The festival, which returned after four years, included sunset soirees, art trails, heritage walks, and stimulating sessions that offered much food for thought
Updated Feb 7, 2021, 12:42 pm IST
A deeply absorbing novel of the old school, Beautiful Place is strongest when it portrays the worlds that the author is familiar with
Cover page of Beautiful Place by Amanthi Harris
Nilwatte Beach, somewhere off the coast of southern Sri Lanka, is a beautiful place. The sea, “with its yearning rising green-blue swell and the deep-blue simmering stillness of horizon” crashes upon a languorous beach that is dotted with shacks selling beer and fish, peopled with a few foreign (mostly white) tourists or posh Sri Lankans the sort who favour scrappy holidays over five-star comfort that they can certainly afford lounging on beach chairs, gazing at the sunset. Around them hover a smattering of local villagers, selling “marijuana, magic mushrooms, lottery tickets, trips to turtle conservation beaches”. The economy and as a consequence, the culture of the village has been permanently disrupted by the rise of tourism, and the villagers can