In Conversation with Daya Dissanayake

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22356/wic.v6i1.40

Keywords:

Sri Lankan authors, Sinhala literature, English literature

Abstract

Daya Dissanayake (born 8 March 1947) is an award-winning bilingual Sri Lankan novelist, poet and feature writer. His work spans nine novels in English, six novels in Sinhala, a collection of poems, and numerous articles in newspapers, journals and magazines. He is the author of the first e-novel in Asia, The Saadhu Testament (1998), and the first e-novel in Sinhala, Vessan Novu Wedun (2003). He is the only Sri Lankan writer to receive the Sri Lankan State Literary Award for the best English novel thrice and was awarded the SAARC Literary Award in 2013. Being the first Sri Lankan to release his work online and for free access, he is often seen as one of Sri Lanka's earliest and most vocal advocates for the e-book format, copy left and Creative Commons.

This interview was conducted at Yercaud, a hill station in Salem District, in Tamil Nadu, India. Some answers were formed during the e mail exchanges.

Author Biography

  • Jaydeep Sarangi, New Alipore College, Kolkota

    Jaydeep Sarangi is an author, editor, translator and critic of multiple works and publications on Australian literature, Indian writing in English, postcolonial studies and the Dalit literary movement in India. He has also travelled to several universities as a resource person (and a poet) on postcolonial studies, poetry, and Indian literature in the context of world literature. He has delivered keynote, plenary address and invited talks at different Indian and foreign universities and read poems including University of Udine, University of New South Wales, Wollongong University,Rezeszow University, Pedagogical  University,Flinders University, University of South Australia, Adelaide University and East Anglia University. He is currently the principal of New Alipore College, Kolkata. He is the Vice President of Guild of Indian English Writers Editors and Critics(GIEWEC) and the Secretary of Intercultural Poetry and Performance Library, ICCR,Kolkata. He guest edited three issues for the Muse India.

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Published

2019-02-03

Issue

Vol. 6 No. 1 (2019): February

Section

Interviews

License

Copyright (c) 2019 Jaydeep Sarangi

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