Servants and the Sri Lankan political landscape

By Vasantha Senanayake

Rajiva Wijesinha’s narration of ‘Servants’ which was the winner of the Gratiaen award for the year 1995 is an enthralling read for several reasons. As suggested in the title itself, the central subject matter of the work are the household servants. At the earliest times of the narration, where the grandmother figure holds fort as the undisputed family matriarch, the servants of that household are an indispensable institution, but one that is almost taken for granted. This is not particular or peculiar to that family alone but is indicative of the time when colonialism in Ceylon is about to end, and the local aristocrats and those of the wealthier classes that have prospered at the end of the colonial era are about to stick their own feet into unoccupied shoes that the colonials leave behind.

The colonial households, large and imposing with their acreages of gardens, must have their many servants to manicure lawns, to polish silver, to cook, act as valets and chauffeurs and sometimes fit into dual roles depending on the eccentricities of each household. These servants are very much a fixture of the household and seldom leave. It is a life sentence, entered into voluntarily, because perhaps life in their own rural villages would be harsher and less economical, and so the servants continue in the household all their lives, until they die or can work no more. Of course, the familied servants do go to visit their families in their villages but they are almost always back to serve their masters.

The first sign of change may be suspected when those of the servant classes appear to be getting more literate with Independent Ceylon’s policy of compulsory free education for all. Later on, as the grandmother figure, formally imposing, is pathetic and helpless, gradually sinking, everything around her too has transformed significantly. Educated youth from villages prefer factory jobs that are beginning to spring up everywhere and the lifelong live-in servant is becoming a very elusive commodity indeed. They are replaced by servants of a different kind. Ones that arrives mainly as a stop gap, until they themselves may find something better. They have individualities of their own, and are sometimes opinionated and feel free to walk out at any time, never to return. The old householders hanging on to their outdated mansions find this new breed of servant rather difficult and puzzling to deal with. The grand houses themselves however are down-sizing, if not totally vanishing. Clarence house itself, the house opposite the narrator’s own home, with its woods-like seemingly unending garden itself has shrunk with economic reasons compelling the owner to sell to new and eager buyers. They have possibly built many practical modern houses on what used to be a serene garden aesthetically pleasing to the eye.

Quite in contrast to the times of the grandmother, the mother character, when an elderly woman, has worn herself out doing the work that was formerly left entirely to the servants. The servants of the past are disappearing altogether, and there are even those that come as dailies or by appointment from such time to such time, but will not live in. The author’s perspective or understanding of the servants too changes. Quite young, he does not give too much weightage to them as people, but the older he gets he realizes that they too are people, quite different to the dull and colourlesss presentation of themselves to the household or employer. When he quite accidentally glimpses a sexual encounter in the servants’ quarters, he is further illuminated that behind their masks of uninteresting docility are real people harbouring real passions.

A negative form of such expression can be seen in the terrorist movements that spring out in Sri Lanka by the depressed communities venting their frustration against the State in violent and inhuman destruction. Although the seeds of both movements, in the deep south just like in the north, are a rebellion against a feudal caste system, their hatred is equally vented against those they see as ‘privileged’. And so through this narration one sees the political landscape of a country change from colonial to independent, to socialist, to constitutional tyranny to anarchy. One sees the importance of families with their vast agricultural estates being speedily overtaken in wealth and power by the entrepreneurs of modern times and the rise of a newer order. This is even mildly indicative in the marriage and social backgrounds of the author’s own parents. The mother is from a well-established English speaking background whereas the father is from a background that has brought him where he finds himself, through education, hard work and perseverance.

The narrative also highlights another problem of what in fashionable jargon is known as othering. But this was within communities, not aimed at those clearly different. So it appears that the pre-colonial caste system that was once a segregator is rivalled with the colonial legacy of a class system, where apart from wealth and status what is also relevant is fluency in the English language. It is as severe as caste distinctions in its severing of those that dare transcend its rigidly structured borders. A prime example is Ella, a close relation who married into an even grander family. But this formerly well to do lady, having been trapped in a loveless marriage, is erased from family history after she elopes with a chauffeur. She is as good as dead to her relatives, and a rather uncomfortable topic of conversation, should someone clumsily bring her name up.

It is an insightful piece of work. It reveals what you already know but are sometimes not aware of consciously.