The Theatre of Kanhailal

Pebet and Memoirs of Africa

Rustom Bharucha

 

6.5 x 9.5 inches, xi + 106 pp, 64 halftones. 1998

ISBN : 9788170460947

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H. Kanhailal's work in Manipuri theatre is at the forefront of contemporary Indian theatre. This volume takes a close look at the world of Kanhailal, in which his theatre is so firmly located. Pebet is a folktale deeply entrenched in the psyche of the Manipuri people, in which a mother bird fights to protect her children from a predatory cat. Kanhailal politicizes this familiar story, turning it into a struggle against the political and cultural colonization of Manipur. Memoirs of Africa is a short theatre piece based on a poem by L. Somorendra Singh in which the history of oppression in Africa stands for oppression anywhere in the world. 

Rustom Bharucha trained as a dramaturg at the Yale School of Drama. He is the author of Rehersals of Revolution: The Political Theatre of Bengal (Seagull Books, Calcutta, 1983) and Theatre and the World: Essays on Performance and Politics of Culture (Manohar, Delhi, 1990). His articles have appeared in The Economic and Political Weekly, Journal Of Arts and Ideas and Theatre of which he is a contributing editor. He is a visiting director and teacher at Ninasam Theatre Institute, Heggodu, Karnataka.

 

Theatre And Performance Studies
Cultural Anthropology