පී. බී. අල්විස් පෙරේරාට විෂය වූ වැටුප් ශ්‍රමික කම්කරු ප්‍රජාව; වේදනාව කාව්‍ය සංග්‍රහය ආශ්‍රයෙන් කරන ලද විශ්ලේෂණාත්මක අධ්‍යයනයක් Wage-Labour Community through P. B. Alwis Perera’s Poetic Subjects; An Analytical Study based on “Wedanawa” (Pain) Poetry Collection.

Abstract

P.B. Alwis Perera is identified as a poet belonging to the second generation of the Colombo era, who was influenced by the Socialist Movement which spread after the 1930s in Sri Lanka. Of all his poetry collections, ‘Wedanawa’ is the ultimatum that signals the impact mentioned above. The objective of this study is to analyze how the poet has depicted wage-labour community in this particular collection.  The analysis also focuses on how Sri Lankan poetic movement evolved from being limited to aesthetic and religious themes during the Anurdhapura era to focus on social realities. The study emphasizes P.B Alwis’ unique contribution to the progress of the Sinhala poetic tradition as a Romantic poet. The analysis of the sample, which is the ‘Wedanawa’ poetry collection shows that the poems are composed to portray the ideologies associated with Classism of the poet. A qualitative analysis of the sample was carried out using Marxist and Socialist concepts on wage-labours and labour community. Hence this is an instance which breaches the idea that ‘Art for art’s sake’ and establishes the conceptual orientations of class-based social realities that the poet represents. Therefore, this poetry collection can definitely be identified as a one that changed the direction of Sinhala poetry to a novel avenue.