Milkman – The translation

by Dr. Lakshmi de Silva

Of the few who read English newspapers in Lanka many would have missed the UK news items in late March this year

“Footage uploaded on social media showed a gang of hooded youths surrounding a bus as one of the protesters throws a petrol bomb through a window … . as rioters continue to wreak havoc in North Ireland …the bus was later seen engulfed in flames …Irish loyalists have been violently protesting … over 41 officers have been injured …

While we recall how our populace-loving JVP killed bus drivers who ignored their diktat because they needed salaries, we barely knew of the rage that triggers recurrent bloody conflicts prompted by Irish resentment regarding English colonisation. The shipping of armies to grab land from native Catholics to settle alien English Protestants created a sustained hatred, never extinguished, for even when the rebellious South regained freedom as Eire, Ulster, Northern Ireland retained English rule, as desired by the descendants of the colonists and remained peopled by hostile communities living side by side but divided by adhesion to different nationalities and sects.

The high sales (“650,000 copies sold”) and awards – Man Booker Prize 2018, the Orwell Prize for Political Fiction – have prompted Sarasavi to publish a translation. What might have been a risk has proved a triumph, given the alert know-how of Swarnakanthi Rajapakse, State Award winner for her Anna Karenina (2008). Unfazed by the gap between Sinhala and Irish culture even in the 21st Century, Rajapakse’s perception of the strength of family feelings in either, both in congenial or conflictual situations makes her keep her readers engaged and responsive. Since Anna Burns clipping speed and transparency of narration is necessary to keep up the pace (except where mysteries, deftly prolonged, erupt) Rajapakse evolves a lively vigorous style both in narrative and dialogue finely matched to the heroine’s environment.

“________ off “I said “What’s that mean ________ been seen? Who’s been seeing me? Your husband?” mokak keeva? kenek daekala thiyenava? kavuda oya dakapu ekkena, oyage mahaththaya dingada?

By introducing strictly colloquial words she creates the full aggressiveness of the girl’s reaction; the hearer is addressed as oya, not akka to intimate she no longer has the closeness or respect owed to an elder sibling while oyage mahaththaya dingada?” indicates her contempt for her brother-in-law.

Rajapakse’s skill lies in the way she deftly captures the tempo of its widely varied moods. Rapid and boisterous as a torrent, Burn’s book sweeps the reader on a swift stimulating surge of hectic humour; matter of fact plans of murder and mayhem involving “renouncers” rebels opposed to a government loyal to the alien English rulers, “the heroine’s mother desperately keen to marry her off before twenty to nice Catholic boys” more stable and desirable than those “fanatically exhilarating, but all the same, daughter, early-to-death rebel men …. It’s war. It’s killing people. It’s being tortured.”

We are given fascinating side lights on gender mania: preponderant male chauvinists opposed by the chivalrous third brother-in-law who sees woman as a higher being who should be both oppositional and a beacon to man; and the new proponents, seven militant “issues women” beglamoured by sympathy for women who underwent Sati and foot-binding some time back. When another beyond bounds joins them, the “renouncers” believing her a state spy, demand that she be expelled: “over our dead bodies” explode the Seven; the rebels are willing to comply, but are dissuaded by the “traditional housewives” (who join them in their curfew protests, and hide and nurse wounded rebels on the run.).

Variegated too, are the heroine’s experiences with her three wooers: Milkman, 43 years to her 18, a reputedly powerful man who unexpectedly emerges besides her, while she, fanatical in her exercise, runs at the public course, keeping pace, but barely looking at her, avoiding glancing at or touching, merely advising her against her habitual exercise and her habit of walking and reading `19th Century books, since rationally she does not like the 20th Century. Her “may-be boyfriend” teaches her the glory of a sunset; she is strongly attracted to the boy but openly repels the third, an aggressive lout who poses as a heroic and respected rebel on the strength of siblings killed by state agents.

Milkman for all its dark setting of secrecy, ready gunplay and bereaved families allied to the para-military heroes is surprisingly well flavoured and enjoyable because Burn’s projection of strong if troubled romances disturbed yet enduring the natural shocks that will occur when people and state are actively opposed, and a man can die of “being the wrong religion in the wrong place”. The manner in which strong bonds are firmly conveyed, as the dictatorial mother nurses the poisoned girl who is silently and deeply responsive to her tenderness, is remarkable for its quiet force while the “wee sisters”, wildly playful, child prodigies at school, quick, active and effective at need are delightful, perhaps an intimation of latent hope for the nation where they live.