Neloufer de Mel is senior lecturer of the Department of English, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka, and a member of the visiting faculty in the women's studies program at the same university.

Elegantly written, thorough, and assured, this book represents a different and extraordinarily valuable insight into the ways in which gender is mediated through the intersection of cultural production and politics. There is very little work done about Sri Lanka on this subject that asks questions with the subtlety de Mel brings to her readings. This work stands as one of most groundbreaking contributions to the literature and will transform how the questions that it engages with are read. -- Geeta Patel, Wellesley College

• Chapter 1 Introduction Chapter 2 Setting the Stage, Gendering the Nation: John de Silva's Nationalist Theatre and the Entrance of Anie Boteju Chapter 3 Framing the Nation's Respectability: Anil Marcia de Silva's Rite of Passage Chapter 4 A Question of Identity: Jean Arasanayagam's Landscape of the Nation Chapter 5 Agent or Victim? The Sri Lanka Woman Militant in the Interregnum Chapter 6 Crossing the Issues—Mother Politics and Women's Politics: Notes on the Contemporary Sri Lanka Women's Movement