Comments on: Denigrating Indian Culture: the Girish Karnad Way Part 1

By: sk babar ali

sk babar ali — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 18:21:13 +0000

sir,
i wish i could have all the articles you wrote on Mr. Girish Karnad.
if you please send me those valuable things, i will be highly grateful.

By: P.D.Kulkarni

P.D.Kulkarni — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 22:51:48 +0000

Seems the only critic in the world lashing all the time the best Indian English dramatist. Readable opinions - though. Any opinion on Karnad’s “The Dreams of Tipu Sultan” and “Bali: the Sacrifice”? and on his Two Monologues?

Eagerly awaiting the positive reply.
P.D.Kulkarni
http://www.freewebs.com/indiandrama

By: Gavarappan Baskaran

Gavarappan Baskaran — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 10:12:40 +0000

Wonderful Sandeep.
It is a pleasure reading you in the Girish Karnad way. I have been guiding scholars on Indian English Drama for the fifteen years. Attemptswere made by them on so many topics - Gender relations, folklore, culture, history, contemporaniety, post colonial elements, Performance and the recent one is comparing Karnad with Tamil theatre writer Sundara Ramaswamy. Your write up would be useful and interesting too. It becomes inevitable that one cannot miss writing the culture in ahatever the genre may be.

By: lavanya

lavanya — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 05:45:31 +0000

can any 1 here give me some more information about G.KARNAD’s HAYAVADANA?

By: Chintan

Chintan — Sun, 22 Apr 2007 06:04:18 +0000

To know about Indian Culture.

It’s a great to understand and know about.

http://indiankulture.blogspot.com/

Regards

By: Seriously Sandeep » Blog Archive » Appreciating a Karnad Play

Seriously Sandeep » Blog Archive » Appreciating a Karnad Play — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 10:10:56 +0000

[...] Related Posts: My Series on Girish Karnad’s Plays. [...]

By: INI Signal - » Appreciating a Karnad Play

INI Signal - » Appreciating a Karnad Play — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 10:08:47 +0000

[...] Related Posts: My Series on Girish Karnad’s Plays. The plot interestingly sounds similar to a small episode that occurs in Ta Ra Su’s Kannada masterpiece, Hamsageethe. The episode deals with a priest of a Devi (generally, Goddess Parvati) temple whose devotion to the Goddess is unparalleled. The climax of this episode is when the Goddess herself saves the priest from shame and ignominy. The priest ends his life after learning this. This is touchingly told in the novel. Given Ta Ra Su’s mastery over the pen, it moves you to tears.Not that Karnad has been inspired by, or copied from this. It turns out, he actually has borrowed from a folktale set in Chitradurga, the same setting for Ta Ra Su’s Hamsageethe. I introduced the comparison by way of a parallel. [...]

By: preeti

preeti — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 05:20:44 +0000

all i have come to know with little reading on karnad is that he is one of the post colonial indian writer with his uncanny ability to remake past within contemporary vision.i wish to read his work yayati in english translation.Is it available? From where can i get it

By: Charles Barton

Charles Barton — Sun, 18 Feb 2007 14:27:07 +0000

I was introduced to the work of Girish Karnad by a friend, a Tamil literary scholar who teaches English. We first discussed “Nagamandala,” and I found it a facinating expression of the delimas posed by the cultural role assigned to Indian women. Indian women are socialized to be loyal to their husbands, but within the bonds of marriage to be sexually unrepressed. This creates a conflict between women’s cultural idenities, and their sexual needs. Kanard uses Indian folklore to elisit the conflict. I do not se him denigating Indian culture by doing so.

There is no doubt that Kanard is influanced by Western culture including existentualisam. there is more than a little influance of Sartre in “A Heap of Broken Images.” But Kanard is on to something. I noted in my own blog:

“I recently have looking at the impact of Islam on Hindu civilization. Muslims Conquored Northern India around a thousand years ago. The impact on Hindu culture of the Muslim conquest, at least in Nothern India was quite dramatic. No Hindu temple in the area of Muslim conquest is more than 300 years old. This cut off age is directly related to the emergance of British rule in India, as the British East India Company gradually surplanted Muslim rule.

The cultural impact of British rule on Hindu civilization cannot be underestimated. The British liberated the Hindus of India from the truely oppressive rule of their previous Muslim overlords. After 700 years of Muslim rule, this liberation gave Hindu civilization a new beginning. At the same time that renews civilization found itself in a cultural dialogue with their British overlords, and through the British with the West. For better or for worse the English language and the whole of Western civilization haxs taken root in the Indian Soul. This westernization has not displaced the Hindu idenity, rather it has become an aspect of the self of the educated Indian, a self which is in dynamic tension between renewed traditional India, and the western English language heritage.

Girish Karnad understands this devision of the Indian self.

By: Smitha

Smitha — Mon, 12 Feb 2007 07:17:32 +0000

Hi!
I think your knowledge on Karnad and Existentialism is profound. I would appreicte it if you could tell me more about the Existentialist aspect of Karnad’s plays.