Village in the Jungle

The story of "Village in the Jungle" by Leonard Wolf takes a poignant turn in the events that unfold in the court room scene in pages 121 to 124 and the significance of the scenes whilst being relevant to the plot of the story reaching a climax, (as the tragic element of the sentencing of innocent Babun which ultimately drives Silindu to murder lies heavily in this scene) goes deeper into many other aspects of recent Ceylon history that are reflected naturally and vividly through the entire process of the court room scene.

Portraying village life in Ceylon during Colonial times, the thoughts that surfaced in my mind about the significance of the scenes, were mostly to do with the realization of a justice system that seemed to be very much in tact as meted by the British rulers of the “judge” here who commanded the respect of the locals as “no one else moved, the only sound in the world seemed to be the scratching of the pen on paper”. Indeed this took me back to history in Ceylon when the British ruled while the locals for the most part, experienced righteous hearings on domestic issues that cropped up amongst themselves.

The feelings of fear, the “curious look of pain and distress” in Babun made me think on the issues of the innocent accused, the internal, conflicts between the villagers or local people at that time in history being such that injustice, lying, cheating and false accusations, quarrels etc, in which “evidence was untrustworthy: highlights the fact that such inequalities and threats to fair play based on local monopoly and squabbles (Fernando vs. Babun) undermines as it were even the efforts of the Judge or white ruler, to seek out the truth even when the complainant impressed the righteous judicial system “most unfavourably”; thus leaving even a justice system that was intact, no choice but to accept that the lack of corroborating evidence against the actual wrong doers, means helplessness of a system “I am sorry”.

The manner in which the fleeting hearing, the consequent leaving of court but the judge and the sad manner in which Silindu is driven to work within his madness to bring about justice by taking matters into his own hands also I felt, to be significant in its powerful unspoken relating of a fact that human desperation and frustration is vented when the “old buffalo: who is cunning still, has no choice but to charge, when cornered and hunted down. Babun was innocent and he “sighed and looked quickly from side to side like a hunted animal”. The eyes of the judge frightened him. Could this be an emphasis on the fact that fear was driven into the innocent who had a fair hearing and should have felt vindicated had it not have been his inner realization that corruption would win at the end of the day? Village life and the corrupt dealings among its local inhabitants, the inequalities that existed among Ceylonese because of greed for each other’s land, for possession of for example the wife (punchi manike) of a helpless man over whom the offender has some authority by reason of a system of control which existed, further makes this courtroom scene a significance tone as it portrays the underlying social system of the villages of that day.

The strategy that the “mad” Silindy who takes the place of that “hunted” son-in-law as it were, in executing justice, is described powerfully through the lines Silindu mutters to himself, that no one save Silindu (and the reader) are privy to knowing/hearing. Again the deeper significance of family, poor, innocent and accused, the depths of bonds of family and feeling for the other among the simple local village folk, is depicted in these scenes, not merely though Silindu’s move into action that follows, but through the helpless cry of Babun “there is the woman hamuduro what will becomes of her?”. Thus the scenes are further significant in giving us an insight into feelings for family among the villagers of that time, their helplessness, their dependency and the patriarchal system that existed.

The respect (hamuduro), the authority (silence), the colonial situation (interpreter) and every other aspect of colonial times is packed into these few pages of the court room scene and I personally felt that Wolf did a superb job in portraying events, struggles, systems and situations within local Ceylonese village life most effectively and naturally … thus these 4 pages were packed with meaning I felt, that was relevant to life in Ceylon – like in the “Village in the jungle”.

© Slow Chills