Indian Response to Shakespeare

Indian Response to Shakespeare
Author: Ed. Basavaraj Naikar
Publisher: Atlantic Publishers & Dist
Total Pages: 276
Release: 2002
Genre: Criticism
ISBN: 9788126900787

Essays Collected In This Anthology Offer Glimpses Of Indian Response To Shakespeare, The Myriad Minded Genius Of The World. Shakespeare Has Influenced The Indian Readers, Researchers, Translators, Directors And Actors Very Deeply. The Indian Scholars With Various Cultural And Linguistic Backgrounds Have Tried To Appropriate The Beauty And Meaning Of Shakespeareana In Their Own Way Like The Five Blind Men In The Buddha'S Story Trying To Understand The Elephant And Shown The Way To The Future Scholars Of India To Pursue Fruitfully.Among The Contributors To This Volume Are Both The Senior And The Younger Scholars Of India Like R.S. Pathak, Mohit K. Ray, Shweta Khanna, Basavaraj Naikar, Rama Kundu, O.P. Budholia, Sudhir Dixit, Sahdeo Chougule, B.G. Tandon, Nivedita Mukerjee, Shabiba Khan And Narasimha Ramayya, Who Have Dealt With Various Aspects Of Shakespearean Drama In The Indian Context.

Performing Shakespeare in India

Performing Shakespeare in India
Author: Shormishtha Panja
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 329
Release: 2024-07-20
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 9356405387

This book is envisaged as an intervention in the ongoing explorations in social and cultural history, into questions of what constitutes Indianness for the colonial and the postcolonial subject and the role that Shakespeare plays in this identity formation. Performing Shakespeare in India presents studies of Indian Shakespeare adaptations on stage, on screen, on OTT platforms, in translation, in visual culture and in digital humanities and examines the ways in which these construct Indianness. Shakespeare in India has had multiple local interpretations in different media and equally wide-ranging responses, be it the celebration of Shakespeare as a bishwokobi (world poet) in 19th-century Bengal, be it in the elusive adaptation of Shakespeare in Meitei and Tangkhul tribal art forms in Manipur, or be it in the clamour of a boisterous Bollywood musical. In the response of diasporic theatre professionals, or in Telugu and Kannada translations, whether resisted or accepted with open arms, Shakespeare in India has had multiple local interpretations in different media. All the essays are connected by the common thread of extraordinary negotiations of postcolonial identity formation in language, in politics, in social and cultural practices, or in art forms.

Shakespeare Studies in Colonial Bengal

Shakespeare Studies in Colonial Bengal
Author: Hema Dahiya
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 230
Release: 2014-07-03
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 144386353X

Shakespeare Studies in Colonial Bengal: The Early Phase represents an important direction in the area of historical research on the role of English education in India, particularly with regards to Shakespeare studies at the Hindu College, the first native college of European education in Calcutta, the capital city of British India during the nineteenth century. Focusing on the developments that led to the introduction of English education in India, Dr Dahiya’s book highlights the pioneering role that the eminent Shakespeare teachers at Hindu College, namely Henry Derozio, D.L. Richardson and H.M. Percival, played in accelerating the movement of the Bengal Renaissance. Drawing on available information about colonial Bengal, the book exposes both the angular interpretations of Shakespeare by fanatical scholars on both sides of the cultural divide, and the serious limitations of the present-day reductive theory of postcolonialism, emphasizing how in both cases such interpretations led to distorted readings of Shakespeare. Offering a comprehensive account of how English education in India came to be introduced in an atmosphere of clashing ideas and conflicting interests emanating from various forces at work in the early nineteenth century, Shakespeare Studies in Colonial Bengal places, in a normative perspective, the part played by each major actor in this highly-contested historical context, including the Christian missionaries, British orientalists, Macaulay’s Minute, the secular duo of Rammohan Roy and David Hare, and, above all, the Shakespeare teachers at Hindu College, the first native institution of European education in India.

Shakespeare and Indian Theatre

Shakespeare and Indian Theatre
Author: Vikram Singh Thakur
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 232
Release: 2021-12-30
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9389812658

This book looks at adaptations, translations and performance of Shakespeare's productions in India from the mid-18th century, when British officers in India staged Shakespeare's plays along with other English playwrights for entertainment, through various Indian adaptations of his plays during the colonial period to post-Independence period. It studies Shakespeare in Bengali and Parsi theatre at length. Other theatre traditions, such as Marathi, Kannada, Malayalam and Hindi, have been included. The book dwells on the fascinating story of the languages of India that have absorbed Shakespeare's work and have transformed the original educated Indian's Shakespeare into the popular Shakespeare practice of the 19th and 20th centuries, and the unique urban-folkish tradition in postcolonial India.

English Studies in India

English Studies in India
Author: Banibrata Mahanta
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 231
Release: 2018-11-03
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9811315256

This volume is a collection of scholarly papers that explore the complex issues concerning English Studies in the present Indian context. The discussions in this volume range from historical perspectives to classroom-specific pedagogies, from sociological and political hierarchies to the dynamics of intellectual development in the English language environment. Interrogating both policy and practice pertaining to English Studies in the context of Indian society, culture, history, literature and governance, the chapters seek to formulate contemporary perspectives to these debates and envision alternative possibilities. Since the introduction of English to India more than 2 centuries ago, the language has transmuted the very fabric of Indian society, culture, history, literature and governance. The idea of India cannot be conceived in its entirety without taking into consideration the epistemological role that English has played in its formation. The present globalized world order has added dimensions to English Studies which are radically different from those of India’s colonial and postcolonial past. It is therefore imperative that the multitudinous shades and shadows of the discipline be re-examined with inputs drawn from the present context. This volume is for scholars and researchers of English literature and language studies, linguistics, and culture studies, and others interested in exploring new paradigms of engagement with the disciplinary formulation of English Studies in India.

Sri Aurobindo and Shakespeare

Sri Aurobindo and Shakespeare
Author: Dr. Meenu Sodhi Sharma
Publisher: Prabhat Prakashan
Total Pages: 325
Release: 2022-06-16
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9394534970

In this book an attempt has been made to compare the two legendary writers by comparing the eastern way of thinking with the western way. Shakespeare is amongst the writers Sri Aurobindo holds in high esteem. Sri Aurobindo’s admiration for the great dramatist resulted in obvious Shakespearean influences on him. He adopts for his plays Elizabethan model of drama perfected by Shakespeare’s genius. Shakespeare’s influence is traceable also in Sri Aurobindo’s sonnets. It is said that Sri Aurobindo had Shakespearean literature on his bed-side when he left his mortal remains. Both the great writers were not satisfied by merely holding mirror to the nature but due to their greater and deeper life power, they recreated the human life in its beauty and completeness. Therefore, there is an obvious need to compare and contrast Shakeapeare and Sri Aurobindo so as to bring out affinities that may be there between their creative ideal and vision as well as their poetic and dramatic art, along with the former’s influence on the later. In this book an attempt has been made to fulfill the need and to contribute, in some measure to the appreciation of Sri Aurobindo’s poetry and plays. It also briefly touches upon Indian response to Shakespeare. It focuses mainly on Sri Aurobindo’s numerous insights and critical observations on him. To sum up writings of the two such outstanding writers, who represent two very different ways of thinking. On one hand Shakespeare potrays lot of blood shed, gory tales and a wild kind of poetic justice in his writings, but on the other hand Sri Aurobindo truely follows Indian ethos of non violence or ‘Ahimsa’. The author underlines the stark similarities and differences in both the writer’s exploring their plays and sonnets. The structure of plays and sonnets may be same of both the greatest minds but ethos and personna ingrained in their writings is quite different.

England's Asian Renaissance

England's Asian Renaissance
Author: Su Fang Ng
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 225
Release: 2021-12-17
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1644532425

England's Asian Renaissance explores how Asian knowledges, narratives, and customs inflected early modern English literature. Just as Asian imports changed England's tastes and enriched the English language, Eastern themes, characters, and motifs helped shape the country's culture and contributed to its national identity. Questioning long-standing dichotomies between East and West and embracing a capacious understanding of translatio as geographic movement, linquistic transformation, and cultural grafting, the collection gives pride of place to convergence, approximation, and hybridity, thus underscoring the radical mobility of early modern culture. In so doing, England's Asian Renaissance also moves away from entrenched narratives of Western cultural sovereignty to think anew England's debts to Asia. Published by the University of Delaware Press. Distributed worldwide by Rutgers University Press.

Shakespeare in the World

Shakespeare in the World
Author: Suddhaseel Sen
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 226
Release: 2020-10-15
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1000206068

Shakespeare in the World traces the reception histories and adaptations of Shakespeare in the nineteenth century, when his works became well-known to non-Anglophone communities in both Europe and colonial India. Sen provides thorough and searching examinations of nineteenth-century theatrical, operatic, novelistic, and prose adaptations that are still read and performed, in order to argue that, crucial to the transmission and appeal of Shakespeare’s plays were the adaptations they generated in a wide range of media. These adaptations, in turn, made the absorption of the plays into different "national" cultural traditions possible, contributing to the development of "nationalist cosmopolitanisms" in the receiving cultures. Sen challenges the customary reading of Shakespeare reception in terms of "hegemony" and "mimicry," showing instead important parallels in the practices of Shakespeare adaptation in Europe and colonial India. Shakespeare in the World strikes a fine balance between the Bard’s iconicity and his colonial and post-colonial afterlives, and is an important contribution to Shakespeare studies.

Shakespeare and Indian Nationalism

Shakespeare and Indian Nationalism
Author: Manojit Mandal
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 170
Release: 2023-09-29
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1000963098

Shakespeare and Indian Nationalism aims to articulate the reception of Shakespeare by the 19th-century Indian intelligentsia from Bengal and their ambivalent approach to the Indian Renaissance and consequent nationalist project. Showcasing the cultural politics of British imperialism, this volume focuses on six early nationalist writers and their engagement with Shakespeare: Hemchandra Bandopadhay (1838–1903), Girishchandra Ghosh (1844–1912), Purnachandra Basu (1844–unknown), Iswarchandra Vidyasagar (1820–1891), Bankimchandra Chattopadhaya(1838–1894), and Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941). Drawing on Antonio Gramsci’s theory of hegemony and a host of prominent writers of cultural politics, nationalism and Indian history, this interdisciplinary approach combines postcolonial studies and Shakespeare studies in an attempt to reconcile the existence of an unbridled admiration for an English cultural icon in India alongside the rise of nationalism and a fierce resistance to British rule. The book, finally, moves to re-explore Shakespeare's position in academic, political and popular nationalist discourses in postcolonial India.

Women and Indian Shakespeares

Women and Indian Shakespeares
Author: Thea Buckley
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2022-06-16
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1350234338

Women and Indian Shakespeares explores the multiple ways in which women are, and have been, engaged with Shakespeare in India. Women's engagements encompass the full range of media, from translation to cinematic adaptation and from early colonial performance to contemporary theatrical experiment. Simultaneously, Women and Indian Shakespeares makes visible the ways in which women are figured in various representational registers as resistant agents, martial seductresses, redemptive daughters, victims of caste discrimination, conflicted spaces and global citizens. In so doing, the collection reorients existing lines of investigation, extends the disciplinary field, brings into visibility still occluded subjects and opens up radical readings. More broadly, the collection identifies how, in Indian Shakespeares on page, stage and screen, women increasingly possess the ability to shape alternative futures across patriarchal and societal barriers of race, caste, religion and class. In repeated iterations, the collection turns our attention to localized modes of adaptation that enable opportunities for women while celebrating Shakespeare's gendered interactions in India's rapidly changing, and increasingly globalized, cultural, economic and political environment. In the contributions, we see a transformed Shakespeare, a playwright who appears differently when seen through the gendered eyes of a new Indian, diasporic and global generation of critics, historians, archivists, practitioners and directors. Radically imagining Indian Shakespeares with women at the centre, Women and Indian Shakespeares interweaves history, regional geography/regionality, language and the present day to establish a record of women as creators and adapters of Shakespeare in Indian contexts.