An English–Sinhala dictionary compiled by Dr Somapala Jayawardhana, whose surname also appears in print as Jayawardena. English words are the headwords; the meanings are given in Sinhala. International buyers should know before ordering that this is a Sinhala-language book: the glosses, the front matter and the supplementary material are all in Sinhala script, and the volume assumes a reader who can read that script and wants English explained in it rather than the other way round.
The word list covers the core of English vocabulary. Bound in with it is a set of reference tables the compiler added for everyday use: common abbreviations, the administrative divisions of the Sinhalese kingdom, Roman numerals, numerals of Sanskrit origin in common use, the Sinhalese months, and Sinhalese measures of time. That mix is characteristic of the book — a working bilingual dictionary with a layer of Sinhala historical and calendrical reference attached to it.
Jayawardhana undertook the compilation at the request of his publisher, Sirisumana Godage, and the work was issued by Godage International Publishers. By then he had been writing in Sinhala for a long stretch of years across an unusually wide range of subjects: Buddhist history and archaeology, Sinhala grammar, psychology, short stories, children's books and dictionaries. The lexicographical habit of mind shows in the arrangement of the reference material, which is set out for quick consultation rather than reading through.
It will suit Sinhala readers studying or working in English, households wanting a single substantial English reference on the shelf, and libraries and collectors abroad building holdings of Sri Lankan reference publishing. Readers with no Sinhala will not be able to use it.
- Author: Dr. Somapala Jayawardhana
- Publisher: Godage International Publishers
- Language: Sinhala
- Pages: 819
- ISBN: 9789552024320
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