (the western style of) blank verse, nisandas (to give the term coined by him), into contemporary Sinhala literature. His first collection Mas Le Naeti Aeta (“Dry Bones”) (1956) is the first collection of this genre. In addition to two other collections, Abinikmana “Renunciation” (1958) Ratukaekula “Red Bud” (1961), he is also author of a groundbreaking novel, Hevanaella “Shadow” (circa 1959), and the film, Satsamudura “Seven Seas” (circa 1960s).
He produced only one film; that is Sathsamudura which is a landmark film in the Sri Lankan cinema history. When once a reporter asked Prof Gunasinghe about this film and why it was so different his answer was, “I tried to make the movie more cinematic. In the sense that I wanted to make the visuals the main medium.
I used very little dialogue in that movie. No dance and music and fighting... The Sinhalese film was all dancing and singing ... of the Bombay variety kind.” The same journalist asked him why he left Sri Lanka to live on a foreign land, for which he gave another simple answer. “I didn’t really leave Sri Lanka. I came here (Canada) as a visiting professor for one year. And then certain political problems - not national politics but university politics - compelled me to stay on.”