Indian Drama in English: An Introduction

Indian Drama in English: An Introduction
There is a paucity of drama in Indian writing in English. Compared to
other literary genres, its output has been scanty. There are many reasons for
this; but the most important reason is that English is not the mother tongue
of the Indians. It is a language learnt, as the second language. English is used
in India only for practical purposes by the urban elite. Natural conversation
is the most important aspect of drama. While conversing in the native idiom,
the vigour and the vitality of a spoken language naturally exhibit themselves.
This is not possible when two Indian characters speak in English on the
stage. Their conversation is bound to sound artificial and the impact on the
audience would be feeble, often comic.
Shanta Gokhale in her well documented chapter “The Dramatist” in a
book called Illustrated History of Indian Literature in English says that,
Krishna Mohan Banerji’s The Persecuted or Dramatic Scenes Illustrative of
the Present State of Hindu Society in Calcutta in 1837 was the first play
written by an Indian in English. She says, “It was less a play and more a
dramatized debate of the conflict between orthodox Hindu customs and the
new ideas introduced by western education.” (1837: 337)
Drama, as a developed or finished literary genre or type, presupposes
a long period of development not only in the literary expression of a people
but also in its fine arts, including architecture, sculpture, painting, music and
dancing. In India, from the earliest times in her history, at least more than
2000 years ago, the art of drama seems to have been well established. India
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has made significant contributions to the world’s dramatic literature.
Through a series of works in Sanskrit of outstanding merit and beauty
produced by the most talented dramatists in the ancient India and also during
the modem times under the European influence.
Drama is first and foremost, meant to be staged. It is an audio-visual
medium of expression. So, it is very effective and powerful genre in world
literature. In Bharatmuni’s Natyashatra, drama is hailed as the fifth Veda,
Natyaveda. Indian Drama has established itself as a unique phenomenon in
the literary world. Krishna Mohan Banerji’s The Persecuted (1831), is the
first flower in the garland of Indian English Drama, after too many prolific
playwrights tried their hands to complete this garland.
In English it will be easy to discuss the development of the Indian
drama in the context of the Pre-Independence drama, the Post -Independence
drama and the Contemporary drama.
Pre-Independence Indian English Drama:
The real journey of Indian English Drama began with Michel
Madhusudan Dutt’s Is This Called Civilization? which appeared on the
literary horizon in 1871. In the Pre- Independence era, stalwarts like
Rabindranath Tagore, Shri Aurobindo, T. P. Kailasam, A. S. P. Ayyar,
Lobo- Prabhu, Harindranath Chattopadhyaya and Bharati Sarabhai
contributed to the development of the Indian Drama in English.
Rabindranath Tagore, The Nobel Prize Winner dramatist and the
epitome of the Indian spiritual heritage, wrote primarily in Bengali but
almost all his plays were translated into English. His important plays are
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Chitra (1914), The Post Office (1912), Sacrifice (1917), Red Oleanders
(1926), Chandlika (1933), Mukta Dhara (1922), Natir Puja (1926), The
King of The Dark Chamber (1910), The Cycle of Spring (1917), Sanyass
(1884). All these plays are representative of the Indian ethos and display a
unique blend of simplicity and complexity, conventionality and modernity.
Tagore played the roles of interpreter and mediator between the East and the
West. His plays are famous not only for the careful knotting of the plot but
also for the music of ideas and symbols.
Chitra, an One Act play, is Tagore’s interpretation of an episode from
the Mahabharata. Chitra, a daughter and child of the king of Manipur, has
been brought up like a boy. She is proud of her prowess and manliness till
she falls in love with Arjuna who spurns her. The broken hearted Chitra
realizes the vain pride of her manlike strength and prays to the Gods for a
brief day of perfect beauty to ensnare Arjuna. Tagore has handled this
delicate story with great charm and at times the play is sheer poetry.
The Cycle of Spring is a drama associated with the festivals of
seasons. He gives his spiritual message to the king ,the royal metaphor he
uses in all his plays to symbolize his universal man. His most famous play,
Red Oleanders is a name of red flower. It is a tale of a king who lives behind
an iron curtain while his subjects have cruelty and death delivered upon
them at the slightest pretext. People are forced to work in the mines so that
the kleptocratic king and his cronies may render themselves even wealthier.
The play follows the heroine Nandini who leads the people and finally the
king himself towards the destruction of this artifact of subjugation.
However, this ultimate victory is preceded by numerous deaths, most
importantly that of Rajan, Nandini’s lover, and Kishore, a young boy
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devoted to her. Tagore’s Chandalika is modelled on an ancient Buddhist
legend describing how Gautam Buddha’s disciple Anand asks for water to
an adivasi.
Shri Aurobindo, writing between 1890 to 1920, was a major Indian
English playwright. His dramatic genius is reflected through his five
complete blank verse plays and six incomplete plays. His complete plays
are Perseus The Deliverer (1979), Vasavadutta (1957) , Rodogune (1906),
The Viziers of Bassora (1959), and Eric The King of Norway (1960) each of
these plays is in five acts. His incomplete plays are The Witch of Uni, Achab
and Esarhaddon, The Maid and The Mill (1962), The House of Brut (1962),
The Birth of Sin and Prince of Edur (1907). Many scholars and critics have
generally found that Sri Auribindo was highly influenced by Robert Bridges
and Stephen Phillips in whose contact he came when he was at Oxford and
who wrote poetic plays in the manner of the Elizabethan playwrights. Sri
Auribindo’s plays can safely be called Elizabethan and romantic in nature,
though they are Victorian by chronology.
These plays are considered romantic because they often deal with
matters remote from the interests of the ordinary life. The people, they deal
with are illustrious, like Eric, Vasvadutta, Perseus ect. They generally make
no attempt to preserve the unity of tone or time or place found in the
classical or Neo- classical type of dramas.
The most noticeable feature of Shri Aurobindo's plays is that they
deal with different cultures and countries. Variety of characters, moods and
sentiments enhance the beauty of his plays. His Collected Poems and Plays
published in 1942. Perseus the Delieverer is grounded on the ancient Greek
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myth of Perseus. Vasavadutta is a romantic tale of ancient India, Rodogune
is a Syrian romance, the Viziers of Bassora is a romantic comedy, Eric The
King of Norway is a romance of Scandinavia, a story of love and war
between the children of Odin and Thor. Sri Aurobindo has handled all the
forms of drama- romance, heroic play, tragedy, comedy, farce etc. His
treatment of various themes, his flawless use of English blank verse and the
right tuning of the characters and situations contribute to the overall
impression of his plays.
growth of the Indian English Drama is Harindranath Chattopadhyay. Five
plays (1937), a collection of his social playlets contains: The Window, The
Parrot, The Sentrys Lantern, The Coffin and The Evening Lamp. He started
his career as a playwright with Abu Hasan (1918). The Window, the first in
the collection of the author’s five social plays, attempts a rather
melodramatic picture of the cruelty inflicted by capitalistic industrialists on
poor labourers and the consequent misery to which the latter are subjected.
The Parrot is a tragedy dedicated to “All those whose morality is not a
parrot-cage”. The theme of the play is man’s inner urge for freedom from
the bondage created by him in the form of customs, like marriage. The
Sentry's Lantern brings to the light the evils of imperialism as can be seen in
the playwright’s significant dedication itself: “To all the victims of
Imperialist Gallows”. The Coffin, a Two Act play satirizes a bourgeois artist
and his false world and highlights the responsibilities. The Evening Lamp,
the last play in the collection is a poetic evocation of life, and the picture
presented is that of a young man who queerly observes his own shadows. It
is dedicated “to those who may be able to light it towards the new dawn of
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realism.” Sidhartha: Man of Peace (1956) is an adventurous effort to show
Buddha’s life on stage. There are no dramatic qualities in Chattopadhyay's
plays which can make the plays stage worthy.
T. P. Kailasam, though essentially a Kannada playwright, occupies a
prominent place in the firmament of the Indian English Drama. His
knowledge of the ancient Indian lore and his long stay in England made him
substantially contribute to this field. Kailasam's published plays and playlets
are: The Vurden (1933), The Purpose (1944), Fulfilment (1933), The Course
or Kama (1946), Keechaka (1947) and A Monologue (1933). It is learnt that
some thirteen English plays were also composed by him and recited
extempore, but none of these has been published.
The next great contributor came forward was A. S. P. Ayyar, who
wrote six plays. His first play was In The Clutch of The Devil (1926) and the
last was The Trial of Science For The Murder of Humanity. Ayyar's plays
were didactic and plot and characterization were of secondary importance.
Another worth considering voice on the Indian dramatic scene is Bharati
Sarabhai. During the colonial era of Indian English Drama, she wrote two
plays, The Well of the People (1943) and Two Women (1952). The Well of
The People is symbolic, poetic, and significant contribution to the Gandhian
social order. It is based on a real story published in Gandhi's Harijan, in
which, an old Brahmin widow, unable to accomplish her desire to go on a
pilgrimage to Banaras and have a dip in the holy Ganges, decides to get a
well dug for the untouchables in her village.
J. M. Lobo Prabhu is the last great name in the Pre-Independence
Indian English Drama. Out of the dozen plays which he wrote, only two
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were published in 1956.The names of these plays are Mother of New India :
A Play of The Indian Village In Three Acts (1944) and Death Abdicates
(1945). Though, Lobo Prabhu is capable of writing dialogues with felicity,
his characters are not life -like.
While giving a brief survey of Indian English Drama, few more
playwrights may be taken into account though they have not made
substantial contribution to the Indian English Drama. Some are the important
writers who have squirrel's part in the development of drama. They are
Surindranath Ghosh, R. K. Narayan, K R S Iyengar, Balwant Gargi and
Mrinalini Sarabhai.
The watershed in Indian English Drama came after Independence.
Compared to the other genres, drama did not make a noteworthy presence in
the Pre-Independence era. The main reason for this was that 'drama' is
essentially a composite art involving the playwright, the actors and the
audience in a shared experience on the stage. The drama has its own
problems from which the other literary forms are free. In the Post­
independence period foreign countries have started showing interest in
Indian English Literature in general and Indian English Drama in particular.
A number of plays written by playwrights like Asif Currimbhoy, Pratap
Sharma, Gurucharan Das were successfully staged in England and America.
Asif Currimbhoy is India's first authentic voice in the theatre. He is
the first modem Indian playwright who has shown great interest in
producing drama. His 29 plays are, first and foremost, meant for the stage
and he brilliantly succeeds in producing the actable plays. His plays are
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characterized by variety and versatility. His choice of titles is notable for his
coinage of new words. The Dumb Dancer (1966), The Doldrummers (1960),
The Hungry Ones (1966), Goa (1964), Refugee (1971) and Sonar Bangla
(1972) these are some of the notable plays written by Currimbhoy. The East-
West encounter, psychological conflicts, religion philosophy, art, social and
economic problems are handled successfully by Currimbhoy. Among the
plays with historical and political themes, Goa is a two-act play where
Currimbhoy presents a story of passion and violence of the period of the
Indian take-over of Goa. In his one-act play The Refugee, the playwright
shows his concern for the burning problem of the refugees of East Bengal
who poured into India during the 1971 war. In Sonar Bangla, the dramatist
deals with the conflict between the people of East Bengal and the Pakistani
forces. The play with its moving dialogue and fast action presents a realistic
picture of some horrible events of the war.
Tagore-Aurobindo-Kailasam's tradition of poetic drama was
continued by Manjeri Isvaran, G.V. Desani, Lakhan Deb, and Pritish Nandi.
Manjeri Ivasaran’s Yama and Yami (1948) is a dialogue in poetic prose,
dealing with the incestuous love of Yami for her brother. G.V. Desani's Hali
(1950), an entirely different kind of play, received high praise for its
originality, symbolism and rich imagery. Lakhan Deb's Tiger Claw (1967) is
a historical play in three Acts on the controversial murder of Afzal Khan by
Shivaji. His two other plays are Vivekananda (1972) and Murder at the
Prayer Meeting (1976). His use of blank verse is flawless and the last play
compels us to remind T. S. Eliot's Murder In The Cathedral
Pratap Sharma's association with the Indian National Theatre began in
1961 with the production of his first full length play Bars Invisible (1961).
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He has written two prose plays- A Touch of Brightness (1968), anc The
Professor Has a Warcry (1970). The Word (1966), Zen Katha (3004),
Sammy (2005) are these are the recent plays by Sharma. Sex remains the
prime theme of his plays.
Girish Kamad is a prolific writer, playwright, actor and movie director
in Kannada language. He is the recipient of the 'Jnanpith Award' the highest
literary honour conferred in India. For four decades, Kamad has been
composing plays often using history and mythology to tackle the
contemporary issues. It was Tughalaq (1972) his second play which
established his eminence. His other plays are Hayavadana (1975), Tughlaq,
Nag-mandala: A Play With A Cobra (1990), Tale Danda (1993), The Fire
and the Rain (1998). Tughlaq his second play had proved how Indian *
English drama could revitalize itself by employing experimental models.
Kamad has added three more plays to his distinguished repertoire during the
last two decades. Nag - Mandala : A play With A Cobra (1990), Tale Danda
(1993) and the Fire and the Rain (1998).
Nag-Mandala is based on two oral tales from Karnataka. It is a story
of the newlywed Rani, Appana, her husband and Cobra. The Rani, Appana , o
and Cobra refer evidently to the allegory of the nexus between the world of
art and the world of mundane reality. Tale Danda deals with the final crisis
in the life of Basavanna, the great social reformer, in 12th century Karnataka
and the founder of the Lingayat faith. In The Fire and the Rain, Kamad has
given contemporary meaning to an old legend which stresses the dangers of
knowledge without wisdom, and power without integrity.
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The next notable dramatist is Vijay Tendulkar, also a leading and
television leading Indian playwright, movie and television writer, literary
essayist, political journalist and social commentator, primarily in Marathi.
Many of Tendulkar’s Plays derived inspiration from the real life incidents or
social upheavals which provide the clear projection of the harsh realities. He
provided his guidance to students. Tendulkar wrote a play The Vultures in
1961; but it was not produced until 1970.The play is set in a morally
collapsed family structure and explores the theme of voilence. Sakharam
Binder (1972) deals with the topic of domination of the male gender over the
female gender. Ghashiram Kotwal (1972) treats the political violence. It is a
political satire set in the 18th century as a musical drama. Silence! Court is in
Session (1967) , The Rich (1956), An Island named Man (1958) , Kamala
(1981) , Kanyadan (1983), His Fifth Woman (2004) are some other notable
plays on to his credit.
Contemporary Indian English Drama:
It is very difficult to make watertight compartments like Modem and
Postmodern Drama in Indian English Literature. The term ‘post-modem’ in
the world of literary critical scmtiny is considered to be a highly debatable
and doubtful enterprise. In the contemporary literature, the evaluation of
literary work depends on the norms and the forms and the knotting and the
knitting of the subject matter. There is no any particular theory to apply to
the work of art. Structuralism, modernism, deconstmction, social realism,
and socio-psycho analytical criticism- all these theories gained importance in
the Contemporary Indian English Drama.
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playwrights in the contemporary Indian English literature. The prolific
dramatist, Nissim Ezekiel also the pioneer of the Post-Independent Indian
Verse in English, a well-known, critic, broadcaster, and social commentator,
wrote the following plays: Don't Call It Suicide (1993), Three Plays (1969),
and Songs of Deprivation (1969). The theme of Songs of Deprivation is the
plight of a sensitive individual in this harsh world of stark realities. Three
Plays includes Nalini, Marriage-Poem, and Sleepwalkers. Nalini, described
as a comedy, is generally considered the most successful and more important
play, while Marriage Poem shines like a polished gem in very short setting.
It explores an upper-middle-class marriage in which the homebound wife
craves the attention and love of a husband who, if he ever loved her, is now
indifferent. The insecurity of her position drives her to alternate between
nagging him and trying to seduce him. On the other hand, he is trapped
between his dreams of another woman and his feelings of tenderness
towards his lonely wife.
Nalini concerns itself with precisely that class of westernized Indians
who were then beginning to express their guilt about being without roots.
Bharat imagines Nalini to be a svelte social climber who will allow him to
seduce her for his marketing services. But Nalini, with her intelligence,
sincerity, and doubts handle him at the end. Sleepwalkers is a One- Act
satire in a minor key on the Indian habit of always looking up to the United
States.
Brides Are Not For Burning (1993), Getting Away With Murder
(2000) are the award winning plays by Dina Mehta. Brides Are Not For
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Burning won the B.B.C., Radio Play Writing Contest in (1979) on a subject
of urgent contemporary relevance- dowry deaths. The later play Getting
Away With Murder is also devoted to the problem of women.
Uma Parmeswaran is also a notable woman dramatist. She has written
these plays: Sons Must Die and Other Plays (1998), Sita's Promise (1981),
Dear Deedi My Sister (1989), Rootless But Green are The Boulevard Tree
(1987). She has handled different subjects. Sons Must Die is a war play
against the background of the Kashmir conflict in 1948, it centers on the
experiences of three women. This play is influenced by her interest in Greek
tragedies, containing a chorus and stylized language of verse. Whereas,
Rootless But Green Are The Boulevard Tree is a social play with a modem
setting, presenting the problems of the immigrants in Canada. Meera and
Seeta ’s Promise, on the other hand set out to celebrate Indian art tradition
and at the same time to educate the outsider about our culture. Dear Deedi
My…