Burning Memories: Documentary on Jaffna Library

[TamilNet, Thursday, 08 May 2008, 15:51 GMT]
A 49-minute documentary, titled Burning Memories, featuring the story and the memories of the Jaffna Library, which was burnt down by the Sri Lankan Police in June 01, 1981, has been produced by an audio visual journalist, S. Someetharan. The tri-lingual documentary is scheduled to be released in May by the Nikari, the producers and distributors of the film.

The work by Someetharan is the first of its kind in documenting the story of the Jaffna Library.

The burning of the library, widely regarded by the Tamils as an act of cultural vandalism, was a deliberate destruction of 97,000 books, considered as the best collection of Tamil literature in Asia, including many irreplaceable manuscripts.

The documentary authored in Tamil, English and French, contains a unique collection of memories in the form of photographs, video footage, paper clippings, speeches, interviews and musical compositions.

The 'Nikari' producers described the mission behind the documentary as an effort to transcend the memories of a unique cultural asset into the newer generations.

Contact details and further information on the release of the documentary will be provided later, according to the distributors.