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This Encyclopedic Volume Is The First Of Its Kind In Any Language Covering All Of Indian Theatre. Lavishly Illustrated, With Some Rare Photographs From Archival Collections.
Indian Theatre expands the boundaries of what is usually regarded as theatre in order to explore the multiple dimensions of theatrical performance in India. From rural festivals to contemporary urban theatre, from dramatic rituals and devotional performances to dance-dramas and classical Sanskrit plays, this volume is a vivid introduction to the colourful and often surprising world of Indian performance. Besides mapping the vast range of performance traditions, the volume provides in-depth treatment of representative genres, including well-known forms such as Kathakali and ram lila and little-knowa performances such as tamasha. Each of these chapters explains the historical background of the theatre form under consideration and interprets its dramatic literature, probes its ritual or religious significance, and, where relevant, explores its social and political implications. Moreover, each chapter, except for those on the origins of Indian theatre, concludes with performance notes describing the actual experience of seeing a live performance in its original context. Based on extensive fieldwork, Indian Theatre is the first comprehensive account of the subject to be written by Western specialists and addressed to the needs of readers in the West. It will be a valuable resource for all students of Indian culture and a standard work in the history of theatre and performance for years to come.
This volume of the HISTORY OF INDIAN THEATRE presents most enhanting and colourful panorama of folk and traditional theatre flourishing in India since time immemorial. Utilising various sources the author meticulously and systematically builds up the theatre history, which spans over several centuries. It is for the first time an elaborate account of dramatic rituals associated with the Bhuta or the Cult of Spirits is given here. This will enable the students of theatre understand and relationship of ritual and dramatic performance in its correct perspective. Various ritualistic theatre forms such as Teyyam are described and discussed. The book also tells us how the teachnique of ballad singing was dramatized and finally evolved into full-fledged drama in the course of time. The history of narrative forms is traced from the Vedic times to the present. With the emergence of Bhakti cult the spics were dramatized. This gave rise to the Leela Theatre which dedicated itself to portraying the divine acts of incarnations such as Krishna and Rama. Various forms of Leela Theatre are described in the book. Audiences turn to theatre for entertainment. A class of folk theatre arose in India whose main function was secular entertainment. Swang, Tamasha, Nautanki, Khyal entertained the people with dance, music and song, as well as with humour and pathos, love and war. Their enchanting story is narrated here.
Written by one of most renowned culture historians of our times, the present fresh edition with an afterword by the author , describes and presents an analysis of forms such as Yaksagna,Bhagvatamala,Chau,Nautanki,Ramlila,Etc.
This work discusses why so many western theatre workers have come to India and what they were looking for. It identifies Indian theatre as a site of reappraisal and renewal both in India and in the world of performance.
Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.
This book critically engages with the study of theatre and performance in colonial India, and relates it with colonial (and postcolonial) discussions on experience, freedom, institution-building, modernity, nation/subject not only as concepts but also as philosophical queries. It opens up with the discourse around ‘Indian theatre’ that was started by the orientalists in the late 18th century, and which continued till much later. The study specifically focuses on the two major urban centres of colonial India: Bombay and Calcutta of the 19th and early 20th centuries. It discusses different cultural practices in colonial India, including the initiation of ‘Indian theatre’ practices, which resulted in many forms of colonial-native ‘theatre’ by the 19th century; the challenges to this dominant discourse from the ‘swadeshi jatra’ (national jatra/theatre) in Bengal, which drew upon earlier folk and religious traditions and was used as a tool by the nationalist movement; and the Indian People’s Theatre Association (IPTA) that functioned from Bombay around the 1940s, which focused on the creation of one national subject – that of the ‘Indian’. The author contextualizes the relevance of the concept of ‘Indian theatre’ in today’s political atmosphere. She also critically analyses the post-Independence Drama Seminar organized by the Sangeet Natak Akademi in 1956 and its relevance to the subsequent organization of ‘Indian theatre’. Many theatre personalities who emerged as faces of smaller theatre committees were part of the seminar which envisioned a national cultural body. This book is an important contribution to the field and is of interest to researchers and students of cultural studies, especially Theatre and Performance Studies, and South Asian Studies.
This book looks at adaptations, translations and performance of Shakespeare's productions in India from the mid-18th century, when British officers in India staged Shakespeare's plays along with other English playwrights for entertainment, through various Indian adaptations of his plays during the colonial period to post-Independence period. It studies Shakespeare in Bengali and Parsi theatre at length. Other theatre traditions, such as Marathi, Kannada, Malayalam and Hindi, have been included. The book dwells on the fascinating story of the languages of India that have absorbed Shakespeare's work and have transformed the original educated Indian's Shakespeare into the popular Shakespeare practice of the 19th and 20th centuries, and the unique urban-folkish tradition in postcolonial India.