The Modern Malayalam Theatre a Brief Survey

7/27/2019 The Modern Malayalam Theatre a Brief Survey

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The Modern Malayalam Theatre

- V.M RamachandranA Brief Survey

The origins of Malayalam theatre goes back into the past, to the religious,semi-religious and secular rites and rituals of the earliest Dravidiancommunities and tribes. Throughout the history of mankind there can befound the traces of songs and dances and rituals in honour of theunknown forces of nature, Gods and Goddesses performed by priests andworshippers and of the portrayals of the struggle between man and themysterious forces of nature, Gods and heroes. Even now similar

ceremonies can be discovered among primitive tribal communities andman's affinity for traditions has a particular bearing on the broadconnotation of the term 'theatre'. The subtle differences between thefundamental components of what is known to be 'ritual', 'folk' and what istermed 'theatre' cannot be lost sight of. Judged from any angle, 'theatre'in any socio-cultural and political condition, is a spectacle meant to beperformed.

The common feature in theatrical art and in traditional ritual and folkforms of art is the element of spectacle which, in the last instance, is

'situation specific'. But, even in this respect, a good deal of divergence inthe methodology of exposition and performance and in the design ofstructure cannot go unnoticed. The structure and performance of thespectacle in a ritual or a folk form have their roots running deeper intothe depths of social myths upon which they are based. And these mythsare mixed up with the life pattern of the ancient communities and theirspecific inter-relationship between the social formations of the period inwhich they lived and also with their productive relations and the existingproductive forces. All these primary factors are dialectically related withtheir elemental sensibilities, their concept of Gods and Goddesses, their

codes of virtue and vice, their awareness of truth and beauty and theirinteraction with nature and the cosmos as it were. We see that thespectacle of a particular ritual and folk performance in a particular socio-cultural matrix has an ethos of its own, its own elemental colour andsocial necessity. Moreover, to those who practice these forms, theperformances become a meaningful social activity and the seasonalenactments aim at the full and absolute participation of the villagecommunities concerned. It is to them, the inevitable observance of certainvital principles of the structure of their collective life.

The argument that theatrical performance can never evince the abovementioned collective characteristics of the ritualistic and folk performance


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has to be scrutinized scientifically if one attempts to chart out thehistorical evolution of Malayalam theatre. Moreover, the methodologicalscaffolding for such an analysis has to shape itself and develop from thestructure of collective feelings and societal dimension of the elementaltheatrical features of rituals and folk performances.

It is in this context that one has to get at the roots of a seminalobservation made by Galvano Della Volpe who was essentially concernedwith the problem of rehabilitating the inherently rational and intellectualnature of aesthetic experience. He observes, "The essential issue wasbrought to the surface by no less than Goethe on the one hand and Marxon the other. For, it was Goethe who declared that 'the highest form oflyric is decidedly historical'.........and it was Marx who argued that Greekart pre-supposes Greek mythology", that is "nature and the social formsalready elaborated....by the popular imagination", and concluded that

"the difficulty for the materialist lies not in understanding that the Greek(figurative) arts and epic are bound up with certain forms of socialdevelopment" but rather in the fact that "they shall afford us artisticpleasure and that in a certain respect they count as norm and as anunattainable model."

Della Volpe reads Marx's formulation as an indication of the historical andsocial bonds of a work of art which do not condition it mechanically andexternally, but must in some way be part of the particular kinds of"pleasure" which the work and not some other object affords us.

The methodological infrastructure employed in the study of Malayalamtheatre, in the broadest sense, incorporates the historical-materialisttheoretical framework mentioned above. Thus, the basic premise is that,the sort of living sediment, the historical 'humus' whose organic presencein a work of art of theatre performance has properly to be demonstratedby the materialist, is to be traced back to its concrete-rational core. For,that is the sole medium within the work through which we may assumethat reality, as a complex of ideologies and the facts and institutions ofevery kind, is articulated. Thus a historical materialist and dialectical

analysis of the development of Malayalam theatre could provide usimmense insights into the problematics of Kerala's cultural performancehistory, which was time and again being mystified and vulgarised by theso-called idealist intellectual gymnasts and foreign aided culturalindustrialists of Kerala and elsewhere. It is in this context that we have tolook at the process of appropriation of the collective aesthetico-theatricalexperience of the primitive communities of Kerala and the development ofa coercive aesthetics of oppression and subjugation which through thecenturies had continued its struggle to maintain dominance.

The equality and democratic collectivity of the pre-historic communities ofKerala had been completely destroyed by the newly emerged,


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undemocratic social apparatus based on 'high' and 'low' castes. Social lifein Kerala was in no way fundamentally different from the rest of India.Kerala's caste organization was, if anything, even more unequal than inother parts of India; the system of untouchability here was far morerigorous. This social transformation took place under the cultural

leadership of Brahmanism which brought the newly emerging strata of theintellectual, administrative and other elite of society on par with theircounterparts in the rest of India. Unlike in several parts of north India,Kerala never had a non-Hindu ruling 'elite' down to the establishment ofthe British rule. The Jew, the Christian and the Muslim had theirrespective places in the socio-political set-up, but they were subordinatedto the dominant class caste which was caste Hindu.

The political-administrative system was thus one in which the non-Hinduand low-caste Hindus were second class citizens, over and above these

differences in the social organization is the big difference in economy andpolity which marks Kerala off from the rest of India- the difference arisingout of the evolution of private property in land. Thus was created asystem of feudal landlordism, the system under which the landlord andother categories of non-cultivating tenants had each of them, his allottedshare of the produce. This system was subsequently modified andperfected by the British, the princely states and rulers of independentIndia.

It was on the soil of this system of feudal landlordism that the various

tribes and castes inhabiting present day Kerala started developing into alinguistic-cultural community.

It is true that most of the cultural and art forms arose within the narrowcompass of one caste or group of castes belonging to separate classcategories. The classical literary works of Malayalam were mostlyproduced by Hindu authors and dealt with Hindu religious themes; sowere kathakali, koodiyattom and other arts mainly of Hindu origin. It isalso true that most of these national literary and art places were confinedto upper caste (class) circles. Nevertheless, these works of literature and

art forms have laid the basis for the creation of a style and technique thatgo beyond all castes and communities; they are truly national. Moreover,men of culture, drawn, of course, from the upper classes but of all castesbegan to appreciate and even adopt this style and technique in their ownparticular caste or religious circles. The chavittunatakam of the Christiansis a simplified adaptation of the kathakaliform of the Hindu.

This flowering of literature and arts was nothing but the expression ofthat 'community of economic life, economic cohesion' which, as isunderstood by historical materialists, is one of the characteristics of anation. Thus was emerging, slowly and through the generations, that pre-requisite for the formation of a nationality-the national market. As is well


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known, it was this that which attracted first the Arabs, then thePortuguese, then again the Dutch, the French and lastly the British, to thecoastal towns of Kozhikode, Kochi, Kollam etc., where they opened theirfactories and started trade.

The impact of this on the political-administrative system was tremendous.For, the growth of trade necessitated a steadily expanding home marketwhich, in its turn, made petty kingdoms ineffective and outdated. Theprogress had to begin and very obviously did begin with all the inherentcontradictions shaping it into differing and conflicting designs.

The question arises then, that if this is the case, how is one to explain thepeculiar development of Kerala theatre and its performance patternswhich are, at one and the same time, integrally and dialectically relatedwith the socio-political formations?

Theatre history, in the ultimate analysis, is the history of performanceand performance of any kind is a socio-cultural act. Basing oneself on theassumption that all cultural artifacts are socially symbolic acts, one has torealize that in order to articulate the past historically, it is not sufficient torecognize it "the way it was". As Walter Benjamin says, "it means to seizehold of a memory as it flashes up at a moment of danger". Thus, theinevitability of radical perspective. In this a sense, the venture isessentially a demythificatory critical attempt and hopefully enable one tolocate the sort of sedimented human experience embedded at the core of

Kerala performance and theatrical patterns.

At the outset, one has to disregard the proposition put forward by most ofthe eminent established theoreticians that Kerala theatre has only ahistory of hundred years beginning from 1882 with the publication ofKerala Varma Valiya Koil Tampuran's translation ofKalidasa's Sakuntalam. This highly academic point of view discards thedialectical development of human performance which in itself has anuninterrupted narrative mode. This uninterrupted mode of humanperformance begins with people singing and dancing freely in the open

air. This was communal celebration in which all could participate andexpress themselves using their body, voice and mind. The unconsciousurge of the individual to merge himself or herself with the collectiveunconscious becomes very prominent in this socially symbolic act. Theperformance pattern of these socially symbolic acts still retain theirelemental characteristics even in modern theatre performances, thoughthere exists a concrete barrier between the performers and the audience.The master code of the collective which ultimately is determined by thespecific social formation serves as an unbroken chain of humanexperience which gets represented in the ideological framework of anytype of theatrical performance. The limitations of a study of Keralaperformance patterns are quite obvious in the sense that the performance


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patterns of the past can only be reconstructed from a study of myths andritualistic practices of which many have become obsolete and those thatremain have undergone drastic transformations.

Kerala culture, according to available records and traditions never

underwent any convulsions violent enough to bring about any completemetamorphosis. Even at the earliest periods of which we have any record-and this is pre-Christian in point of time Keralites were carrying on a verybrisk trade with many countries far and near. When it is remembered thatKerala culture was constantly brought into contact with a number ofdistinct and different cultures, one can naturally expect to find culturalassimilation and cultural superimposition, resulting in a new synthesis ofconflicting civilisations. We also find, added to these, the existence of alarge number of 'genuine primitive survivals' in almost every aspect of oursocial, religious and political life. Thus the cultural antiquities open up a

field of inquiry at once interesting and important to the student of art andculture.

One aspect in which this wide and varied culture has found expression isthe stage and performance which had made its valuable contribution tothe sum total of Indian culture. The orthodox section of this stage whichhas a religious atmosphere attached to it and is, therefore, beyond thegaze of profane eyes, plays no inconsiderable role in helping thereconstruction of the ancient Sanskrit stage - the active traditions ofwhich have died out elsewhere in India. No less important is the

vernacular section in which beginnings may be found revealed of the artof dramatic representation, beginning probably primitive in character butnonetheless significant for that.

It is here that we are again confronted by a serious question about thecontinuity of Malayalam theatre tradition.

Malayalam as a distinct language had its formulation almost a thousandyears back and Malayalam drama in the form of the texts written by theSanskrit dramatists and European dramatists, has only a history of

hundred years. How will one account for this 'Great Gap' in the history ofMalayalam drama? Indian theatre or Sanskrit theatre has a tradition, asevery one knows, which goes back thousands of years. Kerala which hadbeen closely linked with the Brahmanical tradition for centuries had towait till 1898 to find the first dramatic text to be produced, that too atranslation of Kalidasa's Sakuntalam.

This does not mean that Keralites had no theatre movement of their own.On the other hand, the tradition of Sanskrit drama find itself manifestedonly in Kerala in the form ofkoodiyattom and lot of Sanskrit plays havebeen written by Keralites in the past.


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But, there was not even a single drama in Malayalam till 1898 when allother areas of literature were making headway.

The simple reason usually attributed is that of the dominance of Sanskritand Brahmanical ideologies over the vernacular. It may be true that

Brahmanical dominance might have discouraged every developmentbased on the vernacular culture. But the change in the sensibility whichcame to manifest itself in the people for the emerging language made thedominant ideological machinery of the upper castes disturbingly silent.Thus Ezhuthassan could walk with his head held high even aftercomposingAdhyathma Ramayana in Malayalam. But the dominant theatretradition and its audience were purely Brahmanical in its orientation. Theywere satisfied by their koothu and koodiyattom and there was nonecessity for them to come outside, and be part of the ordinary folk. Sothe upper caste intellectuals never went for writing plays in Malayalam.

The majority had at the same time their own forms which were highlyparticipatory in nature and their theatrical urges were satisfied by theperformance patterns based on folk and ritual practices of the people.Even before 1882 the Portuguese infiltration into the social life of Keralain general and the Christian community in particular created certainperformance patterns known asgenova natakam and caralman charitam;which were just imitations of Christian religious plays of Europe. Theintention behind the creation of these new theatrical forms was to bringabout parallel art forms immitating the classical Hindu religious theatreforms like kathakaliand koodiyattom. These alternative Christian

theatrical forms were much more accessible to the common folk. Theresult was that the complex technicalities and structure of the feudal artsforms gave way to much more simpler theatrical experience for thepeople. But these innovations could not provide any lasting contributiontowards the development of modern Malayalam theatre. The origin ofmodern Malayalam theatre which took place in the second half ofnineteenth century finds itself distanced by atleast hundred years fromthe Christian theatrical forms.

It was indeed a major event in the performance history of Kerala that a

Sanskrit play got translated into Malayalam, (the hybrid variety ofMalayalam which is known as manipravalam) for the first time by aperson belonging to the feudal class structure. The cultural importance ofthis even along with its influence upon many educated intellectuals of theperiod cannot go unnoticed. The ideological underpinnings of theinnumerable translations of plays from Sanskrit and English created anatmosphere which was very much in accordance with the value systemsof ruling class. It must also be remembered that almost all thetranslations were not performance-oriented and the reason for this canalso be attributed to the dominance of theatrical formslike kathakaliwhich could fulfil the theatrical urges of the upper classes ingeneral.


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A major change in the style of producing a dramatic text with a newlystructured performance pattern which is known assangeethanatakam (musical drama) is worth mentioning in this context. In thehistory of modern Malayalam performance patterns, this new

development which had spread over to Kerala from Tamil Nadu andKarnataka demands particular attention from a socio-political perspective.This new mode which became very popular throughout Kerala makes onethink about the cultural climate that necessitated such an extremelypopular theatrical form. The verse form of this performance pattern whichdeveloped slowly was very much based on the vernacular Malayalam withits highly flexible metrical pattern and this was really a major breakthrough in the performance history of Kerala.

In 1889, Chathukutty Mannadiar translated Ramabadradikshita'sJanaki

Parinayam and Bhavabhuti's Uttara rama charitam, which stood evenabove the translation of Kerala Varma's Sakuntalam. The languageemployed by Mannadiar was highly relaxing and acceptable to themajority than the intellectualised Sanskrit/Malayalam of Kerala Varma.

Some original plays were based on themes from epics and stories fromhistory. Thottakkad Ikkavamma's Subhadrarjunam, NatuvattachanNamboodiri's Bhagavadoodu, Kunhikkuttan Tampuran's Lakshmanasangam, Varghese Mapila's Ebrayakuttybased on the Old Testament areall worth mentioning in this context. K.C. Keshava Pillai's Sadarama and

T.C. Achutha Menon'sSangeethanyshadham; Kuttamath KanniyoorKrishna Kurup's Balagopalan were the mostpopular sangeethanatakams of Kerala.

The effervescence in this form of theatre activity was inspired by thefamous actor Thiruvattar Narayana Pillai who organized the firstprofessional theatre company manomohanam in the south of Kerala. Incentral Kerala Chathukutty Mannadiar gave shape to rasikaranjini natanasabha. A new theatre culture and performance practice inspired by thehighly populist and commercial musical drama movement of Tamil Nadu

and Karnataka was able to become successful in many respects. In asociety subjugated and oppressed by the ideological machinery of theBritish Empire in collaboration with the feudal landlord system in Keralamade the majority seek relief in cheap entertainments and performancepractices. But in the north of Kerala this musical drama movement had adifferent orientation other than purely being commercial. Vidwan P. KeluNair's (Pakkanar Charitam, Lanka Dahanam, Paduka Pattabhishekam,Srikrishna leela, Kabeerdasa Charitam, Vivekodayam) plays and theirpresentations were very popular especially in Malabar in the 20's.The sangeetha nataka performance pattern in Malabar popularised byVidwan P. Kelu Nair, Kuttamath Kunniyur KunhikrishnaKurup(Harischandracharitam, Devayanee-charitam etc.) Ananthan Nair


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(Kuchelagopalam), Kunhambu Kurup(Vydarbhivasudevem, Amsumathidha ramagupta etc.) and a host ofothers in collaboration with great actors like Rasikashiromani P. KomanNair, C.U.K. Nambiar, Malabar Raman Nair stands apart mainly in onerespect from the tradition. One can obviously find certain elements like

the affinity for themes from epics and the dominance of karnatic music inthe sangeetha nataka tradition of Kerala. But in Malabar this performancepattern had its roots in the turbulent struggles for national liberation andmost of the playwrights of this form were involved in one way or anotherin the national liberation struggle. Most of them had the experience ofbeing in prison for participating in the struggles of the period. The newlyemerged theatre practice, they thought, would inspire the people to maketheir contributions towards the transformation of Kerala society inparticular and Indian society in general.

People, started feeling that they have had enough ofkathakali,koodiyattom, tullaland all other folk and ritual forms as a consequence ofthe development of new productive forces and relations which wereoppressive in form and content. The new theatre practice was by andlarge highly communicative and it was for the first time that aperformance pattern went straight into the people's sensibility,irrespective of their caste, creed, religion or class. Lot of play-wrightsstarted working on themes similar to that of the Tamil musical dramapurely for commercial reasons.

There were others who wanted to have a performance pattern whichcame over to Kerala from Tamil Nadu and Karnataka to be employedconsciously for the transformation of society. Thus, the new developmentsand upheavals in the performing arts of Kerala which started in the lastdecades of nineteenth century paved the way for the flowering of a newcultural synthesis and within a period of ten to fifteen years more thantwo hundred plays were performed many a time throughout the lengthand breadth of Kerala.

It is at this juncture that the play Chakkichangaram by Munshi Rama

Kurup made a fierce attack against this onslaught of the new type ofperformance pattern. It is against the vulgarisation of taste that RamaKurup took arms against. The play was in the form of an English farce andit had the aim of cleaning the taste and sensibility of the upper middleclass which was being polluted by the sub-culture of the Tamil musicaldrama and the imitations in Malayalam based on them which werebecoming very popular. If we look deeper into the social structure thatproduced a new dramatic sensibility in the south of Kerala which provokedMunshi Rama Kurup, we could find that those who invited the commercialtheatre companies to perform were people belonging to the upper strataof society. The audience will sit according to their ranks. All the 'inferiors'in the society will flock at the back of the open 'auditorium'. The upper


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class women and their attendents will sit themselves at the doors andbalcony of their traditional homes (from where they had watched thetraditional kathakaliand koodiyattompreviously). The actors in theirhighly ornamental costumes will appear on the stage and salute the upperclass section of the audience. They will force themselves to locate the

lords and the local chieftains in the front row and give special salutationsto them.

In such a performance atmosphere, it is no wonder that the structure ofthe performance will do justice only to the taste of the upper class. Thevalue systems of the leisured class will be glorified and the lower classeswill find themselves mocked at to the utmost satisfaction of the superiorclass. The most sophisticated Munshi Rama Kurup himself made funofchakkiandchangaran who happened to represent the lower orders ofthe society. The tendency to look down upon household servants and

those who do menial jobs and to make them targets of laughter andderision in theatre is not a new cultural phenomenon which we find inmodern plays and films, but as old as Munshi Rama Kurup and his upperclass ideological make-up. Moreover, cultural practice in the vernacularwas looked at with contempt, by those belonging to the upper strata butthe social forces that unchained the human energy in this particularperiod was beyond the control of the ruling class alliance of the Britishand the regional monarchies. It is to be noted that even as early as1880's when the commercial theatre practice based on sangeethanataka tradition was making its headway in the south of Kerala, in the

north Malabar and Malabar in general this tradition was being nurturedwith a radical perspective. This radical development in performancepractice, it can be rationally argued, did exert great influence upon theprogressive theatre movement of Kerala in general which started withV.T. Bhattathiripad in 1929.

By 1900 one could visualize a gradual shift in the structure of sensibilityof the people of Kerala, especially the educated middle class and theprogressive minority. The socio-political climate was slowly becomingtense as a result of the people's movement for national liberation gaining

momentum. This can be felt in the popular medium of literary creation,the novel, of O. Chandumenon's Indulekha (1889) which tried to listen tothe changing pulse of the times. Student struggles were beginning to takeshape under the leadership of G.P. Pillai and supported by intellectualslike C.V. Raman Pillai and educated middle class slowly entered into thearena of national liberation struggle.

The "Malayali Memorial" struggle also radically changed the wholesensibility of the middle class intellectuals of south Kerala and elsewhere.Intellectuals like G.P. Pillai, C.V. Raman Pillai, SwadeshabhimaniRamakrishna Pillai, C. Krishna Pillai and Kumaran Asan in particularstarted expressing themselves in a different tone and idiom and the


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people felt themselves being drawn to an alternative ideological domainwhich was basically antagonistic towards the hegemonic ideology of

Brahmanism and British rulers. In 1903 Sri Narayana Guru, the greatsocial reformer of Kerala unleashed a powerful movement of reformation

giving voice to the silent democratic urges of the educated anduneducated backward classes. The dominant ideological framework of thefeudal and Brahmanical system which willingly stood subservient to theBritish ruling class were attacked from different quarters and the socialstruggles were being thought of as part of national struggle for freedom.

The theatrical performance strategies developed during this period is tobe examined in the light of the newly emerging social consciousnessamong the educated and the uneducated. In 1909 Kumaran Asan's VeenaPoovu (The Fallen Flower) was a radical break through in the field of

Malayalam poetry. Though the force of C.V. Raman Pilla's KurupillaKalari(1909) did not in any way open the doors of a new age in thehistory of Malayalam theatre, it can be considered as a piece whichcreated a change in the form and content of modern Malayalam dramaticrepresentation. C.V. Raman Pillai pushed out the abundance of music andthe conventional 'Raja Part' (role of King) from his plays. But theideological influence of Kochunni Tampuram (Kalyani Natakam) K.C.Keshava Pillai (Lakshmi Kalyanam), and Munshi Rama Kurup (ChakkiChangaram) can be felt in the plays of C.V. and the major playwrights ofthe period E.V. Krishna Pillai, N.G. Keshava Pillai, N.P. Chellappan Nair

and T.N. Gopinathan Nair. The unconscious gravitational pull of the uppermiddle class ideology, in the above mentioned play-wrights did not allowthem to look downward and even in the midst of the turbulance createdby a new national consciousness, they could not unchain themselves fromthe ardent devotion towards the Maharaja of Tiruvitamkur. Instead theycompeted themselves in paying tributes to the Maharaja through theirplays. Though these play-wrights brought their plays away from thecourtyards of the noble class, their class orientation did not allow them tocome down from the ideological layers of the upper middle class.

It is indeed unjust if we say that C.V. and associates did not criticise thesocial norms of the period. What they actually did was to criticise thevulgarities which they found in the upper middle class society. But theultimate aim of every good character in their plays is a secure job in thegovernment service and the security under the wings of the Maharaja.Their performance patterns cloistered upon the Government offices andthe royal families of Tiruvitamkur and the elite upper middle class. Theforced exile of Swadeshabhimani Ramakrishna Pillai, the upsurge in thenational consciousness just after the World War I and the social reformistmovement to eradicate the caste system-all these struggles andupheavals taking place in different levels of Kerala society did not in anyway make deeper inroads into the sensibilities of these play wrights. It is


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true to some extent that C.V. Raman Pillai managed to absorb the turmoilof the times but to his contemporaries, all these struggles and changeswere something beyond their reach just because of their ideologicalaffinities with the ruling elite class. The performance designs and theirideological underpinnings in Malabar was totally different as explained

earlier and the reasons for this can be seen in the differing socio-politicalformation of the region which was directly under the Madras presidency.The seeds of a radical performance practice has been sown already whichgerminated under the pressures of the anti-feudal and anti-imperialisticstruggles.

The reason why for the first time in the cultural history of Kerala, thestage and performance became a highly conscious social activity in thehands of social reformers and political activists like V.T. Bhattathiripad,M.R.Bhattathiripad, K.Damodaran and M.P. Bhattathiripad (Premji) is that

theatre practice for them was part of the social and political praxis of theperiod in which they lived. Thus the most vigorous and sociallymeaningful period in the history of Malayalam performance began for thefirst time in Kerala from the last phase of the twenties. It must also beremembered at this juncture that in Malabar thesangeethanataka movement had established a non-commercial and nationalisticbase in the twenties and it was in 1929 that the pioneer of this powerfulmovement, Vidwan P. Kelu Nair had his untimely death. In the south aswell, the monotony of the sangeetha natakam was broken in 1930 by oneplay 'Karuna' an adaptation of Kumaran Asan's famous poetic piece. The

adaptation was done by Sri. Brahmavrathan and the great actorsSebastian Kunhu Kunhu Bhagavathar and Ochira Velukutty. Thisadaptation was able to make a radical breakthrough in the sangeethanataka tradition and the implication was far reaching as well. It becamepart of the social reformist movement being led by the precepts of SreeNarayana Guru but the commercial orientation still remained.

The year 1929 is most significant in the sense that V.T. Bhattathiripadwrote his playAdukkalayil Ninnu Arangathekku. It was the first play inMalayalam to have a definite and concrete social objective and which was

produced in 1929 itself as part of a very powerful social reformistmovement led by Namboodiri Yogakshema Sabha. The degenerateBrahmanical ideology and its social structure had its first powerful assaultfrom within for the first time and the most fervent slogan of the periodwas for the transformation of "Brahmans into human beings".

From the 1930's to 1940's Malayalam performance patterns changed soradically that the structure of human experience encapsulated in themunderwent thorough transformation from that of the sangeethanataka style. The most notable among the plays which were produced onbehalf of the Yogakshema Sabha areAdukkalayil Ninnu

Arangathekku (1929-V.T. Bhattathiripad), Marakkutakkullile


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Mahanarakam (1931- M.R. Bhattathiripad) and Rithumathi(1938-M.P.Bhattathiripad). It is no wonder that the very base of thedegenerate Namboodirivalue system was being shattered once and for alland these three plays had the privilege to do such a 'subversive' socialact.

The age-old concept of a coercive aesthetics of "divine bliss" and theBrahmanical appropriation of the cultural life and elemental humanexperience of the majority came to have little significance in the newlyevolved performance praxis which clearly was being determined by thesocial contradictions of the times. Here, art and performance became ahighly conscious and rational social activity for the new playwrights whowere basically social reformers first and foremost. The shaping spirit ofthis newly emerged theatre practice with an aggressive aesthetic andperformance orientation gave birth to another genre totally new to

Malayalam theatre which found its expression in K.Damodaran's Pattabakki(1936). Considered even by bourgeoistheoreticians as the first Communist play in Malayalam Pattabakkirooteditself in the anti-feudal consciousness of the people which was gettingmanifested in the struggles of the peasants against feudal landlordismsupported by the British regime. A new structure of human experience,determined, in the last analysis, by the socio-political reality undertookthe task of vehemently challenging the hegemonic ideology of the times.The result was the emergence of political theatre in Malayalam in the realsense of the term. This new performance pattern which was basically

realistic reached every nook and corner of Kerala to establish a lastingeffect upon the future developments in the radical theatre practice ofKerala.

It is indeed illuminating to have a glimpse at the overall socialbackground of the origin of radical political theatre movement in Kerala.The first world war and its global implications, the October SocialistRevolution, National Independence Struggle under the leadership ofGandhiji and the radical left, and the revolutionary struggles of theworking class and peasants became most powerful in Kerala beginning

from the thirtees. The uttaravada bharana prakshobam (the struggle for aresponsible government) in Tiruvitamkur, the anti-British and anti-feudalstruggles in Malabar came to be co-ordinated. The working class and thepeasants along with anti-communal forces and caste equality movementswere gaining power to shake the foundations of the state machinery. Themovements in which only the educated intellectuals and progressivemiddle class got involved were creative enough to absorb the vastmajority of the toiling masses. In the midst of these massive orientationof the struggles of the people, theatre practice made a sudden leap fromthe trivial conventions and acted as a very powerful weapon in the handsof the fighting people. Thus, it can be surmised that with K.Damodaran's PattabakkiMalayalam theatre practice came of age in 1937


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and the subsequent developments in Kerala theatre very clearly indicatesthe class-contradictions embedded at the core of the fast changing socialformations.

The historic struggles which shook the foundations of the British Empire in

India during the period 1940 to 1947 had their far-reaching implicationsin every sphere of the life of the Indian people. The anti-fascist and anti-imperialist consciousness which spread throughout the length and breadthof India in particular had its repercussions in the field of culture. For thefirst time in India, a mass theatre organisation with a national perspectivegot organised under the leadership of the Communist party of India.Ideological currents of differing perspective began to fight each other fordominance and the theatre practice during the forties in Kerala exhibitsthis struggle with greater clarity than ever. The later developments inMalayalam theatre with differing ideological bias had been slowly being

shaped in the forties. Indian society was becoming ready to face newchallenges in every sphere of life.

As early as in 1936 when the political arena in Kerala was becoming moreand more tense with the peasant landlord antagonism and anti-Britishmovement, the ideological intellectualism of the middle class wasstruggling to find strategies of containment in various fields of creativeactivity. A text-oriented translations of European plays began to have are-emergence with the translations of Ibsen's "Ghosts" by A. BalakrishnaPillai in 1936. It may be argued that this trend had influenced many a

playwright and the influence of Ibsen was a major phenmenon whichguided the development of a theatre tradition in Malayalam; whichalthough had been getting away from the 'superficial reality' of the timesto the 'so called' complexity of the interior life of the individual self. Aserious critique of this trend has to be undertaken to analyse the class-orientation of the playwrights who idealized the individual to the level of'vulgarity' when the whole nation was being swept away by the tides ofanti-British and anti-feudal struggles. The major playwright whopioneered such a text-oriented movement in Malayalam with the strongsupport given by the dramatic texts of Ibsen, was N. Krishna Pillai.

His Bhagna Bhavanam (1942) was indeed created with a desire tochallenge the triviality of the commercial theatre practice which waspolluting the sensibility of the people, especially of the south. Malayalam'drama' became very 'serious' in the hands of N. Krishna Pillai. There werehighly talented actors like P.K. Vikraman Nair, who were also deadagainst the superficial farces being presented and 'enjoyed' by the people.Krishna Pillai's plays were produced with the backbone given by theprominent actors of Tiruvananthapuram. But it must be argued thatpeople in the forties were looking for a theatre practice other than the'farces' and intellectualized plays of N. Krishna Pillai, it is also to be notedthat the tradition of political theatre inaugurated by K.Damodaran's Pattabakkidid not have powerful follow ups in the forties


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when the national atmosphere was surcharged with the Quit IndiaMovement and worker's strikes on a vast scale. But the creative effort inthe field of theatre seems to be curiously aloof. The themes of N. KrishnaPillai's plays do not bear any testimony to the gathering storm. The mainburden of the plays of the forties-man-woman relation-reflects the newly

acquired consciousness of playwrights like N. Krishna Pillai.

The theatre history of the 40's will not be complete if we exclude theintervention of two playwrights, Pulimana Parameswaran Pillai and C.J.Thomas, who were adventurous enough to go beyond the realms ofIbsenist fixation of the period. Pulimana'sSamathwavadi(1944) was acourageous experimentation in theatre practice which can be categorisedas the first expressionist play in Malayalam which for many reasons gotrecognised and produced only in the sixties.

C.J. Thomas, whose play written in the forties,Avan VeendumVarunnu (1949), thematically listens to the second world war and tries tosort out one of the crises which disturbed the social life of Kerala-Absentee-husbandism. Here was a playwright who was struggling tointeriorise the spirit of Greek Tragedy and this intense personalisation ofhuman experience gave rise to his later plays like, 1128 il crime27andAa manushyan nee thanne which indeed, from a creativeperspective paved the way for future theatre of experimentation in Keralaperformance practice.

From 1942 to 1947 is a period of intense political activity resulting inIndian Independence. With the transfer of power and establishment ofIndian Government at the centre and states, things changed rapidly. Theinhuman massacre of minorities and the subsequent exchange ofpopulation cast a shadow too deep for any other thought and it was in thefifties that the country started settling down.

The theatre of the forties in the Indian context raises many intriguingquestions yet to be answered not only by our theatre practitioners butalso by the cultural historians of India. What is most significant is the

necessity felt by the theatre activists and progressive politicalorganizations to have a national theatre organization with a clear-cutnational perspective based on anti-fascist and anti-imperialist ideologicalupsurge in the consciousness of the people of India. Almost all theregional theatre practices had been influenced by this new development inthe national consciousness. The mass organizational framework of theIndian National People's Theatre Association (IPTA) contributed to thedevelopment of eminent theatre personalities like Manmathanath Rai,K.A. Abbas, Shanti Vardhan, Shambu Mitra, Balraj Sahni Utpal Dutt,Ritwik Ghatak, Dena Gandhi, Habib Tanveer, Sheela Bhatia and manyothers who later, after the dismemberment of IPTA went in search ofindividual styles of their own. It was after the transfer of power to the


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Indian ruling class that these individuals developed their own theatricalpatterns. Kerala theatre and performance in the forties did not listen tothe call of the forceful and revolutionary performance patterns which wereanti-fascist and anti-imperialist and, all the more, progressivelysubversive. Instead of this, highly individualised and European-

orientedexperimentation in the creation of the dramatic texts were themain concern of the prominent play-wrights of the period.

But, by 1949, seeds were sown for the future furthering and developmentof radical theatre practice by progressive play-wrights like EdasseriGovindan Nair (Kootukrishi-1949). The presentation of this play heraldeda revitalised and organised theatre culture especially in Malabar.

The organized theatre movement in Malabar under the banner ofMalabarKendra Kalasamithican be looked upon as the logical continuity of the

political theatre movement in Kerala inaugurated by K.Damodaran's Pattabakki. Apart from these bright patches the stage in theforties in Kerala was dominated by trivial farces and melodramaticpresentations overburdened with music and sentimental songs.

But the fifties in Malayalam theatre presents a very different picture andthe dominance of the theatre culture of the Indian People's TheatreAssociation (IPTA) had given impetus to a radical collectivity whichshaped innumerable amateur theatre groups in Kerala, mostly under theguidance of the Communist party. The most significant aspect of the

impact of IPTA, it can be argued, is that for the first time in Kerala, theCommunist party formulated a cultural policy and programmes of its own.What came as a result was another theatre organisation similar to thatofMalabar Kendra Kala Samithi: K.P.A.C. (Kerala People's Arts Club)which spearheaded a powerful people's theatre movement in Kerala. Theagitprop nature of the most prominent of the plays produced byK.P.A.C., Ningalenne Communistakki, was part and parcel of theCommunist movement in Kerala and the performance design of the playhad immediate impact upon the audience. The reasons for theunprecedented success of this play may be many, apart from its ban by

the state apparatus, Thoppil Bhasi, thus became a cult figure in the worldof Malayalam theatre mainly with this play and playslike Surveykallu, Mutiyanaya Puthran, Mooladhanam,Aswamedham etc.Play-wrights like P.J. Antony (Chakravalam) were also moving fast withthe fervent times. Thoppil Bhasi whose revolutionary theatre practice hadcome to a standstill when he diverted his attention from the struggles ofthe people gaining ground and he slowly switched over to the populistcommercial theatre practice, the evidence of which can be seen inPuthiya

Akasam Puthiya Bhoomi(1958).

In the meanwhile, Malabar Kendra Kala Samithiwas developing into apowerful theatrical weapon of the people presenting plays by Cherukad,


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K.T. Mohammed, E.K. Ayamu and Mohammed Yoosuf, Thikkodiyan, P.C.Kuttikrishnan and a host of others who became very popular mainly inMalabar. The period from 1950 to 1957 has to be examined in the light ofthe powerful progressive theatre movement developed by Malabar KendraKala Samithi. This theatre movement of the left with definite ideological

affinities with the IPTA and having its dynamic nucleus in

Kozhikode conducted theatre festivals which influenced the futuredevelopments in radical theatre practice in Kerala. In a way, it was thebeginning of a cultural renaissance in Malabar under the leadershipofMalabar Kendra Kala Samithi, which did not concentrate on theatrepractice alone but on all other cultural fronts. It was the era in which thepeople's library movement - Kerala GranthaSalaSangham - formulatedits programmes which were basically an attempt to raise theconsciousness of the people in the villages and almost all the libraries and

reading rooms thus conceived had a theatre organization, attached tothem. This cultural action for freedom, in the broadest sense, unleashedthe hidden potential of the village communities in Malabar. The idea ofvillage theatre gatherings gained momentum and the annual theatrefestivals conducted by the Malabar Kendra Kala Samithiwere not justtheatre festivals but highly participatory social festivals and the plays andperformances which revitalized the theatre culture of the people ofMalabar need worth mentioning in this context.Jeevitham, Prasavikkatha

Amma, Nirahara Samaram, Pazhaya Bandham, Kanyadanam (all byThikkodiyan), MannumPennum, TheeKonduKalikkaruthu (P.C.

Kuttikrishnan- Uroob), Tharavatitham, Sneha Bhandhangal, ManushyaHridayangal,Janma Bhoomi, (all by Cherukad); KaravattaPasu, IthuBoomiyanu, Velichum Vilakkannveshikkunnu, ManushyanKaragrihathilanuPuthiya Veedu, Rathri Vandikal, NjanPetikkunnu, Chuvanna Gatikaram (all by K.T.Mohammed); KandamVecha Kottu (Mohammed Yoosuf); TharavadumMadissilayum (P.N.M. Alikkoya); Prabhatham Chuvanna Theruvil(A.K.Puthiyangadi) and so many other plays were either meant forpresentation during the great theatre festivals or for presenting beforevillage communities. Almost all the efforts in this unprecedented

regeneration and socialisation of theatre and cultural practice weredirectly inspired by the political process of the Communist movement inKerala in the forties and fifties. The leadership given by this movementhas not been able to become hegemonic in the field of culture for a longperiod and the activities of the Malabar Kendra Kala Samithiceased toexist even though it has laid the foundation for a fervent amateur theatremovement in Kerala which still retains its spirit to a limited extent. It canbe clearly seen that the spirit of this cultural renaissance still inspires thetheatre practices mainly in the districts of Kannur and Kozhikode. Theideological undercurrents that sustains such a 'subversive' theatricalpotential remains a serious area of socio-political and cultural research.


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In the south of Kerala as well, the fifties have given rise to certainprogressive trends in theatre culture. The amateur theatre practice wasmainly centred upon the plays of T.N. Gopinathan Nair. Another attempt,which did not last for long was the formation ofNavasamskaraSamithiwhich reviewed the presentation of play likeAvan Veendum

Varunnu (C.J. Thomas), what matters most in this context is the activeparticipation of eminent theatre personalities like K.V. Neelankandan Nair,P.K. Veeraraghavan Nair and P.K. Vikraman Nair to accelerate the processof creating a theatre atmosphere which could basically challenge andchange the trivial theatrical practices of the times. But the impact of theirefforts did not last long even though the stage in Tiruvananthapuram didproduce serious presentations like Thoovalum Thoombayum (P.K.Veeraraghavan Nair),Nashtakkatchavadam (C.N. SreekantanNair) Kunhali Marakkar(K. Padmanabhan Nair). Commercial theatrepractice had a tremendous appeal among the masses especially in the

south in the fifties for one reason or other.

Just like 1947 in the national context, 1957 marks a turning point in theuninterrupted narrative mode of Kerala performance practice. Thetransfer of power in 1947 which inspired a sudden leap in the hopes andaspirations of the people of India came to nothing and the newly gainedfreedom gave great impetus to a creative upsurge and the theatrebecame powerful weapon in the hands of the people. The state machinerydid indeed formulate strategies of containment by organising its ownideological platforms like Kendra SangeethaNatakaAcademy. The

revolutionary theatre praxis of the IPTA died down and the era ofindividualistic theatre practice came to dominate the ideologicalsuperstructure of serious theatre attempts. But the fifties in Kerala up tothe formation of the first Communist ministry, did in fact provide a firmbase for a radical theatre culture which got uprooted in the later fifties. Avery clear divide in the political and cultural life of the people of Keralabecame wider and wider. The so-called 'liberation struggle' in 1959 withits communal and anti-people ideology came to dominate the intellectuallife of the individualist cultural activists. Commercial theatre activity onceagain started giving trivial entertainment patterns to the masses and a

society divided into different ideological domains started doingexperiments in theatre practice influenced by decadent Europeanperformance patterns. K.P.A.C. which was formally affiliated with theCommunist movement slowly drifted away from its original moorings tothe sphere of commercial theatre. Another trend setter was N.N. Pillaiwho formulated highly populist theatre culture which made deeperinroads into the public sphere of a political consciousness of the masses.

The only serious venture in the midst of innumerable populist commercialtheatre practice was the work of C.N. Sreekantan Nair, who made alandmark in the history of post independent Malayalam theatre with histrilogy based in Ramayana.KanchanaSita by C.N. initiates a different


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performance pattern based on the influences from European and Indianclassical theatre tradition. The two other plays in the trilogy written in theseventies Saketham and Lanka Lekshmihave at its rational kernel themajor ethnic contradiction, that of Arya and Dravida. The tragic trilogytakes

Malayalam theatre and performance to a highly individualistic plane withserious theatrical implications. C.N. Sreekantan Nair in fact had tried toformulate his own performance theory which inspired serious individualistdramatists and theatre activists like G. Sankara Pillai and KavalamNarayana Panickar to experiment and codify their theatre practices inmeaningful ways.

The decline of the radical progressive theatre practice after the infamous'liberation struggle' of 1959 gave added energy and enthusiasm to those

theatre activists who were deliberately maintaining strategies of silencewhen social life in Kerala was being shaken by the forces of degeneratecommunal and ruling class political ideologies. The political unconscious ofthese theatre activists were being ruled by the ideology of the ruling classand the result was a concerted effort to push aside 'politics' from theatre.'Purity of theatre', as for these individualistic intellectuals and playwrightslike C.N. Sreekantan Nair, M. Govindan, G. Sankara Pillai, G. Arvindan,M.V. Devan, Kavalam Narayana Panickar and a host of others consisted inabolishing political ideologies that might creep into their creativeprocesses. Theatre or arts in general for them was nothing other than the

specific disciplines concerned. This intellectual elitism did make itsheadway in the absence of a powerful people's theatre movement directlyinspired by the social praxis of the people in the sixties. Professional andcommercial theatre groups in Kerala in the sixties made a concerted effortto liberate themselves from the sentimental and melodramaticperformance patterns to a plane of pseudo intellectualism to suit theideological make up of the political middle class audience. This alone wasnot enough for them to become commercially successful and thereforethey designed their performance structure in such a way that the cheapsentiments of the masses are also aroused.

But the sixties specifically brought serious theatre activities into a sphereof academic experimentation and the beginning of this movement wasmade in Delhi in 1957 by the establishment of the National School ofDrama with assistance from UNESCO. Alkazi and the National School ofDrama formulated certain performance strategies which had far reachingconsequences. Theatre came to be looked upon as an ensemble art andtheatre practice became highly scientific with academic systematization.The above mentioned intellectual elite of Kerala also subscribed to theacademic perspectives of the new trend in theatre. A novel venture toorganize nataka kalaris in which theatre practice became highly practicaloriented and actor's training and technical aspects connected with


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presentation of plays were treated with utmost seriousness. The ideologyof performance and theatre practice underwent drastic changes in thisdecade and the unprecedented assistance given by the State and CentralSangeetha Nataka Academies to these ventures were accepted withoutany reservation whatsoever. What is positive in this context is the

seriousness given to theatre practice when the professional, commercialand political theatre in Kerala were playing with trivialities. What is moreimportant in this highly charged academic theatre practice dominating the'high' cultural life of the people is the infiltration of the ruling classideology in the most subtle manner which in the long run perverts theorganic cultural heritage of the people. This aspect of unconsciousideological penetration demands specialised research and a perception isgaining ground that theatre activity disconnected with the day to day lifeand struggles of the people become meaningful only to those who aresubservient to the political and cultural hegemony of the Indian ruling

class.

The sixties in Kerala very clearly brings before us the complex picture ofserious cultural practice making headway into two extremely divergentand dominant performance strategies determined by a social structurethat has obviously become polarised into left and right politicalframeworks. The search for 'Indianness' in the theatre became thedominant trend and was supported by the ruling class cultural agencies aswell as by imperialist cultural corporations like Ford foundation. In Kerala,theatre activists like Kavalam Narayana Panickar and G. Sankara Pillai

wholeheartedly welcomed this new enthusiasm to further theirexperimentation in Malayalam performance practice. G. Sankara Pillai'sidea of a meaningful theatre found its fruitful culmination in the formationof the 'School of Drama' as an academic department under the Universityof Calicut. This has to be taken very seriously as the immense potential ofsuch a department can never go unnoticed. The seventies also finds theaugmentation of a performance strategy which did influence the theatreactivists and cultural workers of Kerala who were ready to disregard withcontempt the political forces at work in the society. The socalled thanathu nataka vedi(indigenous theatre) and its performance

patterns derived from the folk and classical theatre tradition of Kerala wasconsidered by people as pseudo-intellectual exercises with export orientedmotives. But the unprecedented silence in the field of people's theatrepractice was violently shaken by the ultra-radical left and an extremistperformance pattern began to develop with elemental subversivepotential. The political theatre practice in the seventies with its extremistovertones did indeed open the eyes of the established left which has lostits hegemony in the cultural front in Kerala and on a national level afterthe disruption of Indian People's Theatre Association. The impact ofBaby's Natugaddika became much more popular than the revivalistperformance models of Kavalam and his associates. The ultra-left theatrepractice on the seventies inspired by a mechanical understanding of


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Bertolt Brecht and other Communist play-wrights also was sectarian in itsstrategies of presentation and thus had come to a halt without muchpolitical or theatrical reverberation.

But the theatre of the people can never be dead and this is what is being

seen in the contemporary developments taking place on a national level.All the pseudo-intellectual experimentations in theatre get nowhere intothe serious domain of peoples' consciousness and all the avant-gardeexperiments in Kerala theatre has come to nothing other than creating anempty space which gradually is being occupied by a theatre consciousnessthat demands the participation of the oppressed.

There indeed is a reawakening of the people's theatre practice on anational level in the form of a new performance pattern which terms itselfas street theatre. Kerala theatre has also entered into this peoples' arena

and the martyrdom of Safdar Hashmi ofjana natya manch once againreminds the theatre activists through out India that class-struggle in thesphere of culture will continue and theatre will again be a powerfulweapon in the hands of the oppressed and the 'rehearsals of revolution'will all the time disturb the 'peaceful' slumber of the oppressor.

Documents

The Modern Malayalam Theatre a Brief Survey