Twist In The Folktale

Each of the playwrights in this collection takes a folktale and turns it into a contemporary experimental play intervening in the traditional material and reshaping conventions from an urban perspective. Although the folk and rural element remain embedded in the body of the narratives it is interesting to note the shifts and intersections which occur in the process of rendering folklore as a presentday performative text. Jokumaraswami by leading Kannada playwright and poet Chandrasekhar Kambar is a vibrant earthy play which creatively reworks the folk myth of a phallic god of fertility into a powerfully contemporary antifeudal message. Pebet is a folktale about a mother bird fighting to protect her children from a predatory cat politicized by H. Kanhailal who transforms this familiar story into a struggle against the political and cultural colonization of Manipur. Charandas Chor by veteran playwrightdirector Habib Tanvir performed by Naya Theatre s Chattisgarhi folk artists is a contemporary Indian classic depicting the irrepressible folk hero and honest thief Charandas a Robin Hood figure who charms his way into everyone s heart.