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Theatre has constituted an important part of cultural life and public entertainment in India from pre-colonial times. It was not only a site of appropriation, contestation, and subversion of authority but also emerged as a frontal site of political contestation in colonial India.
Underscoring theatre as a popular site of hegemonic and counter-hegemonic struggle, Play-House of Power locates the art form in the larger social and political context. Going beyond the dominant binary framework characteristic of studies on theatre—rural/urban, classical/folk, elite/popular—it takes a more nuanced approach. The volume explores various aspects of colonial theatre in terms of its politics, its linkages with modernity, and as a domain for intersection of ‘high’ and ‘low’ cultures.
The essays also emphasize the multifaceted relationship between gender and theatre. They showcase how women shared a problematic and tenuous relationship with theatre during this period. The politics of social class, gendered ideologies, and nationalism permeating the theatre space excluded women performers from the new nation state. However, the conjunction of political and cultural activism also had the potential to highlight women’s role in culture.
ISBN - 9780198060970
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