Narrative methods of Sinhala prose: A historical and theoretical study of Sinhala prose from twelfth century narratives to post-realist fiction

Broadly stated, this dissertation concerns a literary historical and literary theoretical debate on the modernity in Sinhala fiction. In order to address this general concern, the prose narratives of four writers from the twelfth and the twentieth centuries are analyzed with special attention to the narrative structures and narrative methods that underlie them. The colonial historical context in which the modern fiction was introduced to Sri Lanka and the dominance of realism within that literary historical milieu created a certain void in the historical and theoretical understanding of both tradition and modernity in Sinhala literary culture. With the influence of post-realist fiction in South Asia, Latin America and Europe, and also with the pioneering experiments by some Sinhala fiction writers, a trend that sought to rethink the continuity between the modern fiction and pre-modern narratives developed within the modern Sinhala literary culture. This dissertation delves into that discourse by summarizing the key moments in that debate and by theorizing it for the first time in an academic study on the subject. In order to reconcile the discrepancies and inconsistencies in the existing historical and theoretical work on the subject, this dissertation supplements literary history with literary theory and takes 'close reading' as methodological apparatuses that might enrich the scholarship on South Asian literary studies. With that theoretical and historical approach, this dissertation analyzes Amavatura and Butsarana, two Sinhala prose works from the twelfth century Sinhala literary culture. That analysis is accompanied by a discussion of the work of two contemporary Sinhala fiction writers. Taking much of its theoretical tools from post-structuralist literary theory, this dissertation seeks to participate in Comparative Literature, South Asian Literary Studies, Buddhist studies and in literary theory in general.