Anne Ranasinghe, 1925-

Select page numbers to listen or LCCN to display the bibliographic record. These recordings were made in the field and audio quality may vary.

Readings:

1. Du fragst mich, warum ich Gedichte schreibe = You ask me why I write poems.
   Augsburg: Maro-Verlag, 2000
   ( LC has not acquired this title)
   
   • "You ask me why I write poems"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 71-74
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 71-74
2. Against eternity and darkness.
   [Colombo?] English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 2000
   (LCCN: 85903903; LC has different edition)
   
   • "Holocaust 1944 to my mother"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 40
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 40
   • "You, father"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 65
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 65
   • "At what dark point"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 44-45
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 44-45
   • "Well, I'm sorry"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 52
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 52
   • "Auschwitz from Colombo"
     Realmedia excerpts:pp. 64
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 64
3. Not even shadows.
   [Colombo?] : English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 2000
   (LCCN: 88904670; LC has different edition)
   
   • "Not even shadows"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 22
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 22
   • "Origami"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 21
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 21
   • "The is no longer a need"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 96
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 96
   • "Leaves are black"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 65
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 65
   • "A kind of Love Poem"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 90
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 90
   • "Trilogy-Sep/Oct/Nov"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 34-35
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 34-35
4. Against eternity and darkness.
   [Colombo?] English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 2000
   (LCCN: 85903903; LC has different edition)
   
   • "I had expected tears"(Renuka's departure)
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 76
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 76
   • "An unemotional departure"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 81
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 81
   • "A letter to my daughter"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 72
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 72
   • "Contradiction"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 97
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 97
5. Mascot and symbol.
   [Colombo?] English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 1997
   (Not acquired by LC)
   
   • "For Rosemary"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 2
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 2
6. Sunday Island newspaper
   
   • "Jeremy"
     Realmedia excerpts: [Excerpts]
     MP3 excerpt: [Excerpts]
     
7. Against eternity and darkness.
   [Colombo?] English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 2000
   (LCCN: 85903903; LC has different edition)
   
   • "Poem 1982"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 112
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 112
8. Not even shadows.
   [Colombo?] : English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 2000
   (LCCN: 88904670; LC has different edition)
   
   • "Atteriya"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 18
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 18
   • "I wonder whether they know joy"
     Realmedia excerpts: [Excerpts]
     MP3 excerpt: [Excerpts]
     
9. Against eternity and darkness.
   [Colombo?] English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 2000
   (LCCN: 85903903; LC has different edition)
   
   • "Polonnaruwa"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 2
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 2
   • "Hot Season"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 4
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 4
   • "Don't cry"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 82
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 82
   • "The night of the tropical storm"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 3
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 3
   • "Museum piece"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 6-7
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 6-7
   • "The Fiddler of Kollupitiya"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 17
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 17
   • "Four things"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 88
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 88
   • "The face of God"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 26
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 26
   • "The silence of the snake"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 36
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 36
   • "Fear grows like a cactus"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 62
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 62
   • "On the beach"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 38
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 38
   • "Insurgency 1971"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 47
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 47
   • "Sinhala new year 1971"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 49
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 49
   • "A happy new year"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 58
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 58
   • "July 1983"
     Realmedia excerpts: pp. 46
     MP3 excerpt: pp. 46
10. Not even shadows.
    [Colombo?] : English Writers Cooperative of Sri Lanka, 2000
    (LCCN: 88904670; LC has different edition)
    
    • "Landscapes"
      Realmedia excerpts: pp. 32
      MP3 excerpt: pp. 32

Anne Ranasinghe, born on October 2, 1925 as Anneliese Katz in Essen, Germany, is an internationally renowned poet from Sri Lanka. Escaping from Nazi Germany to England, she married a Sri Lankan professor and became a citizen of Sri Lanka in 1956. Her first collection of poems, And the Sun That Sucks The Earth to Dry, was published in 1971. Although primarily a poet, she has also published short stories, essays, and translations. Her works have been broadcast on radio and published in seventeen countries and translated into nine languages.

Drawing from her own life experiences, her writing has been described as "vibrantly sensuous or stark and deeply moving." The Holocaust is a recurring theme in Anne Ranasinghe's poetry and is contrasted with Sri Lanka's violent past as in "July 1983." Themes of alienation and minority persecution are found in many of her poems.

Anne Ranasinghe has won numerous local and international awards for her writing including the Sri Lanka Arts Council Prize for Poetry 1985 and 1992 and non-fiction in 1987. In 1994, she won the Sri Lanka Literary Award for best collection of short stories.

She is a founding member of the English Writers' Cooperative of Sri Lanka and regular editor of its journal, Channels. Her name has been included in the Oxford Companion to Twentieth Century Poetry (Oxford & New York: Oxford, 1994).

The Library of Congress has seven works by her.