“Douglas Victor Abraham Sooriyarachchi Amarasekara was the kindest, gentlest and wisest man I have met. When I first met him, he was the Professor of Mathematics at the University of Colombo, the Sri Lanka University. He was a mathematician, astronomer, musician, pianist, poet, dramatist, short story writer, artist and scientist etc”. – Hemantha Warnakulasooriya

 Michael Ondaatje, in his renowned fiction, Running in the Family used two epigraphs to describe various facets of Sri Lanka.  The first epigraph was derived from an account on then Ceylon by Franciscan Friar who visited the island in the 14^th century. The Franciscan Friar, Oderic noted that he “ saw in this island, fowls, as big as our country geese having two heads, ….and other miraculous things which I will not here write of…’ (Oderic, Franciscan Friar, 14^th Century)

 The second epigraph was derived the Sri Lankan mathematician Douglas Amarasekera’s article written to the Ceylon Sunday Times in 1978: ‘The Americans were able to put a man on the moon because they knew English. The Sinhalese and Tamils whose knowledge of English was poor, thought that the earth was flat.’ Thereby, Ondaatje simultaneously suggests the magical, mystical quality in which the island was enveloped during the mediaeval times, and its backwardness in science and technology during the contemporary times.

 Douglas Amarasekara’s article was published subsequent to Basil Mendis’ lecture delivered at the University of Colombo titled “The Earth is Flat, the Moon is on the Other Side of the Earth.” Basil Mendis, who was then a lecturer in Philosophy in Peradeniya University was enthusiastically heard and applauded by the Colombo University undergraduates and media.  During a period when Russians had successfully launched their first sputnik and Douglas Amarasekara was working as a Mathematics Professor at the University of Colombo with immense interest in science and Astronomy, the mathematician thought that the perpetuation of the belief that the earth was flat was incredulous.

In the same manner as Ondaatje suggests multiple manner of perceiving the Ceylon, Douglas Amarasekara also had prominent multiple facets which were embedded into his professional life.

Douglas Victor Abraham Sooriyarachchi Amarasekara was born in 1918 as the son of the famous painter Mudliyar A. C. G. S. Amarasekera, the founder of the famous Atelier de Amarasekara, where most of the Sri Lankan painters during that time obtained their foremost instructions in painting. In 1930’s Mudliyar Amarasekara got his son enrolled at the Cambridge University to follow a Bachelors in Mathematics, and accompanied him to London. Even though Douglas Amarasekara was studying in London, he had already followed his father’s footsteps in painting and thereby, the “Amarasekara Father and Son Art Exhibition of 200 paintings of Ceylon was declared open on 1st September 1939 in London, on the very date Hitler had threatened to bomb London.”

While his father was a brilliant portrait painter, Douglas himself executed several portraits, his Portrait of Leonard Woolf and the German Lady’s Portrait are some of his better-known works. He was a great admirer of Chinese brush drawings, and executed paintings and watercolours on landscapes. He is professed to have preferred French impressionism over other styles. His works such as View of a Street, Scenery of a Village Bridge and Road to the World’s End are some of his works which employed French Impressionism.

Mudaliyar A. G. S. Amarasekera, was not only the leading artist and the Government Art Master in Ceylon at that time, but also a professional Conjuror, known as “The Gay Deceiver.” Mudliyar Amarasekara, who was born in 1940 was decorated by King George V at Buckingham Palace with the insignia of the “Officer of the British Empire” due to the entertainment he offered to troops throughout the war in the United Kingdom, braving London raids over and over again. There are reminiscences where in the early stages of the Second World War, Douglas accompanied his father during his study sojourn in England, during the occasions where the Mudliyar entertained troops while the universities were closed in England due to the war. Douglas is described to have chosen to follow his father’s footsteps and perform along with him at magic shows by the name of ‘Gay Deceiver Junior.’

Apparently, the Mudliyar and Douglas, performed along with Edward, the then Prince of Wales-Duke of Windsor, though, Douglas seemingly distanced himself from ‘Magic, once he commenced his professional life.

Later, Douglas Amarasekara would graduate from Queen’s College in Cambridge with a Mathematics degree, and subsequently with a Masters in Mathematics. Subsequent to his return from London, in 1949, he joined University of Ceylon as a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Colombo, the Sri Lanka University, and culminated his career later as the Department Head of Mathematics, at Peradeniya in the early 1960s; subsequently the Director of the Amarasekara Academy of Art at Dawson Road, which was commenced by his father.

The duality or the multiple facets which Ondaatje portraits of the island in his novel on the island where he was born is somewhat distinctive in Amarasekara’s life as well; a mathematician – a performing magician – a painter.

 However, Douglas Amarasekara’s talents were not limited to these three domains; professed to speak and converse in more than twelve languages, and read and write in more than sixty languages, he was deemed as the ‘Socrates of Sri Lanka’ among the Sri Lankan intellectual circles. Douglas was also an astronomer, musician, pianist, poet, dramatist, short story writer, and a scientist etc. A great admirer of both Eastern and Western classical works, he had studied both Japanese Haiku poetry and Greek culture and civilization.

Thereby, his statement on Sri Lankans incapability of understanding science arose from the mind of a mathematician who having travelled in the Europe was professed to have interest in comparing and contrasting the Western and Eastern civilizations.

 Equipped with a deep knowledge both on Greek writers and the contemporary authors; he was familiar with writers such as Plato, and Socrates, as well as Bertrand Russell, Henry Miller and Tennessee Williams. He used the knowledge he had derived from the Western classics to enrich the Sri Lankan Stage Dramas; hence the drama, named as the Valaakulu, a translation of the Greek drama by Aristophanes, Clouds which was initially titled as Aththa Kumakda. According to Sunanda Mahendra it was the only occasion when a Greek comedy was brought on to the Sri Lankan stage, … not only introduced the Greek comedy but also paved the way to peep more into Greek theatre.

As a talented pianist and a musician, he did the musical score for the Sunanda Mahendra’s stage adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler, and the musical score for the stage drama, ‘Gahaniyak.‘ His passion for Sinhala drama later led him to write a critic of the famous drama Maname jointly with Hemantha Warnakulasuriya titled as Twenty-five years after Maname in 1982. He became an admirer of the plays produced by the ‘Ape Kattiya’ Group, later. While he was a profound admirer of English, he also published works such as The Food Crisis, Romanisation of Sinhala and Colloquial Sinhala; the latter works discussed the Sinhala language. Further he wrote prefaces and criticism on Sinhala works on science and superstitions such as on; ‘Deviyo ha Bhuthayo’ (Gods and Ghosts) and Vidyaawa saha Oba (Science and You). 

Even though, Amarasekera had been at times represented by English literary critics as a subject of the English speaking elite who is ideologically rooted in the west, it is important to notice the service he has rendered to the English teaching in Sri Lanka. With a profound interest in the teaching of English both at school level and university level, Douglas was an instructor of English, but not a lecturer of English at universities. He wrote a series of well-known English books’ series called the Deepali English Readers written in late 40s and 50s, which was widely by the teachers of English all over the country. who believed that in teaching English, the local flavour as he denoted his concept should enter …. as a variant to the existing patterns, and believed, in experimenting constantly on teaching and learning methods of the study of language acquired due colonialism.

Hence the statement, used by Ondaatje in his novel; The Americans were able to put a man on the moon because they knew English. The Sinhalese and Tamils whose knowledge of English was poor, thought that the earth was flat, evidently manifests, his perception in English as a technological power-tool. Whether, it was hard to judge, whether the Sinhalese and the Tamils believed that the “earth was flat, Douglas opted that the lack of knowledge in English in the natives, extended and projected into an inability within the Ceylonese to advance in technological spheres.

Unable to sleep in his father’s house after his demise at the age of 100 years, Douglas Amarasekara spent the last 12 years of his life at his protégée, Hemantha Warnakulasuriya’s house and passed away in 2001 at the age of 83. Subsequent to his death, a prize was established in 2004 in his memory of the at the Department of Mathematics, University of Colombo.

While one critic has stated Douglas Victor Abraham Sooriyarachchi Amarasekara to be the kindest, gentlest of humans, one of his students, Marie Alles Fernando claimed that while he taught her French impressionist style he was the best teacher she ever had; taught her Shakespeare, classical music (appreciation) and poetry. While she claims that he was a brilliant professor of Mathematics at the University of Ceylon, she certifies that he never had an art exhibition and never sold his paintings.