The Ramayana, one of the two pre-eminent Hindu epics, has played a foundational role in many aspects of India's arts and social norms. For centuries, people learned this narrative by watching, listening, and participating in enactments of it. Although the Ramayana's first extant telling in Sanskrit dates back to ancient times, the story has continued to be retold and rethought through the centuries in many of India's regional languages, such as Hindi, Tamil, and
Bengali. The narrative has provided the basis for enactments of its episodes in recitation, musical renditions, dance, and avant-garde performances. This volume introduces non-specialists to the Ramayana's major themes and complexities, as well as to the highly nuanced terms in Indian languages used to
represent theater and performance.
Two introductions orient readers to the history of Ramayana texts by Tulsidas, Valmiki, Kamban, Sankaradeva, and others, as well as to the dramaturgy and aesthetics of their enactments. The contributed essays provide context-specific analyses of diverse Ramayana performance traditions and the narratives from which they draw. The essays are clustered around the shared themes of the politics of caste and gender; the representation of the anti-hero; contemporary re-interpretations of traditional
narratives; and the presence of Ramayana discourse in daily life.
- ISBN10 019755251X
- ISBN13 9780197552513
- Publish Date 30 September 2021 (first published 1 June 2021)
- Publish Status Active
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Oxford University Press Inc
- Format Paperback (US Trade)
- Pages 392
- Language English