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Saturday Dec 28, 2024
Saturday, 12 October 2019 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
By Uditha Jayasinghe
‘The One Who Loves You So’ is a multi-layered exploration of what can happen if a blip in time is remembered, rehashed, related to, reflected on, and, in its latest version, read.
The book version of the widely-acclaimed play is almost stark in its bare-boned showing of a series of events that take place in one room between two men. But there is so much to unpack that once it is taken apart the pieces take on a life of their own.
The book can be devoured in a matter of half-an-hour or so and is almost a deceptive speed read. But its essence can be hammered into so many different meanings that conversations about the book will likely take longer to chew through than the book itself. The play has captured rave reviews and multiple accolades, with the most noteworthy being the Gratiaen Prize.
“When the show happened it felt like a lot of pressure. Then a friend told me to remember the space from where I wrote it, the feeling of being exposed, the feeling of where the hurt was, if you are doing that then you are being honest and that is all you can do. When the Gratiaen happened it felt great because all the pressure was off. I thought, ‘well, nothing I ever do is ever going to hit all these marks, I can fail and be utterly mediocre next time’.”
His next work is yet to find Arun but he contends that his part in ‘The One Who Loves You So’ is emphatically done. He has said all there is to say, in some ways more than necessary as the repeated press outings have already churned through the bulk of the themes.
Much has been written about the play’s inroads into connection, space, sexuality, and living as a gay person in Sri Lanka. There is no attachment left for the creator but he does at times get generous feedback on how the audience has become invested in the work and that is likely to continue for the book.
“I always knew I wanted to tell a story about hook-ups and dating apps that didn’t reduce them to the things they are always reduced to, which is that they reduce our forms of connection, that they isolate us, which are true to some extent, but are not entirely true. The reality of it is much more interesting. The reaction shows it does transcend that. People see themselves in it not because they know what it is like to have a hook up but it is that even within your long term relationships you do play those parts and you are constantly in this negotiation with this other person and yourself about what parts of yourself to give.”
‘The One Who Loves You So’ gives a glimpse into how queer relationships are formed in different spaces. Arun insists that partly because of the way they are formed and partly due to queer people growing up in heteronormative environments they are rarely able to experience heartbreaks and crushes in their adolescence.
The typical “being in love with love” experiences are then sometimes layered into deeper interactions later in life and Arun is insistent that the connection between Vidura and Nick is emblematic of this complexity.
The honesty that is displayed, especially by Nick, in providing story after story of his life and having an unedited interaction with Vidura and the latter struggling to come to terms with the reality of their connection when the real world finally intrudes is at the core of the play.
“Falling in love with the idea of somebody or what they could be to you rather than with who they are. I think that is what the play is really looking at. Both Nick and Vidura are incredibly flawed and are not necessarily giving each other what they need but there is some connection and the heartbreak of it is that cannot occur.
“One of the things that I really liked around writing it was the idea that this is a blip, these two people will have other experiences, perhaps it might fundamentally change them or it might not, but in fact it was about looking at something that is often reduced to nothing, but for so many queer people is everything. Also because for many people it is the only way you are experiencing romantic intimacy. Because of queer culture and gay culture you have really codified that’s how you experience intimacy. If you go on a date it is probably with someone you have already hooked up with and there is always this feeling of transience. Everyone is moving to the next thing. This was the exploration.”
Vidura, who is arguably a protagonist that readers may feel more frustration with than initially expected, nonetheless also evokes a connection with the audience because of his vulnerability and the inevitability of his heartbreak. Vidura is aware that things will not end well, but is unable to change his path. When the connection finally breaks his next step is left tantalisingly open and this is where Arun throws it open to either the audience or the reader to take the story where they wish. If you end up disliking Vidura, Arun will understand.
“I intentionally wanted (him) to have limited powers of self-evaluation and self-realisation. Vidura always had blinkers on and because of that is constantly hitting walls, is constantly trying to get out of a small room and constantly banging into a wall. That is what makes him utterly human and people see themselves in that. He can talk on a myriad of subjects but is really unable to talk about what he wants or even see themselves for who he really is."
“It’s about one person being split apart and the different ways in which we all played those two different parts in relationships at different times. Our dynamics do change, we don’t go through our lives being one of those people but we are constantly shifting. In a way it was looking at a self that is split and kind of having a conversation with itself.”
This is partly what makes the book such a dive-worthy reading experience – there is no break, no curtain and no respite. In some ways there is no need as after gulping the book down it is possible to return to parts of the conversation that make the most impact and savour them. There is a simplicity in just having to deal with two characters and being able to see them almost in isolation from the real world for part of the book.
“I’m interested in what happens to an audience during the process of the show. What are they asking about? Should they get annoyed with Vidura? Absolutely. He’s designed to be this completely infuriating person. He has no willingness to listen, no willingness to talk, to really in any way engage. Vidura is the protagonist who actually doesn’t have much to say until the last section when he is on the roof. Every other time he is asked something, he sort of deflects it; in fact it is Nick who opens up, whereas we know very little of Vidura and what we know is perhaps not even true. I’m always more interested in characters that are horny, and ugly and just show the worst sides of themselves.”
Attraction, as the book shows, is something that disempowers and empowers at the same time. Readers will relate to the effort that Vidura and Nick makes to connect and then deal with its inherent landmines. Arun points out that when people are attracted to someone, they are often caught between the extremes of being emotionally unavailable or being too needy, ending up showing the worst of themselves when they want to impress the most.
“I have always resisted narratives of ‘man learns better’ as those sort of arches don’t interest me narratively. It’s more interesting to me to allow a snapshot of something occurring and for me narratively the most interesting thing for me is to see someone fall right back into where they were.”
‘The One Who Loves You So’ was for Arun a chance to “write a queer love story that was actually written by a queer person, where queer people actually worked on it”. It was an opportunity to own an experience, tell it in the voice of his own community and provide it with the texture of experience that similar work is often lacking when it is told by a straight person.
“In the last 20 years, it wasn’t so before, but so many queer stories or queer love stories have been reduced to tragedies or coming out narratives; things where characters have to suffer in order to feel like their story is valid. The actual queerness, the sexuality and all that is stripped away and stripped away until it’s this shapeless little ball that everyone is happy to swallow. I really wanted to do something that was kind of honest about what really happens.”
‘The One Who Loves You So’ certainly delivers honesty in spades and that, more than anything else, is why it is worth picking up.
Pix by Daminda Harsha Perera
