Booker Prize winner Shehan Karunatilaka: 'Sri Lanka has seen so many false dawns'

Author speaks to 'The National' at Sharjah International Book Fair

Booker Prize winning author Shehan Karunatilaka speaks to The National's Anjana Sankar at Sharjah International Book fair. Pawan Singh / The National

The Booker Prize-winning author Shehan Karunatilaka has lamented the state of Sri Lanka today after natural disasters, poor economic management and political failure pushed his island nation home to the brink of collapse.

Speaking to The National at the Sharjah International Book Fair, Karunatilaka, 47, said the peril his nation faced quickly vanished from the headlines shortly after protests caused the last government to fall in July.

“We have had a tsunami, we've had the Easter attacks, we have an economic collapse,” he said.

“It is just that I have lived in Sri Lanka for over 40 years, and we've had so many false dawns.”

All these eminent writers … they were all talking about Ukraine, Palestine, climate crisis, ISIS, all these things. No one was mentioning Sri Lanka

Shehan Karunatilaka

A cost of living crisis, medicine shortages and the continuing lack of foreign currency to import goods threatens to leave millions starving, the UN said this week.

On Monday, President Ranil Wickremesinghe set out his first budget since taking office in an attempt to turn around the economy by late 2023.

Karunatilaka's book The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida, set in war-torn Sri Lanka in the late 1980s, centres on a dead war photographer who has seven days to solve his own murder. It won the Booker Prize in October.

Living in a country that has suffered an unrelenting cycle of unrest, violence and natural disasters, he said there is no dearth of stories in Sri Lanka.

“I understand, apart from cricket, or tea, we are not on the world map. Sri Lanka is not on most people's radar,” Karunatilaka said on the final day of the book fair on Sunday.

Though the novel was first published in 2020 under the title Chats with the Dead by Indian publisher Penguin, the author said the book “really struggled elsewhere”, especially in the West.

A demonstrator presents Sri Lanka's new 'Wildlife Minister' at President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's Cabinet meeting room in Colombo. Huge crowds had poured into the city to protest in previous days amid months of unrest sparked by the country's economic collapse. Reuters

Demonstrators take a break inside Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's residence in Colombo. Reuters

Children play the piano inside the president's house in Colombo. Reuters

A demonstrator poses for photographs where President Gotabaya Rajapaksa used to hold events. Reuters

People wait to visit the presidential residence in Colombo after President Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled amid the country's economic turmoil. Reuters

Part of the private residence of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was burnt by demonstrators. Reuters

Demonstrators vandalised part of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's house in Colombo. Reuters

Crowds flock to take a look inside the presidential palace in Colombo. EPA

Part of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's private residence was burnt by demonstrators. Reuters

People take a dip in a swimming pool at the presidential palace in Colombo. EPA

Protesters pretend to hold a Cabinet meeting in the meeting hall of the president's official residence. AP

Firefighters try to douse a fire at the residence of Sri Lanka's prime minister during protests in Colombo. AFP

People watch the blaze. AFP

An unidentified man poses for pictures while seated on President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s chair at the presidential palace in Colombo, a day after it was overrun by anti-government protestors. AFP

Protesters rest on sofas in the prime minister's residence. AP

Soldiers and police gather outside the burnt private residence of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in Colombo. AP

A security officer inspects a police vehicle, a day after it was vandalised by protesters in front of the residence of Sri Lanka's prime minister. AFP

Protesters stand on a vandalised police water cannon at the entrance to the president's official residence. AP

Protesters sing and dance after storming the Sri Lankan president's official residence. AP

Protesters crowd inside the president's official residence. EPA

Protesters cheer inside the president's official residence. EPA

A man picks up a tear-gas canister to throw it away as police try to disperse protesters in Colombo. AP

An injured protester during an anti-government demonstration in Colombo. EPA

The security forces fire tear gas and use water cannon to disperse an anti-government protest. EPA

A protester walks in front of police during an anti-government protest, calling for the resignation of the president over his alleged failure to address Sri Lanka's economic crisis. EPA

Protesters gather inside the compound of Sri Lanka's Presidential Palace in Colombo. AFP

Protesters are demanding that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa resigns. AP Photo

Hundreds of people attended the rally. EPA

Security forces fire tear gas to disperse an anti government protest rally. EPA

Protesters throw back tear gas canisters fired by security forces. EPA

“When you are writing in Colombo as a Sri Lankan writer about a Sri Lankan conflict, you don't take really expect that someone in Missouri or Paris is going to read this stuff,” he said.

The book was later published by independent UK publisher Sort of Books as a new draft.

Sharing an experience earlier in the year when he was attending a writer’s forum at the UN along with other literary heavyweights, Karunatilaka said he was surprised when Sri Lanka did not even get a mention at a time when the country was imploding with mass protests and political unrest that began in April.

“All these eminent writers … they were all talking about Ukraine, Palestine, climate crisis, ISIS, all these things. And I was waiting and waiting. No one was mentioning Sri Lanka,” he said.

The author said he had to jump in and remind the audience that “Sri Lanka is not on the news, but significant stuff is happening there”.

Continued unrest

In July, protesters stormed President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s official residence in Colombo and set fire to the private residence of Mr Wickremesinghe, who was then prime minister, amid months of mounting public anger.

Images of protesters jumping in the palace’s swimming pool and watching cricket from the PM’s living room went viral.

But for Karunatilaka, who grew up in Colombo, the protests were also a show of the power of the written word in uniting people.

“The power of the written word is not in novels, it is in Twitter, on Facebook, on TikTok even. Sometimes, those things can bring down governments and effect change,“ he said.

“It was old people, young people across the races … people were just coming out there and doing this.

“We are a tiny country, but I thought there were lessons there.”

In 2009, when he started writing his book at the end of the two decade-long civil war in Sri Lanka that claimed an estimated 80,000 lives, the author said there was hope it could become a great nation again.

“And then 10 years later, we again find ourselves here,” he said.

But he still remains optimistic that the younger generation of leaders and activists will turn a new page on the country’s grim past.

“There is more gender equality. And all these racial ideas are not there as much any more. That is optimistic,” Karunatilaka said.