Description
A bruised, alcoholic Sri Lankan sportswriter sets out to craft a “decent documentary” on the island’s greatest cricketers—while also chasing the life story of the elusive fast bowler Pradeep Mathew, a figure shrouded in myth, silence, and selective memory. As W.G. Karunasena digs deeper, the cricket narrative becomes inseparable from the nation’s own shifting identity, revealing how stories are shaped, withheld, and weaponized. With Karunatilaka’s sharp, darkly comic voice and layered storytelling, the novel explores obsession, craft, and the moral cost of turning real lives into public legend. Ultimately, the search for “Chinaman” becomes a reckoning with truth itself—how it sinks into the cracks between biography, sport, and a country trying to name its past.
Available Editions
paperback
Penguin Random House
Published Jan 1, 2011
416 pages
ISBN: 9781446475911
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Details
First Published
2010
Language
eng
Content Warnings
Content and trigger warnings for Chinaman by Shehan Karunatilaka.