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'Karna' by National School of Drama, India


Director: Heisnam Kanhailal

Playwright: Heisnam Kanhailal

Institution: National School of Drama, India

Venue: Experimental Theatre

Time: 19:30, May 19, 2011

Event: ATEC 6th International Forum




Director’s Notes

The performance is woven into a text that reflects the presence of both the pre-modern and post-modern elements in balancing the textual presentation and the artistic process in equilibrium. This is a personally valued medium of an individualized theatre. Therefore the system becomes naturally new and strange, particularly to the students of an institutional theatre. However, I do acknowledge the openness and receptive faculty of the students who remove the inhibition themselves in the attitude of a child who tends to play forever. This is the strength on their part. That's how we could make sense of a trajectory along which we would learn how to justify the efficacy a new sense of art amidst imperfections, limitations and circumstances. The performance itself is a testimony to this learning process that is located within work-in-progress framework not to be assessed as a finished product of public theatre.




Synopsis

Karna is defeated and killed in the battle. His soul responds to the cry of Radha, the fostered mother:

O mother, I was not set within the body and spirit of a Sudra, the outcaste by my divine author, the great Veda Vyas. However, I was solely identified as Sudra throughout my life whose anguish and pain failed to represent that of the exploited. My suffering and sacrifice remained personal.

Oh! I became an instrument of divine strategy to glorify and consolidate the divine class.

Alas! Any historical sense of identifying my suffering with my people was not to be!

O mother, receive me now in your womb for the next Mahabharata of the under-priviledged when it comes out to be.