Introduction:

This study investigates the Impact of War on Sri Lankan English Poetry. The poets
usually compose poems on different themes, such as beauty, love, nature, morality,
humanity, war and violence. Sri Lankan English poets also do the same in accordance
with their personal, social, cultural, political and religious experience. In this study,
much attention is paid to the effects of long drawn out war , which had once prevailed
in the country.
Anne Ranasinghe, Richard de Zoysa, Jean Arasanayagam, Kamala Wijeratne,
LakdasaWickramasinghe, YasmineGoonaratne and Patrick Fernando are some of such
prominent and outstanding Sri Lankan poets, who have perceived and experienced such
social problems, which were prevalent during their life time. During the recent past, the
Sri Lankans have experienced more violent and subversive activities, which were
closely observed by the above poets. JVP insurrection in 1971, Black July in 1983, JVP
insurrection in 1988/89 and brutal war between LTTE and Sri Lankan forces were some
of the most tragic and evil incidents that occurred in Sri Lanka. They were so violent
and inhuman that almost all the people of the country suffered in numerous ways. The
worst effect of this tragic situation is that even today, some people hate JVP and LTTE,
whereas some people hate state terrorism. These three elements created chaos, terror
and horror every nook and corner of the country. Those, who are directly or indirectly
responsible for this kind of bloodbaths and inhuman activities in the island can hardly,
get rid of the curse of the people, who bitterly underwent this pathetic and terrified
situation. They have witnessed this detrimental situation in the country, which terrified
the whole island for a long time causing violence and terror everywhere. Some poets
have perceived this violent atmosphere in an indifferent way, whereas some seem to
have been biased and prejudiced. It is also apparent that there are valid reasons for them
to be biased or unbiased. However, the majority of the Sri Lankan poets seem to have
observed the above social issues in a realistic and justifiable way.
In general, violent and brutal activities in a country go down in the history. They can
neither be forgotten nor deleted from the strong memory of the people, who suffered
critically as a result of the evil conduct of the above people. Though these ugly
incidents go down in the history of a country, it is much valuable for the poets to
compose poems on these violent and inhuman themes, which will never vanish from the
memory of the people. That is why it is emphasized that literature of a country is very
significant and it always goes with the history of the country. The literate and
intellectual people read Sri Lankan poems and come to be aware of the social problems;
they had faced during the past.
The research problem found here is whether Sri Lankan poets have successfully
identified these issues. For instance, when their poetry is closely read and investigated,
the intellectual readers will think whether there were such brutal and violent issues
prevailed in the country and they are directly or indirectly related to their poems. It is,
therefore, necessary to explore the history of the country and collect information
regarding the Sri Lanka poetry.
The objective of the present study is to observe whether the Sri Lankan poets have
properly and accurately identified the social issues confronted by the country
maintaining their independence and impartiality. Some poets seem to be biased and
prejudiced in their observation. This is also another significant matter related to their
poetry.

Methodology:
Collecting information from the relevant sources of Sri Lankan poetry in English from
both print and electronic media was the main methodology. Both Sri Lankan poems in
English and comments on them by various critics were deeply studied regarding the
impact of war on Sri Lankan English Poetry. Relevant articles, which appeared in
newspapers, books and web sites, were used as secondary data while interviews were
conducted with those, who have really experienced and observed these problems
created by war. Thus, both primary and secondary data were utilized in the present
study.
The research was extremely confined only to the Sri Lankan poems based on war,
which were composed in English. When the close attention is paid to the Sri Lankan
poetry, it is apparent that many poems have been composed by various poets on
multifarious themes. However, this study is extremely limited only to the poems, which
are based on significant crucial problem of war alone, which were prevalent all over the
country disturbing the human beings and the entire atmosphere.
Literature Review
As indicated above, the whole study is entirely dependent on literature related to the
war, which occurred in Sri Lanka during the recent past. Professor, D.C.R.A.
Goonetilleke (1998) and Professor RajiwaWijesinha (1988) have commented on the Sri
Lankan poems in their anthologies with some examples. As Ashley Halpe[1] points out,
Sri Lankan writers in English make their own particular contribution to Sri Lankan
reality and to the exploration of human potentiality that is central to art of any
importance. Their writings represented different situations that occurred during the eras
they write. Sri Lankan writers in English explore human potentiality through exposé of
characters. These characters have distinctive characteristics that make them different
from the characters of other literatures. Through their writing, they make their audience
aware of Sri Lankan history including the eras of colonialism and post colonialism and
social issues like internal riots and ethnic conflicts of the country. Among those writers
the poets like LakdasaWikkramasinha, YasmineGooneratne and Patrick Fernando can
be taken as Sri Lankan writers, who addressed different perspective views of human
beings as well as social issues.
In LakdasaWikkramasinha’s poetry, he deals with native problems of Sri Lanka. He is
a distinctive character among good local poets. As Suresh Canagarajah indicates
LakdasaWikkramasinha as a better example of a Sri Lankan poet, who succeeds in
reconciling the discourses in his own terms. His stand point is clearly in the rural, folk,
native cultural and literary traditions. In fact in being a poet of no mean stature in one of
the indigenous languages (i.e., Sinhala) he is unique among Sri Lanka Lankan English
poets in his literary bilinguality. Besides, he is a relatively committed poet with a fairly
clear and consistent socio-political stand point. [Canagarajah, 1995]

In his poem ‘The Poet’ Wickkramasingha uses very unusual metaphorical images to
create the role of the poet. First we see the poet as a terrorist ‘tossing a bomb into the
crowd’. The word ‘crowd’ can represents a busy public place in a town. And next a
soldier who mounts a gun on a tripod most probably for a grenade attack. Then the
image shifts into a camera that levels and adjusts ‘for a clear sight’ for a speaker at a
public meeting. Moreover in the second stanza the narrator elaborates another function
of a poet. The role of the poet is compared to an assassinator who hides and waits with
the rifle till the right time comes. These different settings can suggest the different roles
activities done by the poet.

Next again with the idea of terrorism the poet Lakdasa Wickkramasingha indicates the
role of the poet as a guerilla preparing for an ambush in the jungle. And it is at the end
of the poem the role of the poet becomes more revolutionary comparing the poet for a
bomb in the city. This image suggests the uncontrollable feelings of the poet which
become explosive. He is more on alert and would end up the task as a suicide bomber.

As mentioned earlier with these different images Lakdasa Wickkramasingha completely

overturns the image of the traditional poet that can be seen as a commentator or a
bystander. His involvement in the society is not just limited to ideological support. He
needs to have an active participation. A poet can be dangerous in his passion and can
burst out with uncontrollable emotions. A poet can do a change a difference in the
society while creating and reforming new attitudes and aspects. Suresh Canagarajah
depicts Wikkramasinha as a politically committed and socially conscious poet in Sri
Lankan English poetry.
YasmineGooneratne is an outstanding female poet of Sri Lanka, who belongs to
the Western educated minority. During the time she wrote, the social patterns of Sri
Lanka have changed from her childhood. At that time, mother tongue oriented culture
and education emerged in the country and that affected the anglicized minority of the
country. [Raheem and Fernando, 1978] So, it is clearly evident the fact that this
situation has an effect on Gooneratne’s poetry.
YasmineGooneratne’sPeace Game shows the class distinction. There, we see the
upper class people’s attitude towards the working class people. And also, she presents
the snobbish and contemptuous qualities of the upper class people. Her Peace Game is
a mildly suggestive satire on war. She satirizes the inequality of the sides playing the
peace game, or the inequality of the sides fighting for war. Here, the poet presents class
distinction and there we see two side ‘Odds’ and ‘Evens’. ‘Evens’ belong to the upper
class people, who were ‘swell’, ‘upright’, ‘regular guys’ and poet represents them.
‘Odds’ in the poem represent the lower class people, who were ‘little, patched and
scrawny’ were not given a voice.
“We Evens were a well-fed lot
and tough, so that the little patched
and scrawny Odds would never dare.”
On more universal term the meaning of the poem seems to be that wars are not fought
on equal terms. It is one party, the more powerful that chooses the ground and makes
the rules and plays the game, not for war but for peace.
Patrick Fernando is another famous Sri Lankan poet, whose writings contributed to
display Sri Lankan reality and to the exploration of human potentiality. He wrote with a
certain confidence. We see a vivid imagination working through his poems. That has a
peculiar originality of its own. In point of actual achievement, Patrick Fernando is one
of the most talented poets belonging to the period after 1956. He is not exclusively Sri
Lankan or Western. His poems can be read by anyone anywhere as they have a
universal appeal. Suresh Canagarajah introduces Patrick Fernando’s poetry represent
the dominant ethos of Sri Lankan English poetry. [Canagarajah, 1995] He is a native
writer and deals with themes typically native in the West coast of Sri Lanka.
Prof. Ashley Halpe further says that Patrick Fernando highlights a different
theme in his poem Life and Death of a Hawk. He speaks about power, strength and
other talents people have and the way they are abused by some people in the society.
Ultimately, such powerful people are killed as animals. The poet compares such
treacherous and inhuman people to a hawk, which is also detrimental and dangerous in
their community.
Though there can be seen slight differences among the above mentioned Sri Lankan
writers in English all of them have taken a certain effort to explore human potentiality.
With direct and indirect messages they portray characters. The characters that they
portray and social, economic and political issues that they brought out are more familiar
to the Sri Lankan audience rather than Western literature
Prof. WimalDissanayake[2] has the paradox that those, who cared nothing when
Jayewardene presided over the burning of the Jaffna Public Library and the pogrom of
1983, the deprivation of Mrs. Bandaranaike’s Civic Rights and the Referendum of 1982
that put off elections for six years, the nullification through hasty legislation of Appeal
Court judgments and the intimidation of Supreme Court judges, now appear as
champions of the minorities and democracy and the rule of law. Of course, there is a
new generation involved, and we cannot really blame them for their ignorance, in a
society, which remembers nothing, except grudges and prejudices. But, their
paymasters are those who relished authoritarianism when it seemed to promote their
interests, and that is why we should not be surprised that they flirted with
authoritarianism again. Bizarrely, they were also prepared, in promoting this, to ally
themselves with the JVP, which had been hunted down with such relish twenty years
earlier.
Between the ethnic Tamils in the north and the Sinhala people in the south, while
ultra-left groups like JVP were leading uprisings against the state. Matters came to a
head between 1987 and 1989, when the JVP stirred up a new wave of violence and
began to terrorize the government.
In retaliation, the authorities began to crack down on JVP activists and anybody
suspected of having an affiliation to the group. Disappearances, murders and mutilation
of bodies Sri Lanka in the 1970s and 1980s was in crisis. A civil war was raging
became widespread. One commentator in the play noted how newspaper headlines
routinely used the term ‘tyre pyre’ to describe piled-up bodies of people set on fire
along with rubber tyres.
It was in this environment that de Zoysa lived and worked. A well-known
reporter and TV broadcaster, he belonged to the English-speaking elite of Colombo and
was active in the city’s arts scene. He was fond of theatre and used it as a medium to
put forward his own anxieties about the state and the condition of his country.
Contributors to the documentary remember a man, who was educated, cultured
and eager to connect with the Sri Lankan masses. His kidnapping and murder were all
the more distressing because this was the first time an upper-middle class journalist
from Colombo had been killed in such circumstances.
Anne Ranasinghe born of a German-speaking Jewish family in Essen, left
Germany for England in January 1939. Her parents and most of her family circle died in
Nazi concentration camps. Her education, begun in Cologne, was completed at
Parkstone Girls' Grammar School in Britain.
Ranasinghe trained as a nurse in London, studied journalism, and speaks five
languages. Settling in Colombo following her marriage in 1949 to a Sri Lankan
physician, she began writing poetry in 1968 and published her first poems in 1971 . Her
experience of the Nazi holocaust helped her to write of Sri Lanka's 1971 insurrection in
powerful poems that have imparted a new strength to Sri Lankan poetry, especially that
written by women.
Writing articles about Hitler's Germany for a Sri Lankan newspaper, Ranasinghe
began a journey back into her past, which culminated in a return to Essen in 1983 that
has profoundly influenced her subsequent writing. She has won several awards and
prizes, including the Sri Lanka Arts Council Prize for Poetry (1985). Her publications,
all printed in Colombo, include Poems ( 1971 ), With Words We Write Our Lives Past
Present Future ( 1972 ), Plead Mercy ( 1976 ), Love, Sex and Parenthood ( 1977 ), Of
Charred- Wood Midnight-Fear ( 1983 ), Against Eternity and Darkness ( 1985 ),
and Not Even Shadows ( 1989 ). Her work has been translated into four languages, and
is included in Y. Gooneratne (ed.), Poems From India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and
Singapore (Hong Kong, 1979).

Findings and Discussion

When the literature related to the present study is closely examined, it is clear
that some Sri Lankan poets have composed their poetry, with the experience they
underwent during that particular period. Prof. Ashley Halpe and Prof.
WimalDissanayake have comprehensively discussed this matter through their keen
observation. Both have referred to violent activities, which occurred during the recent
past. Mainly, LTTE, JVP and state terrorism were behind all these tragic events. Even
the interviews with those, who observed these violent activities with their own eyes,
substantiate the fact that what Sri Lankan poets convey is accurate. Jean Arasanayagam,
who composed Ruined Gopuram reveals how the kovil was attacked by militants. She
highlights the brutal behavior of the militants, who caused massive damage to the kovil.
This is related to the political situation then. She further says that even god is helpless
before such inhuman acts:
“Unknown goddess, guardian
Of the freshwater spring
Is silent”
In her poem, Nallurshe emphasizes this fact much effectively:
“… the gods are blinded by the rain of bullets.”
This is regarding their attack on the NallurKovil.
Remembering Nallur 1984, Political prisoner,1958,’71,’77,’81,’83,In the
month of July, Refugees-old man – old woman, the dark civilization are the other
poems Jean Arasanayagam has composed, They are all related to social issues, specially
war and violence.
Prof. WimalDissanayake in his newspaper article as discussed earlier,
concentrates much on Richad de Zoysa and the way he was brutally assassinated by the
government forces during the JVP insurrection. This indicates that the media personnel
did not have any freedom to express their respective and independent attitudes or
opinions regarding the social problems the country had been undergoing. His
poem, Animal crackers is highly critical of the political situation of the country during
1980s and 1990s. Through the symbols of animals such as elephants, tigers and lions,
he observes the weaknesses of the human beings. Elephant represents the government
while the lion and tiger represent Sinhala community and LTTE militants respectively.
Any way, he needs peace and justice. He wanted to reveal the truth, but ultimately, he
was abducted and brutally murdered. Prof. WimalDissanayake has realistically
elaborated it in his article.
As Prof. Halpe says, Anne Ranasinghe is another key poetic figure in Sri Lanka,
who perceives the social problems prevalent in the island though she is alien to Sri
Lanka. She, too, highlights much on war and its violent consequences. Plead mercy,
On the beach, At what dark point? Fear grows like a cactus, Vivere in pace and
July, 1983 are some of her masterpieces, which are closely associated with war and
violence in Sri Lanka, which developed into controversial and much blood stained
issues in the country. For instance, her poem, On the beach speaks about a puppy,
which is brutally tortured and killed by three inhuman and treacherous boys. While the
puppy is tortured, the people, who are enjoying swimming in the sea, ignore this tragic
incident. But, the poet feels it very much. However, she fails to get involved in this
incident as she is a foreigner. This is really a social problem, which resulted in the
uprising of the young people of the country during the Sirimavo Bandaranaike regime
in 1971. Three boys represent some government forces, who brutally burnt and killed
some youth, who were involved in the JVP campaign to topple the then government.
When interviews were conducted with the people, who observed these tragic and brutal
incidents with their own eyes, it is apparent what Anne Ranasinghe admits is accurate.
Kamala Wijeratne’s poem, A Soldier’s Wife Weeps is another good example for
highlighting the social issues, which existed in the country during war. She refers to the
matter how a poor soldier was killed in the battle field and his dead body came home in
a sealed coffin. Many such traumatic incidents occurred in the island during war in
North and East. Thousands of such tragic events virtually took place in Sri Lanka. This
is only one example regarding the evil consequences of war and violence. On seen a
white flag across a by road, A mother laments, Farewell and White sareeare some
of the poems Kamala Wijeratne has composed regarding social issues. Even the
ordinary people of rural villages are aware that many such untimely and cruel deaths
were caused by war, which wants to quench the blood thirst of some inhuman elements
of the country. Though it seems to be over presently, the people, who were confronted
with such tragedies, are still living in great fear.
Prof. Ashley Halpe also admits that YasmineGooneratne’sPeace Game shows
the class distinction. There, we see the upper class people’s attitude towards the
working class people. And also, she presents the snobbish and contemptuous qualities
of the upper class people. This poem is directly related to the JVP insurrection, which
occurred in 1971 killing at least 20,000 people. The majority of that number was young
people of the country.
Patrick Fernando in his poem Fisherman Mourned by His Wife deals with the
theme of love and marriage between a young fisherman and his wife. The fisherman is
dead and the wife in her grief analyses the various stages of their relationship. Through
images the poet draws a realistic picture of the hardships of their lives. This is a poem
composed on the reality of the fishing community in Sri Lanka. As Prof. Ashley Halpe
observes, it is clear how much these poor and innocent people suffer silently before the
unpleasant challenges they face every day. Patrick Fernando has highlighted this social
issue with great sympathy and compassion towards the fishing folk.
Patrick Fernando expresses a different theme in his poem Life and Death of a
Hawk. It is the enigmatic nature of the highly elevated life and the pathetic death of the
hawk that form the subject of the poem. Patrick Fernando shows his own bafflement at
the enigmatic nature of the great men ending in meanness. The poet uses the image of a
hawk that often can be seen in the Sri Lankan sky. According to the poet hawk is a very
powerful, strong and cruel animal. It dominates the whole sky. However, the truth is
that one day all such inhuman elements have to be confronted with the evil
consequences of their cruel activates. No one can easily escape from the sins they have
committed. Thus, the theme of the poem is universal as it can be applied to any
society. According to Prof. Ashley Halpe, the whole poem carries the theme of
however majesty, however powerful this is the common end of all living creatures. The
poem is a symbolic of destruction of things beautiful and splendid by violent and
incongruous forces.
Conclusion
It is now obvious that the present study has substantiated the fact that there is a
great link between the war in Sri Lanka and Sri Lankan poetry. As discussed earlier,
many Sri Lankan poets like Jean Arasanayagam, Richard de Zoysa,Patrick Fernando,
LakdasaWickramasinghe and Kamala Wijeratne seemed to have observed these effects
of war very carefully and capable of revealing the reality of such issues. Great literary
scholars, Prof. WimalDissanayake and Prof. Ashley Halpe have also investigated this
matter in detail in their respective literary works as pointed earlier. Accordingly, it is
obvious that the Sri Lankan poets mentioned above are much more sensitive to the
nature and the problems created by war, which are closely associated with the citizens
of the country. In other words, they feel the pulse of the poor and innocent people, who
are harassed and tortured by the evil and selfish elements of the country.