Thuppahi's Blog

Elmo Jayawardena

“My country is the world and my religion is to do good” quotes the author from Thomas Paine. Words are often empty when spoken from high pedestals. Fancy rhetoric and meaningless metaphor rules speeches of most celebrities; often written by experts or coined by the speakers themselves to delude the masses. It is almost a norm across most gilded podiums where pseudo-opulence reigns. The audience sin in silence, accepting words spoken in masquerade. This sure is a norm of the elegiac expressions that spout out from the mouths of the high and the mighty.

But at times we do have the privilege to listen to someone quoting what he believes and then seeing in front of our own eyes how he practises simple virtues that separate the villains from the venerated Judge Weeramantry is a shining example of honesty, integrity and simplicity. The book I review here is a gem, a reflection of the man and his odyssey into a new world. I have no knowledge to evaluate the heights he climbed in the international legal fraternity. It is way beyond me to comprehend. But logic and the words I read in this book clearly dawn on me that the narration is elegant and ecumenical. The names, the institutions and the places that fill the Judge’s stage are luminary. Nothing strange, as the author himself is someone who stands in the highest peak of respectability and recognition in a wide-spread international circle. Continue reading →