The next instalment of ‘Between the Lines’ organized by Jam Fruit Tree Publishers will be a meet-the-author event where four authors will be featured at the O2 cafe on the 24th of February 2024 and the Sunday Observer is the print media partner of the event.
This week the Youth Observer reached out to two of these authors and here’s what we found out:
Shashika Corea:
Growing up a quiet, gentle child at Ladies’ College, Colombo, it was an English Teacher who spotted Sashika’s extraordinary flair for writing and told Sashika who was extremely young at that point, that she looked forward to reading Sashika’s essays because of how beautifully she captured moments and put them into words.
From then on, at every grade, every English teacher would remark how much they enjoyed reading Sashika’s answer scripts and armed with encouragement and confidence, Sashika went on to become the Co-editress of the College Magazine, topping her batch in English at the University of Kelaniya before prolonged university closure caused Sashika to change directions and move into the field of Counselling Psychology, which had always been at the core of her heart.
As a qualified counsellor, Sashika served as an English Teacher at Bishop’s College Colombo as well as Stafford International School where she would often use song lyrics listened to by her students, to teach grammatical terms that children found difficult to grasp, making them learn syntax in ways that would stay in their memory forever. She loved her children in both schools and instilled in them, a passion for self-expression and creativity in writing, by encouraging them in the same way that she was encouraged whilst growing up.
Today she has a Master’s Degree in Applied Psychology from the University of Coventry, U.K, having served on the executive committee of the Sri Lanka National Association of Counsellors.
Something she often sees is how words have wounded countless human beings she has encountered and she prays that more and more people use words to heal as she knows only too well, the effectiveness and far-reaching consequences the written and spoken language can have on a human soul.
Describing herself as more of a listener than a talker, she loves to interact with different types of personalities which enables her to have a richer understanding and broader perspective on life and human beings.
It is this perspective that comes into her maiden publication – ‘’30 Selected Poems’’ which is an astute collection of observations and little stories from a Sri Lankan perspective.
From the petrol pumper who worked tirelessly during the fuel shortage, to the university mobs who come out to the streets to protest, the book is a storehouse of unique Lankan experiences that all Sri Lankans will either recall, appreciate or understand.
There are themes of house-maid exploitation and disappearances as well as arranged marriages and online bullying, all with keen feeling and authentic emotion. Thirty completely different poems that feel like they are short stories in themselves, they were all written live, as and when they occurred, only to be collated across the years and finally published in December 2023.
Sashika chose the Jam Fruit Tree Publications because she saw how filled with integrity, class and quality, their work was. She saw Jeremy Muller as a genuine publisher with a love for writing, who honoured deadlines, never failed to deliver and has been a pleasure to work with.
Her Instagram handle is sashika.corea
Gayathri M. Hewagamage:
t’s after sixteen years in the academy as a scholar and teacher of literature that Gayathri mustered up courage to finally publish her creative writing in 2022. Being exposed to great world of literatures both gives one confidence and takes it away. “I asked for the longest time from myself, what I could possibly offer the world of art”, she said.
So the recognition she received at the State Literary Awards 2023 when her debut publication, Conquering Karma, was nominated for the best collection of short stories, was rather momentous.
Her second was a book of poetry titled Amber Lights, where she apparently shifted from her first book informed by Buddhist philosophy, into an intense play on passion and sensuality. The third and the upcoming is a collection of poetry as well, since for now I would like to explore further the aesthetics of the crafting of the poetic expression. “I consider that it is greatly important to pay attention to revision and literary technique once you go past the initial moment of inspiration”, she added.
Speaking of her choice to publish with The Jam Fruit Tree Publications, she added that as they produce books of excellent print quality; “I am more than happy to entrust my forthcoming collection too to the same. My visions for book covers, the exact shades of color can be quite challenging, but Jeremy always manages to deliver the best.”
