They say that the past is a different country. And indeed, Sri Lanka today is a far cry from what it was in 1990 – a country reeling from the shock of ending one insurgency (in the South) while witnessing the escalation of another (in the North). Yet, even though both of these battles have been won by the time I pen these words, Sri Lanka is still at war with itself, having never really gone through a healing process like the one in South Africa. We are still searching for that elusive Sri Lankan identity, divided as we are on ethnic and religious lines. And we are yet to come to terms with how both these conflicts ended, with different voices coming out with different opinions. The truth is, we have to come to terms with the past to face the future.
This, in short, is the premise of Shehan Karunatilaka’s Booker award winning book “The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida”, a unique take on the often terrible events that shaped Sri Lanka after 1990. While many other authors have tackled the conflict in Sri Lanka through both fiction and non-fiction books with aplomb, Shehan weaves his literary magic on a far broader canvas – the afterlife, where few borders exist, if at all.
Plot
The plot, if any, of Seven Moons is rather simple. Maali Almeida, a renowned photographer who had made it his life’s mission to document the conflict, one day wakes up – dead. He, or rather his ghostly avatar, realises that he has been done in – and done for – by some unseen hand or hands. But why? This is the question that haunts him as he searches for answers to this seemingly simple question. But the clocks keep turning even in the Netherworld – as Maali has only Seven (Full) Moons before his afterlife gives up the ghost – literally. Hence the title of the book.
But nothing is as simple as it seems both in real life and the afterlife, a fact that Maali realises as he guides two of his best friends who are still in the land of the living to solve the mystery primarily by finding some of his photographs. This is somewhat similar to Haley Joel Osment teaming up with Bruce Willis’s ghost in the “Sixth Sense” to solve why some people have been despatched to The Other Side, but on a much darker, more cynical scale. Indeed, through the 400 pages of Seven Moons, Shehan takes the reader on a rollercoaster journey that expertly dissects Sri Lanka’s recent turbulent history.
Solving the mystery
Yes, it is a whodunnit but not in a conventional sense – in solving the mystery of his own untimely demise through his pictures, Maali literally stumbles on the bigger picture of life, war and death and also Sri Lanka’s descent into chaos. No wonder the Times of London called the book “an exuberant whodunnit ...There can’t be many novels that simultaneously bring to mind Agatha Christie, Salman Rushdie and John le Carré - but this one does”. Incidentally, the recent stabbing of Rushdie at a literary event shows that journalists and writers live on the edge of life in any case, as there are fanatics who take umbrage at what they write.
Seven Moons’ Booker success will no doubt send journalists and readers around the world scrambling to find more about Sri Lanka, which recently went through another crisis and a political upheaval. It will also cast a spotlight on Shehan’s other delightful book – “Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew” and by extension, cricket, the game that brings a welcome respite to a nation riven apart by discord and rancour for much of its 74 years of post-Independence history. Death plays a part in this book too, although the protagonist, retired sports journalist W.G. Karunasena is only dying and not actually dead like Maali.
But in the few days he has left before his turn comes to see the White Light, he wants to track down Pradeep S. Mathew - spin bowler extraordinaire and “the greatest cricketer to walk the Earth”. W.G. will spend his final months drinking alcohol, making his wife unhappy, ignoring his son and tracking down the mysterious Pradeep.
On his quest he will also uncover a coach with six fingers, a secret bunker below a famous stadium, a warlord, and startling truths about Sri Lanka, cricket and himself. It is no coincidence that Karunasena shares his initials with the great W.G. Grace, perhaps the greatest cricketer who (actually) ever lived, apart from Sir Donald Bradman. Again, this is a subtle nod from Shehan to the game he and other Sri Lankans love most – he could not help talking about the chances of Sri Lanka taking home the ICC T20 World Cup even at the Booker event.
Trilingual
Cricket brings people of all hues together and again, it was not surprising that Shehan spoke in both Sinhala and Tamil at the awards ceremony. His two children are already trilingual, which is what we want to see in a future Sri Lanka. This will help everyone in the country to understand each other and half our problems will automatically be solved.
Indeed, the very fact the other Sri Lankan winner of the Booker Prize (Michael Ondaatje) hails from a different ethnic background shows the literary and ethnic diversity of our land. Incidentally, apart from his Booker award winning The English Patient, almost all of his other books have a Sri Lanka-based storyline. His book Anil’s Ghost, is somewhat similar in scope to Seven Moons in that it also tackles the National Question. Shehan and Michael have both stressed the importance of more Sri Lankan writers focusing their energies on writing on this critical issue.
Fundamental question
It all comes back to the fundamental question of where and how we went wrong while other countries in Asia overtook us. Sri Lanka was the second richest country in Asia (after Japan) in 1948, but the story is very different today.
The primary cause was that our politicians engaged in divisive, ethnic and religion-based politics, not to mention corruption, nepotism and cronyism. We have still not learned the proper lessons even after going through two Southern insurgencies and a 30-year-old conflict. It is not too late even now to become one Nation, one People where everyone thinks and acts like a Sri Lankan. And like Maali does in Seven Moons, we have to address the ugly chapters in our past to do so. And now we have a chance to work earnestly towards peace and reconciliation within our lifetimes, unlike Maali who found the courage to do so only after leaving his mortal life behind.