"Learning from Performance: Epic Narrative in Regional Theatre Traditions of South India" a lecture by Paula Richman at Kamaladevi Complex, India International Centre (IIC), Lodhi Estate > 6:30pm on 7th September 2013

Time : 6:30 pm - 8:00 pm

Entry : Free (Seating on First-Come First-Served basis)
Note : Call 011-24619431 (IIC) to re-confirm any last minute change or cancellation of the event.

Place : Seminar Hall II & III, Kamaladevi Complex, India International Centre (IIC), 40 Max Muller Marg, Lodhi Estate, New Delhi-110003
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Area : Lodhi Road Area Events

Event Description : 'Learning from Performance: Epic Narrative in Regional Theatre Traditions of South India' a lecture by Paula Richman.

Moderator : Rustom Bharucha

Background : LILA’s Special Lectures programme is envisaged to feature very eminent experts in various fields, so that their insights may be translated into creative methodologies. 

About the Speaker : Paula Richman is the Danforth Professor of South Asian Religions at Oberlin College in Ohio, USA. She has published two monographs on Tamil poetry, one focusing on Manimekalai, a 6th century Buddhist epic in Tamil and the other on the Pillaittamil genre in which a deity or saint is addressed in the form of a child.  She has edited and contributed to 3 volumes on Ramayana tradition - Many Ramayanas, the Diversity of a South Asian Narrative Tradition and Questioning Ramayanas, a South Asian Tradition are both available in paperback from Oxford University Press, New Delhi. She is currently working on a new project that explores how incidents from the Ramayana tradition have been staged in theatrical genres such as Yakshagana, Kattaikkuttu, and Nangiar Kuttu. Dr. Richman has been coming to India for language study and research since 1978. She will be a visiting scholar at the Jawaharlal Nehru Institute for Advanced Studies this year.
The Lecture: We all know that narrative changes as it moves from page to stage, but what kinds of influences, conventions, and concerns shape narrative when it comes from texts such as the Ramayana? How do the conventions of particular theatrical genres shape the ways in which epic incidents get enacted and interpreted? Which characters come to life most vividly in dance-dramas in open air theatres, puppet plays, or proscenium stages?  Which incidents seem dated or out of date and which ones continue to speak to spectators today? This talk reflects on the fixed and fluid aspects of enacting epic incidents in India today, with examples drawn from Yakshagana (Karnataka), Kattaikkuttu (Tamilnadu), Nangiar Kuttu (Kerala), and Ramlila (north and central India).

About the Moderator : Rustom Bharucha, Professor at the School of Arts and Aesthetics, JNU, will introduce the speaker and moderate the discussion. His areas of interest are interculturalism, globalization, theatre, secularism, the politics of faith, public culture, and oral history. As a director, dramaturge, and writer he has been engaged in a series of interventions in the educational, activist, performance and fine arts sectors in different parts of India as well as in the Philippines, South Africa, Brazil, the United States and the Netherlands. He has directed many plays at the grassroots cultural organization Ninasam in Karnataka. More recently, he has worked as a project director of the Arna-Jharna Museum of the Desert in Jodhpur, Rajasthan, devoted to the study of traditional knowledge. For many years, he was an Advisor for the Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development in the Netherlands, which enabled him to network different international projects and initiatives.

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