Short stories
පලිගැනීම
G. B. Senanayake · 1946
Synopsis
A story collection in which, between the prose narratives, the author slips in poems that dispense with rhyme and metre, in a language close to prose.
Context
The author's second collection, after a first published in 1945, the book mixes prose and poetry. The prose poems it contains are regarded as the precursors of Sinhalese free verse, which the author called nisandas and of which he is held to be the pioneer. An anthology of seven of his short stories and three of his poems appeared in English in 2020, in a translation by Vivette Ginige Silva.
Who it is for
A collection in Sinhala, with no French translation; poetic texts are read there between the short stories.
Prizes and reception
Regarded as the book in which Sinhalese free verse begins, that of the nisanda movement.