Sri Lanka: No winners in this war

Samanth Subramanian’s latest book builds a portrait of people affected by the Sri Lankan civil war: The Hindu

A war brings out many memories and stories. There are tales of horror and carnage, of young children being forcibily recruited or new houses being razed to the ground. There are also tales of dark humour. A man is tired of losing his bicycle every time there is an evacuation, decides to slather his cycle with grease and leave it in a well. He is pleased and surprised to discover it right there when he returns many years later. Such tales make the crux of Samanth Subramanian’s This Divided Island, chronicling the stories of ordinary people impacted by the conflict that afflicted Sri Lanka for almost 23 years.