Freeda Villavarayan. (Picture: Rupane). Sunil Tantirige (Picture: Facebook)
Freeda Villavarayan’s debut Sinhala novel Guru Senehasa was released early this year, while Sunil Tantirige unveiled his English memoir The House of A Thousand Memories in 2019. This article is based on two interviews conducted by Anuruddha Weligamage of Rupane web TV and Sunimal Balasuriya of Sawana web radio.
It all began with a little poem to the son: Freeda
Freeda Villavarayan launched her writing career almost by accident. A little poem she scribbled in a sticky note on her office table in 2006, six months before her son got married, helped her explore her latent talent.
“I had a touch of empty nest syndrome caused by my son’s imminent departure from our family and wrote the little poem. I never thought the idea that I scribbled on the sticky note would take me so far along a new career path. After that poem, I developed the habit of noting down my thoughts in my notepad and later, from poems I switched on to writing stories,” Freeda said. “I used to send my stories to my sister-in-law, and she asked me to publish them as my writing had a special appeal to children. I sent 325 of my stories to the Lama Pradeepaya children’s weekly news paper published by the Gnanartha Pradeepaya, the Catholic newspaper of Sri Lanka. That is how I began my writing career.”
Freeda said when she began her debut novel, her Sinhala was a bit rusty. “The main reason was since 1977, my husband Ananda and I lived out of Sri Lanka as he worked as a surveyor in Nigeria and Zimbabwe. We came to Canada in 1990. Till 2006 I did not write anything other than the long letters I wrote to my parents. I also created Sinhala alphabet book to help a friend teach her daughter Sinhala letters.
“My friend who is a professor in Halifax, mentioned to me that when she goes to Sri Lanka next time to see her parents, she was hoping to buy a ‘Kumarodaya’ book so that she could start teaching Sinhala letters to her little daughter. One night it just came to my mind, why does she have to wait another six months, I could try to create a hodi potha (elementary reader), the way I know how. Using Adobe Illustrator program, I created the alphabet book within two weeks and sent it to her.”
“I have met a lot of people like my parents, teachers, friends and many others who had helped me in many ways to become successful in life. I was planning to write a book for quite some time. I used the profession of teaching as the backdrop of the novel because my parents were teachers. I had enough material that I collected from their own lives. I began writing the book on January 20 in 2018. It was my father’s 98th birthday. Four months after I started, my husband had a stroke. He was in the Sunnybrook hospital for three weeks. He was released but he was not in a position to come home. He was transferred to a rehabilitation centre and he was there for five weeks. For two months I was with him from morning 7:00 to 8:30 in the night because his left arm was completely numb, and he needed constant support. During those two months, I continued writing ‘Sevvandi’s Story’ as time permitted. It was the only mental relief I had at that time. Then he was asked to attend the same rehab as an ‘outpatient’ for three months. While he was attending to his physio sessions, I kept on writing. That helped maintain my mental equilibrium,” she said.
She said her husband is a Tamil. He was born and bred in Negombo, and his ancestors had migrated from South India during the Portuguese time. His ancestors were involved in the textile trade in the coastal areas from Negombo to Mannar. The community which is Catholic is known as Bharatha or Paravar.
“As I was writing my novel, I was sending some pages to my brother for his feedback. He was a great help. I am a nature lover, and I have paid a lot of attention to man’s harmony with the environment. For example, Guru Senehasa begins with the heroine of the novel, Sewwandi, looking at the beautiful evening through a bus window, thinking how nice it is to have wings to fly. I think a successful novel should be able to make readers happy. We are burdened and tired of many problems in life and if a novel is also portraying such hardships how can be happy after reading a book?”
Freeda said that she believes her Guru Senehasa is a novel that can ‘calm the reader’s mind.’
Freeda thanks Ven. Ahangama Rathanasiri, Maha Nayake Thero of Toronto Maha Vihara, for helping her with proofreading. She said, “After polishing up my manuscripts, I was looking for someone to proofread, and I thought of the temple. I called and Ven. Rathanasiri Thero picked up the phone. When I told him about my requirement, he readily agreed to help me. That made things very much easy for me.”
Also, Freeda thanks Sunil for reading the 960-page original manuscript and making helpful, critical comments to trim down the book to what it is today. ” His experience and interest in writing were a great help to refine my novel,” she said.
The House of A Thousand Memories completes
circle of life: Sunil Tantirige
Describing how he embarked on a writing career, Sunil Tantirige said he has been working in nuclear reactor safety in Canada for more than 30 years. He did not have any idea of writing a book till the house where he spent his childhood went on sale.
“Selling the house was a turning point in my life. It affected me emotionally because that was the house I grew up surrounded by unforgettable memories of my childhood. My father died about 20 years ago, and my mother’s health was failing, and there was no one to take care of the house as my elder sister too married and left. I consider my memoir as a gift to my son. I know my parents’ stories, but my son, who was born in Canada, did not have access to know what happened to the generation before him. Apart from being my memoir, the House of Thousand Memories also records the peaceful life in Sri Lanka during the 60s and 70s against the backdrop of a middle-class family.”
Sunil had writing experience as he used to prepare reports regularly relating to his profession. “A part of my duty was to write reports ranging from 100 to 200 pages each, and that gave me the practice to express my ideas. Since I had to explain some aspects of nuclear safety to the people outside the industry, I had to employ a simple way to write in English. I also wrote for a newsletter published in our company, and my articles got an excellent response from my friends”.
Opening the first set of books that arrived from my Toronto publisher was a surreal experience, Sunil said. “But that same night, my sister telephoned to inform me that our mother was critically ill. I boarded a plane to travel the following morning, and when I landed, my mother had passed away. She did not know that I was writing a book about us, and I think her death and my book completed a circle of life”.
“The book is not written in a linear tyle. The action moves in flashbacks. It is not essentially an autobiography. It is the story of the Sinhala middle-class family in the 60s and 70s. On my book’s last page, I have translated a Sinhala song sung by the popular singer Clarence Wijewardene. One line of this melody – I stood reminiscing one early dawn, About a world that was once part of me – can summarise the essence of the whole book. The memoir is full of nostalgia, and it honours my parents’ memory and their importance in our lives”.
Sunil had tried to contact several well-known people in the field to go through his book to get feedback. “But I was not successful in that area. Writing a book easy but what is most difficult is the publicity. My wife advised me to turn towards digital media because she had a lot of professional experience in that area. Before the book was printed I started publicity, and almost every week, I tried to create an interest among the readers by quoting interesting passages of the book. When we add a post, every member of my page gets to read that. Discussing a book on Facebook is more interesting than on a website. Readers also started sending their reviews. Many told me that my book reminds them of their childhood. Some readers told me they cried while reading the book. That means my book appeals to the readers’ mind”.
Sunil started his primary education at Hena Vidyalaya at Mount Lavinia. After the sixth grade, he joined Thurstan, but he did his A Level at Aquinas College. “I started learning the violin at the age of ten, and I continued till I entered the university. I got through two exams at the Royal College of Music. I was a member of the Thurston College orchestra. Two of my colleagues in the orchestra have today become well-known musicians. One is violinist Kalani Perera, and the other musician is Toronto-based Sarath Kumarasinghe, who has shown tremendous talent in playing the esraj.
Talking about his life in Toronto, he said he landed at the airport at ten o clock in the night. There was no one to welcome him. “I was thinking what to do, and then I saw a group of people who were my colour. I saw a woman in a sari, and I thought they were Sri Lankans. I approached them and asked whether they were from Sri Lanka. They said they were from India. Then I excused and went away, but they called me and asked whether I needed help. When I told them my story, they invited me to spend the night at their house, promising me to take me to the university the following morning. I have been living in Toronto for more than 40 years, and I have met many Good Samaritans like them. My wife and I believe that my son is lucky to grow up in a country like that”.
Explaining how he met his wife Kanthi, he said she studied materials engineering in the same university as him. They both got first classes and left Sri Lanka for higher studies. “I came to Toronto while she went to England to study for her Masters. Later she came to Toronto to follow her Ph.D. along with me, and we married as students.”
Apart from being a writer, Sunil can play several musical instruments and he is also a painter, a photographer and an avid traveller. newstrais.com
(Sawana is a web radio, and Rupena is a Sinhala TV magazine, both based in Toronto)
