Sam Kandy, born to low prospects in a Ceylon village in 1899, dies a hundred years later as the wealthy headman of the same village - a self-made shipping magnate and the father of sixteen, who's been married three times and widowed twice. Told in four parts, this enthralling novel traces Sam's story from his boyhood - when his parents, convinced by his horoscope that he'd be a blight upon the family, abandoned him at the gates of a distant temple - through to his dramatic escape from the temple, his daring journey across Ceylon to Australia and Singapore, and his bold return to the Ceylon village he once called home. There, he tries to win recognition for his success in the world - at any cost. A novel about family, pride, and ambition set on a gorgeous, troubled island caught between tradition and modernity, Beggar's Feast establishes Boyagoda as a major voice in international literature.

Ever since man started to create stories, there has existed a seemingly invisible yet eternal bond between fictional tales woven out of words and the actual truth. It is undeniable that the truth always reigns with magnificence and glory within any culture and its people. It is this very truth, seemingly shrouded in lies, that a writer attempts to capture and jail forever within intricate cages of letters and words. Doing this is an attempt, on his part, to relieve the heavy hearts of society from the burden of these lies. Although the need for guile exists as the requirement of the times, it is nonetheless preferred to be kept anonymous and unidentifiable. Consequently, the writer too has to alter the identity of these lies. Hence, borrowing unknown shrouds and cloaking these fibs with torn, soiled, and beleaguered words, he is forced to present them as being true. The Naked Beggar and Other Stories is also a similar attempt of a writer to go within the heart of truth and weave out tales that, though born of honesty, cannot be presented as anything else but falsehood. That is the need of the time, and it is the only way these truths will ever be accepted. These stories are strewn all about us but are visible only to the discerning eye and a sensitive heart. Mans intellect can only attempt to capture the essence of these tales. It is ultimately up to the human heart to inject meaning and life into them. For this reason, this collection is not just stories but living beings that have the potential to touch our lives as potently as mortals do. Should the circumambulation of the world seem tedious and wearisome, and should you feel the need to slow down and look inside your heart for peace rather than search for it in the meaningless rowdiness around you, then the stories in this collection will not disappoint you.

A journalist's account of his extensive travels in Sri Lanka and portrayal of the Sri Lankans who carry on in the midst of conflict and strife between warring factions of Sinhalese Buddhists and Tamils.

In the late 1970s Ondaatje returned to his native island of Sri Lanka. As he records his journey through the drug-like heat and intoxicating fragrances of that "pendant off the ear of India, " Ondaatje simultaneously retraces the baroque mythology of his Dutch-Ceylonese family. An inspired travel narrative and family memoir by an exceptional writer.

Shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize “Brave...Brilliant...This is a book that makes one kneel before the elegance of the human spirit and the yearning that is at the essence of every life.” —The New York Times Book Review "One of the best books I have read in years." —Colm Toibin Two and a half decades into a devastating civil war, Sri Lanka’s Tamil minority is pushed inexorably towards the coast by the advancing army. Amongst the evacuees is Dinesh, whose world has contracted to a makeshift camp where time is measured by the shells that fall around him like clockwork. Alienated from family, home, language, and body, he exists in a state of mute acceptance, numb to the violence around him, till he is approached one morning by an old man who makes an unexpected proposal: that Dinesh marry his daughter, Ganga. Marriage, in this world, is an attempt at safety, like the beached fishing boat under which Dinesh huddles during the bombings. As a couple, they would be less likely to be conscripted to fight for the rebels, and less likely to be abused in the case of an army victory. Thrust into this situation of strange intimacy and dependence, Dinesh and Ganga try to come to terms with everything that has happened, hesitantly attempting to awaken to themselves and to one another before the war closes over them once more. Anuk Arudpragasam’s The Story of a Brief Marriage is a feat of extraordinary sensitivity and imagination, a meditation on the fundamental elements of human existence—eating, sleeping, washing, touching, speaking—that give us direction and purpose, even as the world around us collapses. Set over the course of a single day and night, this unflinching debut confronts marriage and war, life and death, bestowing on its subjects the highest dignity, however briefly.