After completing reading the half of ‘Sachin Tendulkar a definitive biography’ book
to know about the CRICKET legends as a
research for my forthcoming book on the game . A friend of mine advised
me to read CHINAMAN, The legend of Pradeep Mathew by Shehan Karunatilaka, the
winner of DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2012. It is a
story of a fictional legendary cricketer Pradeep Mathew narrated in first
person by a drunkard journalist W.G.Karunasena whose liver is in
bad shape and confidently counting days
taking up the last project of writing
about the legend. When I heard the title Chinaman, it did not attract me nor arouse my interest. But when it received
the award, I wanted to read but seeing the size kept postponing it. Recently wanting to read more about cricket, I purchased the book and read .
Chinaman is a running commentary
on cricket and cricketers of Sri Lanka. The author has described the life of an aspiring Tamil cricketer in the trouble torn Sri Lanka. The story of
Pradeep Mathew starts when the sports journalist meeting on a table to party in
Oberoi hotel and decide on the all time great Cricket team of Sri Lanka. The
statistician friend of W.J.Karunasena , Ari Byrd along with a Pakistani
reporter Casts his favorite Pradeep as a best spin
bowler to everyone’s surprise and in their bid to justify the selection W.J. reminds others what a legend he was in spin
bowling who did not get any recognition despite his excellent figures in few matches he played, and vanished out of
the cricket scene as surprisingly as he came.
As he continues his interest in the legend of Pradeep Mathew, he
gets an offer to make a documentary on Sri Lanakn cricket where he intends to
cover the greatness of Pradeep Mathew against the wish of the SLBCC. However to
fund this project he invests all his saving and the small amount received from
SLBCC in Cricket betting and wins a
ransom after which he completes the documentary which did not receive much
acclaim because of the inclusion of Pradeep. Disheartened by this he chases the
ghost of Pradeep and decides to write a book and goes on his trail where he
comes in contact with the shady separatist LTTE activists. Pradeep was an eccentric
character who left studies for cricket. His
performance was par excellence as compared to any other in Srilankan cricket . He falls in love with a girl called Charita after which
his life takes a total turn.
The book is worth praising because of its details on cricket and
its politics. Even though it is about Sri Lankan cricket the same could be true
in any other country where many talents are lost because of politics of sports administration. The narration in the
perception of a sport journalist also is humorous and catchy the way he drinks against his loving wife and
son. His son elopes with a Muslim girl
who comes back after few days and then he
goes to Germany and gets married to a German. Here W.J.K with his friend continues his investigation on the
legend of Pradeep and lands up in many situations which are made interesting by
the impressive and apt plotting and diction .But sometime the
525 pages seems to be dragging with unwanted details stuffed in.
Overall the book is worthy of the South Asian Literature
prize which is interesting, suspense and
intriguing.
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