The twilight zone most of us live in
It’s that time of the year again. Between Deepavali, the great festival of lights, and December 25, the supposed birthday of the great Light-bearer. For me, it is a time of greater fauxjoy and fake cheerfulness (read gloom) than usual. Ironically enough, the period highlights the greatest propensity of human beings for holding light – or money or power – in one hand… and darkness – or what it all means, which is not much – in the other. Don’t stop reading, sunshine, the picture gets brighter and the mood lighter as you go along – in holiday time, as well as towards the end of this article.
A few examples of the Twilight Zone we all live in will suffice to shed illumination on mine thesis, methinks?
Water sports for a privileged few, flooding disasters for hapless multitudes. While the power elites party like there is no tomorrow, the poor of all stripes (political, social, cultural, economic, intellectual) waste away because they have no today. Many labour long and hard with no commensurate reward for the ingrate enjoyment of the few. The few who scrape means together to make ends meet do not think that their standard of living or quality of life are comparable with the lifestyles of the idle rich, their wealthy oppressors, or some exploitative employers. We have two dozen newspapers with sunshine stories about cocktails, fashion extravaganzas, and the latest trends in business and consumer affairs every week/weekend – while on a daily basis it is metaphorically raining crime (ah!) and corruption (oh?) in the blessed isle, and cost-of-living continues to cripple the average citizen for no fault of their own. A war is said to have been ended, but nameless terrors still stalk some regions of the land...
A quick survey of the eclipsed local horizon brings some vivid examples into sharp focus!
Highly influential people woo and win friends yesterday, fall out with each other today, and let the fallout from the parting of their ways (because there is no honour among thieves, even those who are high and exalted) hang like a mushroom cloud over all our tomorrows. No names need be mentioned. We all know Who’s Who and What’s What, but it is a knowledge that dares not speak. Farmers feed the nation for a pittance earned, but find themselves and their near- starving dear ones compelled to lead a hand-to-mouth existence – force-fed on the ground reality of crooked economic practices by food mafias on their own turf. Beggars are bruised, scorned, trampled underfoot in the preseason sales rush, and sometimes even killed for their blind faith in charity. Up goes a communications satellite flying the national flag for all the world’s cities to see; up goes the cost of living as our politico-economic manifesto’s true colours and capacities become visible. Authorities cover up killing sprees; committees bury the long-dead truth; fresh vendettas dig up old dirt; truth-tellers and justice- seekers cower away in dark corners of the web, where the empire won’t or can’t strike back...
I’m going to have to stop living in such a twilight zone (and if you’re brave, true, and honest, dears, so are you). Nothing good ever happens there – there is only the faraway eventual defeat of the old chthonic gods to look forward to. “Fiat lux!” Let there be light again. Where the people walking in darkness can truly claim to have seen a Great Light. No, it is not China rising or India shining or America whining. Nor any of the princes, powers, or potentates of this planet who claim to bless us as we go and die while they live it up. It is the breaking dawn of another kingdom – just, fair, good, true, pure – struggling to become cosmos out of chaos.
No beast slouching towards Bethlehem to be born... but a baby in a barn; glad tidings of great joy; and good news for the weak, the old, the poor, the powerless, the tired, the hungry, the victims, the left-outs, the shut-ins, the sick, the suffering, the lame, the halt, the hopeless, the oppressed, the unfavoured, the unknown, the neglected, the ailing and the dying who don’t know it yet. Potentially, all people everywhere to whom an Amnesty has been granted, Holidays declared, Good News announced, Grand Bargain Sale publicised! It is not simply “The Season” (celebrated sans rhyme and reason), December holidays (one among many), or even ‘Christmas’ as it is traditionally known and trivially commemorated – a religious festival with all the secular trappings. No. It is something more, something less. More next week…
Her plays have graced stages across the island, and even abroad and found their way into the local school syllabuses. She’s widely recognized as the woman who pioneered children’s theatre in Sri Lanka. She set up the Lanka Children’s and Youth Theatre Foundation - the‘Play House Kotte’ for aspiring young actors.
Together with other theatre greats she also set up the Colombo Theatre Festival for Young Audiences in 2006. Now in its seventh year, it will be held from December 5-9 at the Lionel Wendt.
For Somalatha Subasinghe, theatre is in her heart and soul and on no grounds will she let the younger generation miss out on what has defined her life and work.
For a woman who has known nothing but theatre her entire life, Somalatha is