Flowers
Yesterday we went across to Prithvi to see Girish Karnad’s new play, Flowers. Tickets were sold out - Saturday night in Juhu, and it’s a Karnad play after all - but past experience has shown us that someone or the other is generally looking to sell extra tickets, and yes, we were in luck. One by one, we got our tickets, and as we were early, we also managed to get good seats - mid-level this time, as Arundhati Nag advised those of us standing in line, because of the unusual set design.
There was the smoky fragrance of dhoop around us, and long ropes of blue light, as we waited for the play to begin. We didn’t have to wait long though, as plays at Prithvi generally start on time.
This Rangashankara and Rage co-production has been directed by Roysten Abel with Rajit Kapoor performing the 90-minute monologue. The visually breathtaking set design, by Roysten Abel and executed by Shashidhar Adapa and Selva Kumar, consists of an elevated platform, such that the solitary character seated on it appears almost suspended in the air. Below him, on a stage scattered with tiny white jasmines, is an urli decorated with flower garlands. Just visible, in the shadowy darkness behind the urli, is a heap of jasmine flowers sloping gently over a Lingam.
The man sitting on the platform stands up, turns around to face us and begins to speak. The setting is a temple, and the man is standing above the temple tank. He is the temple priest who has been worshipping the Lingam for years, decorating it with fresh flowers every day, softening the black stone with daily worship, talking to it, even discussing contemporary politics with it. A married man, he lives with a devoted wife, children and old parents. One day a courtesan, Chandravati, comes to offer prayers at the temple. The priest is attracted to her. One day, when she does not appear in the temple, he goes to her house to find out the reason for her absence. She tells him that she is having her menstrual period. When he visits her house again, after two days, she has had her cleansing bath. She invites him to decorate her naked body with ropes of flowers, the way he has always been decorating the Lingam. Their affair continues like this, but one day, on the night of the play, the priest must confront his powerful conflicts - the pull of love on one side, and duty on the other; his love for Chandravati, his love for the Lingam, his loyalty to his chieftain, and his loyalty to his wife.
It’s not Karnad’s most powerful play - my favourites are Tughlak, Hayavadana, Nagamandala and Taledanda. I also felt that its English title, Flowers, didn’t quite fit for a play with such a serious theme. Nevertheless, it’s a beautiful, moving work, with some superbly crafted sentences, a rising sense of conflict, and a fine, controlled plot - the hallmark of Karnad’s best work.
But for a 90-minute monologue, Rajit Kapoor’s performance was disappointingly lacking in feeling and energy. At times, he seemed to be reciting his lines, rather than enacting them with the passion of a conflicted, desperate man. I thought the play deserved better.
The setting seems very similar to U R Anathamurthy’s Samskara. are there more connections between the two?
Comment by B — March 26, 2007 @ 3:42 am
Why in Art, this obssession with baser instincts of man? I am not a prude and have a very high regard for Girish Karnad. Can we not go beyond the female flesh ?
Comment by Mahadevan — March 26, 2007 @ 11:19 am
I haven’t seen Tuglaq, but read it, and couldn’t believe at first that Karnad could bring it to life the way he did with those dialogs. Then I read it again.
Comment by Anil — March 29, 2007 @ 12:42 am
You have saved my time and money , as clearly told , english version of FLOWER would have lost its essence , it will imitation of Mallige by KAKADA flower , if you know Kannada you will understand my point
Comment by umesha — June 14, 2007 @ 7:24 am
Mallige Vs Kakada
Comment by umesha — June 14, 2007 @ 7:55 am
…………………
“Why in Art, this obssession with baser instincts of man? I am not a prude and have a very high regard for Girish Karnad. Can we not go beyond the female flesh?”
………………
That’s the whole point!
Nothing is base or noble in art, unless personal emotions and perceptions are ascribed to an act, thought, idea or object.
It’s not about female flesh but more about the treatment of the subject. It’s about a metaphor for temptation, in it’s most basic form, and how naked [in some cases, literally] we can get in examining an issue or a concept.
Hard as one might try, to evade the primal and to don the garb of vain sophistication, we merely touch the reflection of a truth, not the truth itself. The human has not become an ‘evolved’ being because of the superficial accretions brought upon by ‘civilization’.
For e.g. you, Mahadevan, are not rendered any more ‘decent’ than another man just because you express a distaste for ‘baser instincts’. I’d say you just have an incomplete and unhealthy notion of our primeval instincts, of nakedness in general. Or perhaps you are shy to admit in public that you are such a slave to it. So either you are expressing a flawed perception that has been force-fed by the world (which, surely, is not your fault at all) or you are merely trying to gain [probably female] approval by expressing thus.
The artist merely questions [our relationship with] the real self and the space that has come to exist between. So it’s better to get to the core and examine human values there, than to beat around with ornamental fluff, which can be mildly entertaining yet prove no real purpose in the end.
Take your pick.
Comment by Srikanth — June 16, 2007 @ 10:08 am
this is a very different exploration in the psyche of the said upperpicked. need to persue.
Comment by vivek v joshi — January 15, 2008 @ 10:27 am