A classical Sinhala praise-poem addressed to King Parakramabahu the Sixth, composed in the fifteenth century and here presented in an edition prepared by Siri Thilakasiri for Godage International Publishers.
The poem belongs to the prasasti tradition of royal eulogy, in which a ruler is celebrated in formal verse. What distinguishes Parakumba Siritha is that it brings that eulogistic form together with Sinhala court poetry, or kavi. The scholar Stephen Berkwitz, writing in the Journal of the American Oriental Society, describes it as an early attempt at that combination, drawing on the earlier vamsa chronicles and on the inscriptional record, and presenting its subject as a Buddhist king who could stand comparison with the rulers of other lands. The poem is therefore of interest both as literature and as a document of how kingship was imagined and argued for in the Sinhala tradition.
This book is written entirely in Sinhala. The verse and the accompanying editorial material are in Sinhala script, with no English text. Buyers who do not read Sinhala should know this before ordering. For readers who do, it is a working edition of a text that is studied in Sinhala literature courses and read by anyone with an interest in the mediaeval Sinhala poetic canon.
Siri Thilakasiri is the editor of this edition. Parakumba Siritha has appeared in more than one edited version over the years, and editions of classical Sinhala poetry of this kind differ in the readings they adopt and in the apparatus they supply; this is the Godage edition under Thilakasiri's name.
Godage International Publishers is an established Colombo house issuing books in Sinhala and English, with a long list in Sinhala literature, history and classical texts. Editions of older Sinhala works such as this one form a steady part of what they publish, which is what keeps poems of this age in print and in circulation in Sri Lanka.
Suited to readers of Sinhala literature, students of the classical canon, and anyone following the history of Buddhist kingship on the island as it was written about by those who served it.
- Author: Siri Thilakasiri
- Publisher: Godage International Publishers
- Language: Sinhala
- Pages: 334
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