MAGICAL REALISM : Shehan Karunatilaka ‘s The Seven

Moons of Maali Almeida

First Degree Programme In

English Language and Literature under CBCS System
MAGICAL REALISM Shehan Karunatilaka ‘s The Seven

Moons Of Maali Almeida

Dissertation submitted to the University of Kerala in partial fulfillment

of the Degree of Bachelor of Arts

By

1. SNEHA S - 13020121034

2. SOORYA SUGATHAN - 13020121035

3. SURABHI VS - 13020121036

4. VARSHA S BAHUL - 13020121037

Course Code: EN 1645

H.H.M.S.P.B NSS College for Women, Neeramankara

Year 2022 – 23
 CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that the project / dissertation titled “MAGICAL REALISM :

Shehan Karunatilaka’s The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida” is a record of studies

carried out by Sneha S (13020121034), Soorya Sugathan (13020121035), Surabhi VS

(13020121036), Varsha S Bahul (13020121037), at the department of English,

H.H.M.S.P.B NSS College for Women, Neeramankara under my guidance and

submitted to the University of Kerala in partial fulfilment of the Degree of Bachelor

of Arts, First Degree Programme in English Language and Literature under CBCS

System.

Dr Asha K Nair

head, Department of English

HHMSPB NSS College for women

Neeramankara

Aswathy A

Assistant professor

Department of English

HHMSPB NSS College for women

Neeramankara
 DECLARATION

We hereby declare that the dissertation titled “MAGICAL REALISM : Shehan

Karunatilaka’s The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida” is a record of studies carried out

by us at the Department of English, H.H.M.S.P.B NSS College for Women,

Neeramankara under the guidance of Dr Aswathy A and submitted to the University

of Kerala in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the award of the Degree of

Bachelor of Arts First Degree Programme in English Language and Literature under

CBCS System.

1. SNEHA S -13020121034

2. SOORYA SUGATHAN -13020121035

3. SURABHI VS -13020121036

4. VARSHA S BAHUL - 13020121037

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Firstly, we take this opportunity to thank the Almighty, the most benevolent and

beneficent for his abundant mercy and grace throughout our life and particularly during

this programme and dissertation work.

We take this opportunity to place on record our heartfelt gratitude to:

1. Dr. Asha K Nair, Head of the Department of English, H.H.M.S.P.B NSS

College for Women, Neeramankara.

2. Dr. Aswathy A, our dissertation guide and the entire faculty of the Department

of English, H.H.M.S.P.B NSS College for Women, Neeramankara for constant

support and guidance.

3. The librarians of the College Library of our college, State Central Library and

the authors of the journals and online resource material.

4. All our friends for helping us in every way possible.

5. Our family members for their constant support and encouragement.

Neeramankara, Thiruvananthapuram

24th February, 2023

 CONTENTS

1. PREFACE

2. CHAPTER – I: INTRODUCTION

3. CHAPTER – II: MAGICAL REALISM : Shehan Karunatilaka’s THE SEVEN

MOONS oF MAALI ALMEIDA

4. CHAPTER – III: CONCLUSION

5. WORKS CITED
 PREFACE

Winner of the 2022 Booker Prize, The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida is a searing

satire set amid the mayhem of the Sri Lankan civil war. Karunatilaka wrote several

distinct editions of his second book under various titles. Devil Dance was the name of

the first draft when it was chosen for the Gratiaen Award shortlist in 2015. It was first

released in the Indian subcontinent as Chats with the Dead by the Hamish Hamilton

imprint of Penguin India in 2020. Karunatilaka struggled to find an international

publisher for the novel because most deemed Sri Lankan politics "esoteric and

confusing" and many felt "the mythology and worldbuilding was impenetrable, and

difficult for Western readers." Then Sort of Books agreed to publish the novel after

editing to "make it familiar to Western readers."

It's difficult to categorize this book in one genre ,it is partially supernatural because

of ghosts and spirits in the afterlife. Yet, it also provides you with a solid foundation

in Sri Lankan politics. And as the story progresses, it turns into a whodunnit. It is also

hugely comic.. It provides its readers with a very digestible mix of literary-political-

ethical challenges, pleasures, and validations, together with a sense of timeliness.

Our project, titled Magical Realism: The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida, explores

the magic realist interpretation of the novel. The first chapter gives an introduction to

the novel. The second chapter, which is the core subject analysis, discusses the use of

magical realism in the novel and how the author used ghosts to expose the horrors of

war and make a point about reality. He tries to portray what would happen if the dead

could speak.. The third chapter concludes the whole idea of the dissertation. This

novel fizzes with energy and ideas. It also tries to unveil the meaning of life and its

complexities.
 Chapter 1

Introduction

The novel is a long and intricate genre of fiction in literature. It is a prose tale that

typically deals with the human experience through a connected series of events.

Novels have a significant impact on our lives in a variety of ways, including

expanding our world view and influencing our opinions on social and political issues.

It can drive people through imagination and realistic elements.

Novels in literature can be considered as puzzle pieces in order to comprehend

humanity and the world as a whole. As long as humanity exists, novels are essential.
It often questions one’s morals, makes the readers to experience difficult moral
situations. Questioning, contemplation and logical interpretation can contribute to
wisdom. It builds a sense of connection between the reader and the character which
can result in shift in perspectives and moulding opinions. It also offers time travel and
wider scope of imagination.

The Seven moons of Mali Almeida is a novel written by the Sri Lankan author
Shehan Karunatilaka. This story is based on true events happened in Sri Lanka during
1980s. It is a murder mystery and a zany comedy about military atrocities set in
background of Sri Lankan civil war. It is narrated by a dead man , a kind of afterlife
story ,this appeals to the readers imagination, even if the plot is complicated. It
explores brutalities of the civil war. It has been described as a cross-genre novel -
merging different elements. It can be described as part ghost story, part whodunnit,
part political satire.

Many novels were written that discussed the plight of Sri Lanka (especially during
civil war). A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam, which was shortlisted for booker
prize in 2021 ,discussed the Sri Lankan civil war in a philosophical tone. What makes
The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida stand out is its way of narrating a complicated
issue through fantasy. The author mixed up humor, magic realism, violence and
emotions; all of these contribute to the strength of the book.

The obvious literary comparison are with Gabriel Garca Márquez’s and Salman
Rushdie’s magical realism. But the book also has elements of Mikhail Bulgakov’s
The Master and Margarita and Nikolai Gogol’s Dead Souls’ mordant wit and
surrealism. The situations are frequently absurd—dead bodies argue with one another
—but they are handled with a sense of humour and melancholy that grounds the
reader. The devastation caused by Sri Lanka’s civil wars lies behind the literary
flourishes, and it is a true and horrifying truth. Karunatilaka has artistically depicted a
horrific time in his nation’s history.
Shehan Karunatilaka is a Sri Lankan author. He was born (1975) in Galle, Sri Lanka.

He grew up in Colombo, studied in New Zealand and has lived and worked in

London, Amsterdam and Singapore. He emerged on the world literary stage in 2011

when he won the Commonwealth Prize ,the DSL and Gratiaen Prize for his debut

novel, Chinaman. Karunatilaka is considered one of Sri Lanka’s foremost authors. In

addition to novels he has written rock songs, screenplays, and travels stories,

publishing in Rolling Stone, Gentleman’s Quarterly and National Geographic. The

Seven Moons of Maali Almeida is his second novel published in 2022. It won the 2022

Booker Prize, which was announced during a ceremony at the round house in London

on 17 October 2022. It was published by the small independent publisher Sort Of

Books.

‘ Life after death in Sri Lanka : an afterlife noir, with nods to Dante and Buddha and

yet unpretentious. Fizzes with energy, imagery, ideas against a broad, surreal vision

of the Sri Lankan civil wars. Slyly, angrily comic.’ -The 2022 Booker Prize

Another version of this novel was published in the Indian subcontinent under the

title Chats with the Dead. Karunatilaka has mentioned the motive behind the revision

of Chats with the Dead in his revised publication.

‘An earlier version of this novel was published in hard cover in the Indian

subcontinent under the title Chats with the Dead in January 2020.The text was then

revised for a global audience, to make the story more accessible for those unfamiliar

with Sri Lankan politics of the late ‘80s, and unacquainted with Sri Lankan
mythology and folklore. This version – renamed The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida

– shares much of its DNA with the previous edition.’ (Author’s note -Seven moons)

Background

The war in in Sri Lanka between the separatist Tamil forces and the government was

a destructive that resulted in nearly 150000 deaths on both sides including civilians.

It took over 26 years for the government to ultimately put an end to the terrible civil

war which had its beginning in 1983 as a small uprising. The origins of the Sri

Lankan civil war predate its beginning in 1983.

The majority of Sri Lankans are of the ethnic group known as the Sinhalese, an Indo-

European people that arrived on the island from northern India around 500 BC. The

Tamils who had settled in the southern region of the Indian subcontinent came in

contact with the Sinhalese. Between the seventh and eleventh centuries CE, there was

a significant migration of Tamils.

Around 3 million Sinhalese lived in Sri Lanka at the time of the British conquest in

1815, while up to 300,000 Tamils lived there. The two groups’ religious connections

were different from one another in addition to their nationalities. Tamils were

primarily Hindu, whereas the majority of Sinhalese were Buddhist. From 1815 to

1948, the British ruled over Sri Lanka. They sent roughly a million Tamils to the

island nation during this time to work on the coffee, tea, and rubber plantations. The

British also built excellent infrastructure, including schools and other facilities, in the

country’s north, where the bulk of the population was Tamil. They also gave the

Tamils preference in the government. All of this inevitably led to animosity among
the Sinhalese. At this point of time, the Island was called Ceylon and when it gained

its independence in 1948, a majority of sinhalese took power. The new administration

passed numerous laws that discriminated against Tamils. When Sinhalese was made

the only official language, Tamils were virtually barred from working for the

government. Additionally, a law was implemented that outright prohibited Indian

Tamils from obtaining citizenship. The Tamils began clamouring for equal rights in

their own country. Their methods were nonviolent, and their demands were

legitimate. However, ethnic tension was rising in the country and the successive

Sinhalese governments did nothing to provide equal rights and opportunities to the

Tamil people. They were even targets of sectarian violence.

In 1972, Ceylon is renamed Sri Lanka. At this time, V. Prabhakaran founds The Tamil

New Movement. Although the gang is primarily made up of students, after they

assassinate the mayor of Jaffna in 1955, their campaign takes a violent turn.In

1976 ,The Tamil New Movement joins with another Tamil group and forms the

Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).Other political organisations led by Tamils start to

develop, and in 1976 the TULF alliance calls for the creation of a distinct Tamil State

in the north of Sri Lanka. In 1983, when tension between the factions reaches a

breaking point and 13 Sri Lankan troops are slain, civil war officially breaks out.

Anti-Tamil riots start, killing thousands of people as the Tamil population is

massacred. India also intervened in the Sri Lankan civil war.In 1987, Rajiv Gandhi

decided to intervene in the situation mainly because of separatism issues in Tamil

Nadu and to prevent a potential influx of refugees from Sri Lanka onto Indian soil.

Indian Peacekeeping Force (IPFK) was sent to the island in the hope of bringing about

peace. This move proved to be a terrible disaster.

The subsequent decades are characterised by assassinations between government

forces and opposition groups, radicalization, suicide and vehicle bombings, the killing

of civilians, kidnapping, and torture. When Norway made an effort to mediate a peace

agreement in the early 2000s, violence persisted, but the long road to peace had

begun.

The Sri Lankan government declared victory in 2009 after killing most of the Tamil

opposition. Over 100,000 people died during the 26-year conflict, and thousands more

were displaced.

This study is based on exploring magic realist elements and various interpretations in

Shehan Karunatilaka’s novel The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida.

 Chapter 2

Magic Realism in Karunatilaka's

The Seven moons of Maali Almeida

'A ‘searing satire set amid the murderous mayhem of Sri Lanka beset by civil war

The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida an afterlife life story and a murder mystery by
the Sri Lankan author Shehan Karunatilaka. Shehan Karunatilaka’s first book
Chinaman:The Legend of Pradeep Mathew, caused a stir a decade ago. It is
recognised as one of the greatest Sri Lankan novels and was awarded the 2012
Commonwealth Book Prize. It describes the alcohol-soaked life of a retired sports
journalist who embarks on an absurd search to find a legendary cricketer from the
1980s who has mysteriously vanished.

The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida is set in 1980s Colombo, Sri Lanka. However,

because the novel is a work of magical realism, the narrative setting is also defined by

the main character Maali’s journeys in the Afterlife, a realm referred to as the In

Between. Throughout the novel, the author strays from traditional ideas of the

novelistic plot line in regard to point of view, organisation, form, and other factors.

This metaphysical thriller blurs the lines between life and death, the physical world

and the hereafter.

Maali Almeida, the soul of the book, was a war photographer, gambler, and closet gay

whose posthumous birth establishes the opening of the book. When he woke up, he

existed in a place that seemed like a celestial visa office. His dismembered body is

sinking in the Beira Lake, and he has no idea who killed him. The ghouls and ghosts
who gather around him can attest to the dismayingly long list of suspects in a period

when grudges are handled by death squads, suicide bombers, and hired goons.

However, Maali’s time is running short even in the afterlife. He has seven moons to

try to get in touch with the people he loves the most and guide them to a hidden cache

of photos that will bring down government in Sri Lanka. He is a joy to be around,

gleefully unapologetic about perceived flaws, and unflinching in his commitment to

his violently turbulent nation and to Jaki and DD, the loves of his tangled life, even in

the face of his own untimely death.

Maali grew up with his parents, Dada and Amma. His childhood was filled with

conflicts because his parents have a troubled marriage and are constantly quarrelling.

Later, Maali’s father leaves his mother when Maali is still a young boy. Maali

harbours resentment toward his absent father for the ensuing years. He discovers only

later that Dada had indeed continued to write him letters after his departure. These

letters were hidden from Maali by Amma. After learning about her interference,

Maali breaks off ties with her.

Later, Maali pursues a career in photo journalism. The Nikon camera symbolises his

passion for the profession. He was passionate about showing the world the evils in Sri

Lanka. He mostly covers the battles, bloodshed, and political atrocities that defined

contemporary life in Sri Lanka during the 1980s. He also works for the army, the

Associated Press, and other news organizations.

Maali is portrayed as an incredibly selfish person. Mali has a lot of flaws, and he

doesn’t care about the people with whom he has had relationships in his life. It is only
after his death that he starts to realise how much they mean to him, or how they

should mean to him.

He was a gambler and one night while at a casino, he meet a young woman named

Jaki. They become friends and Jaki shared her flat with him. He meets DD there

eventually pursues a love and sexual relationship with him.

DD and Maali maintain their relationship a secret despite their love for one another.

Since DD is still in the closet, he worries about what would happen if his father found

out the truth about his sexual orientation. Despite these fears, DD keeps pleading with

Maali to travel with him to the US . He thinks San Francisco, California, will allow

them to live freely together, therefore he wants to establish a new life there with him.

Although Maali is in love with DD, he is hesitant to leave Sri Lanka and give up his

job and his home. At one point, Maali decides to go with DD’s wish and start a new

life. He meets with several of his bosses and informs them that he is going to be

breaking his contract with them. He intends to depart the country. Then he meets

Stanley, DD’s father, who has learned the truth about Maali’s and DD’s relationship.

Stanley insists that Mali break off his relationship with his son. When Mali refuses,

Stanley has him killed with the help of Kottu and Balal.

He wakes up In the Afterlife. Maali doesn’t recognise the realm and doesn’t recall

dying, so he assumes he is dozing off and dreaming. He finds out shortly after that he

was murdered brutally. He found himself in a place which is referred as the In

Between. He has seven moons, or nights to fulfil his unfinished business in the land

of the living Down There. In the In Between he had chats with the dead.
Throughout the week in the Afterlife Maali feels frustrated,his emotions, concerns

were clearly mentioned. Maali is stuck in the In Between because of unsolved

traumas, guilts, and misdeeds from his past.

There are certain rules to be followed in the In Between and he learns the skill of

communicating with people . Maali desperately wants to get in touch with Jaki and

DD. He wants them to locate a box of pictures he’s stashed under his mother’s bed,

develop, print, and share them with the public. The images expose the hypocrisies,

crimes, and injustices committed by the minister of justice. Maali thinks that once the

images are seen by everyone, the world will learn the truth, he will have made a

significant impact, and his life will have meaning.

Maali’s friends finally make his images public, by the end of his stay in the In

Between but Maali had lost interest in it as he understands that his work did not give

his life meaning. His life was made lovely and meaningful by the friendship and love

he had for Jaki and DD.He seeks to determine the true purpose of life.

At the end of his seven moons, Maali travels into The Light. In The Light, he gains

clarity and achieves transcendence.He understands that all lives and deaths have

fundamental value, regardless of how they may appear.

A magic-realist interpretation of a recent bloody era in Sri Lankan history, taking

place in an unhappy, chaotic confused, afterlife. It is an exhilarating, hilarious,

heartbreaking, and suspenseful murder mystery.

Magical Realism in The Seven moons of Maali Almeida

Magical realism is a literary fiction and artistic movement. It depicts the world

realistically while also incorporating mystical elements, frequently blending the

boundaries between fantasy and reality. Magical or supernatural occurrences

presented in an otherwise real-world or mundane setting are referred to as magical

realism. Magical realism is typically seen as being a different genre from fantasy,

although having some magic aspects, because it uses a lot more realistic detail and

uses magic to illustrate a point about reality, whereas fantasy stories frequently

distance themselves from reality. The combination of actual and magical aspects in

magical realism is frequently considered as a more inclusive kind of story telling.

Due to the widespread classification of writers as magical realists the term and its
broad scope are frequently misunderstood. The phrase was inspired by 1920s German
and Italian art movement of the same name. German art critic Franz Roh initially
introduced the word "magischer realismus," which translates to "magic realism," in
his 1925 book Nach Expressionismus: Magischer Realismus (After Expressionism:
Magical Realism). He coined the phrase to describe the "Neue Sachlichkeit," or New
Objectivity, a style of painting popular in Germany. Roh used the term “magischer
realismus” to emphasize how magical, fantastic, and strange normal objects can
appear in the real world when you stop and look at them. When Nach
Expressionismus: Magischer Realismus was translated into Spanish in 1927, the
genre was gaining ground in South America. Alejo Carpentier, a French-Russian
Cuban writer, was influenced by magic realism while he was in Paris. He expanded
on Roh's idea and coined the term "marvellous realism."

The term "magical realism" (as opposed to "magic realism") was first used in English

in an essay by literary critic Angel Flores in 1955. He claimed that it combines

aspects of both magic realism and marvellous realism. Using his previously released

collection of short stories Historia Universal de la Infamia as his basis, he dubbed

Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges the first magical realist (A Universal History of

Infamy).

While Latin American authors helped shape magical realism into what it is today,

before magical realism was acknowledged as a literary genre, authors had already
written stories about everyday events with fantastical components. For instance, a

decade before Roh wrote about magic realism and years before the genre first

appeared in Latin American literature, Franz Kafka published The Metamorphosis in

1915, a book with themes that modern critics would categorise as belonging to

magical realism.

Magical realism is one of the most unique literary movements of the last century.

Despite being mostly identified with authors from Latin America, authors from all

over the world have significantly contributed to the genre. Founders of the genre

include Gabriel García

Márquez,Isabel Allende, Miguel Angel Asturias, Juan Rulfo, Elena Garro, Mireya

Robles, Rómulo Gallegos, and Arturo Uslar Pietri are a few authors whose works are

notable. The main proponents of it in English literature are Nicola Barker, Salman

Rushdie, Alice Hoffman, Nick Joaquin, and Neil Gaiman. Popular authors of magic

realism in Bengali literature include Nabarun Bhattacharya, Akhteruzzaman Elias,

Shahidul Zahir, Jibanananda Das, and Syed Waliullah. Haruki Murakami is one of

this genre's most significant writers in Japanese literature. The most well-known

works of the Kannada authors Shivaram Karanth and Devanur Mahadeva incorporate

magical realism. The 2018 Nobel Prize in Writing winner Olga Tokarczuk is a

representative of magic realism in Polish literature.

Several works in the magical realism subgenre include One Hundred Years of

Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez (1967).Beloved by Toni Morrison (1987). The

Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami (1994). The Ocean at the End of the

Lane by Neil Gaiman (2013).Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel

(1989).The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende (1982).Midnight’s Children by

Salman Rushdie (1981).

In its depiction of an afterlife amid the backdrop of Sri Lanka's civil war, the 2022

Booker Prize winning novel Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka

can also be categorised as magical realism. It deals with different aspects in literary

fiction, which include whodunnit, political satire, homosexuality, etc..Most of the

characters in the novel are the dead and the most important of them is the protagonist

Mali Almeida. The author uses both the magical and realistic worlds in this book to

coexist. The novel supports a nuanced understanding of truth and life with reference

to social, political scenario of Sri Lanka. The novel reflects the life of the people in

Sri Lanka during the civil war. Magical realism is a narrative technique that can

challenge realistic narrative and put an alternative reality. Within the shade of magical

realism, the author has discussed many complex issues, which include identity crisis,

the meaning of life, the atrocities of war, and politics. In the very beginning, we see

Maali wake up from death and find himself in a place called the In Between. He is

confused, unable to remember anything, and believes that he is dreaming. “ You

wake up in an endless waiting room. You look around and its a dream and, for once

you know it's a dream and, you are happy to wait it out. All things pass, especially

dreams. ” (2)

The In Between world is represented as a place between death and the light. There

they have to do some paper works and ear check etc ,these were connected to their

past life ,the sins, memories so on. Maali believes he has hallucinated as a result of

ingesting "silly pills" that Jaki (friend) gave him. But no, he is actually dead and
appears to be imprisoned in the In Between. He is surrounded by other souls who

are covered in blood, have severed limbs, and are unable to form an orderly queue

to fill out their paperwork. Many of the individuals he encounters in this

depressingly mundane setting are survivors of the violence that wracked Sri Lanka

in the 1980s.

You look around. Behind you, a queue weaves around pillars and

snakes along the walls. The air is foggy, though no one appears to be

exhaling smoke or carbon dioxide. It looks like a car park with no cars,

or a market space with nothing to sell. ”

"Even close up, the figures look blurry-edged with talcum skin and

have eyes that blaze in colours not customary for brown folk. some are

dressed in hospital smokes; some have dried blood on their clothes;

some are missing limbs. (3)

Maali have chats with the dead one among them named Dr Ranee Sridharan,a lecturer
at a Tamil university who was shot dead for criticising the Tamil Tigers, a militant
separatist group. The Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, or People's Liberation party, also
waged an uprising against the Sri Lankan government and murdered many left-
leaning and working-class civilians whostood in their way. Their victims are also
depicted in the book.

It was Ranee who told Maali to get his ear checked because otherwise it can prevent
him from entering the light

“'What's the light?'

‘The short answer is Whatever You Need It To Be. The long answer is, I don't have

time for the long answer. ”

Maali was a war photographer and therefore witnessed the brutalities of Sri Lanka.

He was very passionate about his profession as a photojournalist and even after death
he wants his photographs to be published. Alive or dead, he wants his photographs to

`stop the war. “ These are not holiday snaps. These are photos that will bring down

governments. Photos that could stop wars.”

Those photographs are kept hidden in a box under a bed in his family home. 'If you

could, you would make a thousand copies of each photo and paste them all over

Colombo. Perhaps you still can. It is told to Maali that every souls have seven moons

or seven sunsets to wander in the In Between and to get in touch with the living ( DD

and Jaki ) During these Seven moons ,'there are skills that disembodied spirits have

access to'. 'You can travel wherever your body has been.' and 'you can go where your

name is spoken.' you can 'ride winds'. 'Like public transport for dead people'. They

can talk to the living.

Throughout his journey in purgatory world Maali encounters with a lot of spirits,

ghosts and ghouls. Karunatilaka has portrayed several mythical elements in his novel.

The portrayal of 'A naraka'. A hell being. 'Something worse than a yaka'.

The thing has a head of a bull on the body of a bear and it lumpers

towards you at a quickening pace. It has a necklace of skulls and faces

trapped Beneath its skin. Faces that you cannot draw your eyes away

from.

The importance of mara trees and how it catch winds. Mara trees catch winds.' Like

radios catch frequencies'. Another fantastic thing ,the portrayal of Mahakali.

 The shadow take the shape of a beast. It has the head of a bear and a

body of a large woman. Its hair is serpents and its eyes are black from

corner to corner. It bares its fans and walks into the crowd as the

helpers in white back away. The creature growls and fills the roof with

mist'. 'It wears of skulls and a belt of severed fingers but these are not

what draw your gaze. It is the belly, bare and hanging over a belt of

flesh. Human faces etched in them, the souls trapped within our

screaming to be let out.( 94 ,95)

The whole novel is narrated in the second person, "you." This, in itself, is a striking
fact about this novel. Karunatilaka's protagonist, who introduces himself as
“Photographer. Gambler." He is not virtuous. From page one it states that if he had a
business card it'd say: “Maali Almeida: Photographer. Gambler. Slut.” He takes jobs
from dubious companies, loses a lot of money at a casino, and sleeps around with
many men behind his (secret) partner DD's back. Additionally, he lacks political
affiliation and is disenchanted with the administration in Sri Lanka, which is heavily
mired in a bloody civil conflict during the time this novel is set in the late 1980s. He
was a closet gay, his relationship with DD, whom he loves, and Jaki, whom the world
believed to be his girlfriend. He once admits that 'prefer cock to cooch', and later he
had a chat with a dead man, who said "No one asks for anything. Noone asks to be
born poor, no one asks for disease, no one asks to be born queer"." Iam not queer",
Maali answers as a defensive step as he had said many times before. The main
character being queer was another remarkable aspect of the story, to understand how
Queer treated in that time. These kind of fiction challenge readers to explore worlds
beyond conventional definitions and understandings of sexuality and gender
identity/expression.

Karunatilaka borrowed from a lot of mythologies and also the idea that the spirit

hovers around for seven days - you see that in different forms of Buddhism and other

eastern religions. Every one of Seven Moons' numerous layers has some significance.

“Every soul is allowed seven moons to wander the In Between. To recall past lives.

And then ,to forget.” The presentation of Afterlife- the in between with spirits

wandering around, not knowing where they are supposed to go.

The novel presents the afterlife as a visa office, as a government bureaucracy ,where

'the rich will enslave the penniless. The strong will crush the weak'. The concept of
‘varam’ just like currency here. "It is Varam. The more varam you get ,the more

useful you become. To yourself. And to others".

The portrayal of Crowman and sparrow boy is yet another fantastic characters. It was

crow man who helps Maali get in contact with the living, 'he can see spirits,he can

hear ghost, and they can hear him'. The dead ones can tell what it need and the crow

man will provide it within his powers. It includes talking to the living, want to bless

someone, want to curse. The crow man says ,

“ I can give you the power to whisper in ears. I can even give you powers to possess
the living. But you have to help me. Are you willing? ”

And the sparrow boy, a small boy with a missing hand ,feeds chickpeas to the

sparrow. It is unable to distinguish whether he is flesh or spirit. It is this boy who

hands over the postcard to Jaki for contacting Maali.

By placing his characters in Purgatory or In Between, Shehan is telling us that Sri

Lanka itself is purgatory for many, hanging between life and death or near-death or

after-death. "Being a ghost isn't that different to being a war photographer," the

narrator says. Lanka has become purgatory, but there is some hope: When Maali says

“ Nothing goes forever. It’s the one thing the Buddha got right.”

The spirits who inhabit Karunatilaka's story, waiting in vain for justice in the
Colombo winds, are based on actual people from that year. “You have the student
revolutionary leader who was assassinated, then you have the moderate Tamil leader
who was also assassinated,” says Karunatilaka, his tone reflected one of the fatal
truths of war: No matter whose side you take, someone will always become your
enemy. These spirits represent the conflicting beliefs that engulfed the country that
was devastated by war. “A lot of people were like, ‘Why don't we just move on?
What is the point of raking up all this stuff, what is the point of memorial days? It’s
easy for privileged people to say that, but for many, the scars are real, and they are
seeking justice.”

While some guide Maali to light ,some works against it. Sena is working against The

Light. Against the forgetting. “We must never forget .We must help the forgotten. We

must destroy the lies.”

The Light is symbolic of clarity and revelation. The Light is literally the realm that the

individual enters after dying and leaving the In Between. Throughout the novel, Maali

is reluctant to go to The Light, because he is still attached to his past. Because he

wants to exert control over Down There and make sure his life has meaning, he is

uninterested in the alleged clarity and tranquilly The Light will provide him. Once he

enters the Light ,he develops a new perspective of life. Karunatilaka's skill is in his

ability to juggle these complex aspects into a genuinely engaging narrative, even as he

wrestles with serious political and ideological issues with a strong spiritual undertone.

The idea that people are just people, acting as stupidly as they can with what they

have, without malice, subsumes questions of morality—who is good and who is evil.

In this light, no character is too evil and no situation is too confusing. He even

questions, Is it really a reward to reborn as a human?

The concept of this book is strong, captivating and thought-provoking, the idea of

exploring the afterlife and what that could look like, and Karunatilaka's depiction of it

is unique and interesting. The author's perspective on portraying the afterlife as a

bureaucratic dystopia, the idea of having individuals at desks controlling the afterlife,

for example, the afterlife as having people strolling around in the state they died, are

examples. To reflect how Maali has been alienated from the living, it seems as though

the author purposely distances the reader from Maali. The book is disjointed due to

the many changes in timelines and narratives, although this appears to be on purpose

in light of the book's overall theme. After all the text found to be highly informative

and insighful on Sri Lanka's history of civil war and ethnic cleansing.
 Chapter 3

CONCLUSION

The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida is a riotous magic realist interpretation of a recent

bloody chapter in Sri Lankan history, it also presents an unpeaceful After life. The

protagonist ultimately solves the mystery of the death of his own in the afterlife by

himself. It accompanies fantasy, realism, mythology, philosophy, and politics to a

great extent. Shehan Karunatilaka is known for Sri Lankan writing in English. His

first novel, ‘Chinaman’, won the Commonwealth Prize, the DSL, and the Gratiaen

Prize. This second novel (Booker Prize winner 2022) is hugely comic, an intense

satire, a scathing critique of the Sri Lanka of the 1980s and, since not much has

changed anywhere, of contemporary times. This is the Sri Lanka of the civil wars

(with the LTTE in the north and JVP in the south), of murder and mayhem, where the

number of fatalities climbs dramatically, and where the borders are so permeable that

you can’t tell who is fighting or collaborating with whom. “Ten years after his prize

winning novel Chinaman established him as one of Sri Lanka’s foremost authors,

Karunatilaka is back with a rip-roaring epic, full of mordant wit and disturbing

truths”.

Karunatilaka has mastered his craft as a novelist. It is difficult to categorize the novel

in one genre, it is magical realism, murder mystery, ghost story, historical novel,

political satire and super natural thriller. He never once strays from the second-person

viewpoint, which in the hands of a less accomplished author might be cumbersome.

In The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida, Karunatilaka makes excellent use of humour
to entertain his audience, defuse tense situations, and for pure enjoyment. This book,

which will make readers laugh aloud, eventhough it follows a murder victim during a

terrible civil war. Karunatiilaka presents most of his characters as ghosts and ghouls,

including the protagonist; he explores what if the dead could speak… He make use of

the dead to explore the horrors of war. A dead person who addresses himself in the

second person “you” for the entirety of the novel is the narrator.

Karunatilaka uses magic realism and content derived from mythology and politics to

address some of the most difficult and meaningful themes. The book carefully blends

actual occurrences, such as political corruption, power supremacy, human misery,

gender roles and acceptability, and strong relationships, with a very fantastical setting.

The tale alternates between every day existence and an Afterlife that exists in the In

Between that is just as bureaucratic and governed by laws as the real world. The

author somewhat rejects the notion that there is a better Afterlife. In his words ‘we

have this illusion that all our questions will be answered when we breathe our

last ;you close your eyes, open them and it suddenly all makes sense. But it made

more sense to me that you’d be absolutely more confused when you wake up’.

Karunatilaka used magic realism as a method to illustrate a point about reality. He

incorporated several historical events and personalities from the civil war; for

example, the character of the corrupt minister Cyril Wijeratne seems to be based on

the real Ranjan Wijeratne. Likewise, the character of the savage military general

Major Raja Udugampola, appears to be modeled after the real Deputy Police

Inspector General Premadasa Udugampola. Karunatilaka also mentioned a Sri Lankan

journalist, activist and poet ,Richard Manik de Zoysa, the first moon opens with an
epigraph from the poem Good Friday 1975 by Richard de Zoysa: “Father, forgive

them,/ for I will never.” Zoysa was kidnapped and killed in February 1990. He

incorporated magic and fantasy through several mythical characters and interwining

real incidents in afterlife – portrayal of In Between and how it is bound by power just

like the living world.

In its very deepest level, the novel discusses the absurdity of our everyday lives. It

questions the ultimate purpose of life and leads the reader through the complexities of

life. A perfect example of this is how the protagonist is characterized. Maali is far

from perfect, because of all his complexity and so-called “flaws.” The novel tells us,

“Don’t try and look for the good guys, ‘cause there ain’t none”.Karunatilaka also

presents a homosexual love story; this provides queer readers with a lifeline through

the opportunity to see themselves reflected on the page. Not only are the events of the

story an interweaving of reality and fiction, but the novel as a whole mentions the real

incidents that took place in Sri Lanka from a critical perspective. He portrays a period

when grudges were dealt with through murder. “If you were politically inclined, the

goons picked you up and handed you to an Interrogator and, depending on your

session with him, to an executioner.”

The subject and storyline of Karunatilaka expose, examine, and raise questions about

Sri Lanka’s legacy of its 1983–2009 civil war, whose effects are still being felt today.

In his words, Sri Lankans still argue over how many innocents were killed in our

many wars and whose fault it was. Why don’t we let the dead speak and hear what

they have to say. He asks if you ‘re writing truthfully about an absurd country and the

many ridiculous things that happen in it, are you writing satire or realism. There are
many purposes of this, one is to question about how one is remembered after death,

and what their love meant to people they left behind, and whether it was all

worthwhile.

Despite the fact that his dark humour and prose are laced with the most biting satire

and keep the story fresh and moving ,we gradually realise that his criticism of Sri

Lanka’s internal operations is just a passionate literary expose of a litany of

international organisations and other countries with vested interests who “offered

help”. This story tackles some of the most intense sociopolitical and human issues,

doesn’t wallow in sympathy. He doesn’t want the reader to feel bad for his country;

all he wants is for them to realise that no war is ever fought in a vacuum.

The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida presents its readers with a very agreeable mix of

literary-political-ethical difficulties, pleasures, and validations, along with a sense of

timeliness. The book is intelligent, witty, and emotional, but it ultimately takes us

through the terrible terrain of genocide, torture, mutilation, beheadings, and

assassinations and reveals humanity in a bizarre, complicated, awful scenario.

A novel of many parts, meanings and interpretations. It aside from the central skewed

murder mystery, we get multi-layered, political satire, lots of magic realist devices

and deep personal self-examination of Maali’s own life, work, family and

romantic/sexual relationships. It takes a lot of skill to produce magic realism, which

combines realistic surroundings and characters with fantastical, magical, or mythical

qualities, which is artistically done by Shehan Karunatilaka in his booker prize

winning novel The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida.

Karunatilaka is only the second Sri Lankan novelist to have won the Booker Prize.

(The first was Michael Ondaatje in 1992 for The English Patient.) But last year, his

countryman Anuk Arudpragasam was also shortlisted, for A Passage North, another

accomplished novel set in the aftermath of the civil war. The devastation of Sri

Lanka’s civil wars is a true and frightening reality that lies behind the literary

embellishments. Karunatilaka has artfully rendered justice to a terrible period in his

country’s history.
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