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Art Photogaphy, COVID19Diary, Documentary Photography, erasing cultures, fine Art Photograph, Freedom, History, Jaffna Library, Jaffna public library, knowledge, marks of pain, Memory, Photography, Poetry, Poetry and Photography, Sri Lanka, TagsAbstract art, Time and Space, Waruni Anuruddhik
“Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them as to be as active as that soul was whose progeny they are,” wrote John Milton, author of Paradise Lost, in his 1644 book Areopagitica.
Jaffna public library was burnt in 31 May 1981 It consider as one of the biggest library in South Asia with collection of more than 97,000 books and manuscripts. Books and manuscripts are the souse of history and culture of the communities. This is the practices carried out through the ancient history and it continue today as a mechanism of erasing the traces of the communities and cultures. Why do we deliberately cleansing the cultures ?
After 39 years of burning the jaffna public library remembering the Poem written in Tamil by Prof. M. A. Nuhman, Who was a lecturer at the Jaffna University at that time .
(translation is by S. Pathmanathan )
Murder
Last night
I dreamt
Lord Buddha was shot dead
by the police,
guardians of the law.
His body drenched in blood
on the steps
of the Jaffna Library.
Under cover of darkness
came the ministers,
‘His name is not on our list,
why did you kill him?”
they ask angrily.
“No sirs, no
there was no mistake.
Without killing him
it was impossible
to harm even a fly—
therefore . . . ,” they stammered.
“Alright, then
hide the corpse”
The ministers go back.
The men in civies
dragged the corpse
into the library.
They heaped the books
ninety thousand in all,
and lit the pyre
with the Cikalokavadda Sutta.
Thus the remains
of the Compassionate One
were burned to ashes
along with the Dhammapada.
Link for the poem:
http://dbsjeyaraj.com/dbsj/archives/9716
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Waruni Anuruddhika 