Colin de Silva was born in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in 1920 and was brought up there. During the Second World War he served as a commissioned officer in the British Army. From 1946-1056 he worked in the Ceylon Civil Service, and in 1962 he emigrated to Hawaii, where he now lives and works.
He first began researching 'The Winds of Sinhala' in 1957. Of the novel's major characters, only the narrator, Price Rodana, is purely fictional.
AUTHOR's FOREWORD >
King Abhaya Gamini, or Dutu Gemunu as he is generally known in Ceylon, lived in the second century B.C. His story is told in ancient historical chronicles, such as the Mahavamsa and in rock inscriptions. The city of Anu, the Anuradhapura of today, still contains tangible evidence of his reign.
I have woven my novel from the care threads of facts, introducing fictitious characters, incidents, customs and ceremonial to complete the tapestry. As for the life and government of those early times, I have combined imagination and an assumption of strong Aryan influences stemming from the Indian Emperor Chandra Gupta Moriya, with the sparse records available.
What of the story is history then?
I do not know, any more than I know what of it is fiction, for it could all have happened just as I have written.
Colin de Silva -1981