Amid the sky-kissing buildings, interminable roads, broadened streets and factories from which clouds of smoke are rising high, the life story of Colombo people is the same as before. Still, we can see ‘Nattamis’ pulling carts over-loaded with heavy parcels, deprived kids dressed in rags and people carrying unbearable parcels.
Jeewanthi Rathnasekara’s maiden poetry collection titled ‘Thawama Paranai Kolaba’ will fill readers’ bowl of wisdom, dispelling the darkness. Jeewanthi Rathnasekara is a senior lecturer of the Human Resource Management Department at the Kelaniya University. In an interview with the Youth Observer, she shares her ideas.
“Since my childhood, I have been interested in writing poems.” She awakened her childhood memories thus, “I have a growing interest in creative writing. Most students show a reluctance to recite poems. But when I was doing my O/Ls, I could recite all poems by memory. It happened naturally. My grandmother also recited poems for us. Therefore, I could live with literature and poems.”
Perhaps she might never have thought that poems she scrawled on papers will come out as a poetry collection. Not surprisingly, already it has come true.
Newspapers
Many years ago, we did not have the internet and social media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook. What enriched our hearts and minds with both knowledge and pleasure were newspapers. We loved to read and write articles in the newspapers. Many writers’ enthusiasm in creative writing was fuelled by newspapers.
Going down memory lane, Jeewanthi said, “My first poem appeared in the Sirikatha Sadun Sewana” in the year 2000. Later, some of my poems were published in the ‘Lankadeepa Pannaraya’. Now we can read newspapers online but in those days we did not have the internet. Hence, We had to go to the closest ‘Paththara Kade’ to know whether the poem had appeared in the paper or not. That is how we spent our childhood.” Undoubtedly, at present, most newspapers, including this one, make their presence on the internet. As noted by Jeewanthi, what plays a significant role in creative writing is language. Language is the tool with which writers express their feelings.
“If the writer possesses a good language skill, he can use poetic language for his poems,” she stressed. Neither do you find boundaries in poetry writing. Turning feelings and emotions into words you can communicate with your readers. Speaking of poetess Jeewanthi Rathnasekara’s childhood, she had done her A/L’s in the commerce stream but never confined herself to the school syllabus.
“My university friends planted the seed of a poetry book in my mind. But it took me a long time to do it because I am living a restless life as a lecturer at Kelaniya university. However, I contacted veteran poet Mahinda Prasad Masimbula. He gave me the opportunity to get my poetry collection published by the Santhawa publishers after the analyzing process,” she said.
Jeewanthi was invited to introduce her poetry collection ‘Thawama Paranai Kolaba” at the ‘Santhawa Kavi Salpila’ which was held at the Dr. N.M. Perera Centre recently with the participation of veterans such as Prabhath Jayasinghe, Anuradha Nilmini, Lahiru Karunaratne and Dinithi Ranasinghe.
