Download elizabethan theatre

INTRODUCTION
Theatre is a living organ of society. It has grown and developed with human
psyche and human relationships. It is dynamic. Theatre is a life size art. Its history
is virtually a history of creature‟s endeavours of a nation practically in every field.
In the early stages, the history of the theatre is in fact the history of the origin of
elements of the theatre which came together in the course of time to weave its rich
fabric. Theatre since ages had been in fluid form. It has been assuming different
forms and dimensions in the context of various socio-physic situations and
circumstances. It assumed the shape in whatever context it has been placed. The
first chapter includes the history of theatre. Although theatre now a day‟s
encompasses a vast range of styles, generes but the methods of acting, directing
and producing originated with man‟s latent urge to seek his identification with vast
astonishing and horrifying universe. He started symbolizing his merth, joys and
sorrows with that of nature. The invisible call of nature; the thunderous storms, the
then in-surmountable mountains and roaring seas always prompted man to act. In
this attempt to act one‟s empty space become a stage.
Theatre is a worldwide phenomenon. But mainly there are three
realms in the field of theatre- Greek theatre, Indian theatre and Elizabethan theatre.
:
Earliest theatre tradition in Greece started in 534 B.C. where festivals held in
order to appease gods and men danced and sang and performed Ballies. In this
way, the seed of theatre was sown. Attica where Athens was the principal town,
four festivals were held each Year in honour of Dionysis and it was at one of thesethe city Dionysia – that drama was first presented. The oldest surviving Greek
plays are by Aeschylus.
GREEK
THEATRE
The major innovation attributed to Aeschylus is the introduction of the
second actor. After about 468, when Sophocles placed increased emphasis on
individual characters and reduced the role of chorus. The protagonists noble but
not faultless, are usually subjected to a terrible crisis that leads to suffering and self
recognition, including the perception of a higher than human law behind events.
His poetry has been universally admired for its beauty and clarity of expression.
Euripides (480-406) wrote about ninety plays of which eighteen have survived.
Later the Hellinistic age saw many changes in the theatre. One was initiated by the
victory festivals held by Alexander in which performers from all over the Greek
performed.Consequently, plays were no longer performed exclusively at Dionysian
festivals. The rapid expansion in the number of festivals created a demand for
qualified performers and perhaps as a result the theatre of the Hellnistic period
became totally professionalized.
INDIAN THEATRE:
Originated when all the gods under the leadership of
Indra, approached Brahma and requested him to create an entertainment, audible
as well as visible- a fifth veda ; accessible to all.
Brahma decided to create the veda which would reflect all future actions of people
and be the meeting place of all the sciences and wits and will also be the giver of
wealth, fame, good counsel and knowledge of one‟s duty. Recalling four Vedas,
Brahma went into meditation. Taking the text from the Rigveda, music from the
Sama veda, acting from the Yajur Veda and aesthetic sentiments from the Atharva
veda, he created the fifthe veda- The Natyashastra.
Then, on the auspicious occasion of Indra‟s fag festival, an imitation
of a fight between the gods and the demons, full of action and furry was
performed. Encouraged by his success, Bharata wrote two more plays, Amrita
Manthana and Tripuradha and performed that in the presence of Shiva. He asked
Tandu to instruct Bharata in the art of dancing to make beautiful and grateful
postures. In the course of timi, intoxicated with the knowledge of the Natya Veda,
the sons of Bharata caricatured the sages in their comic plays to evoke laughter.
Angered by the insult, the sages expelled them from heaven. King Nahusha, ruler
of the heaven wanted the drama to be performed on earth Bharat‟s son went with
him. Thus the mortals got this beautiful and auspicious art of drama the fifth Veda
of gods. In this way, drama took its origin in India.
ELIZABETHAN THEATRE:
Elizabethan period is one of the richest
period in the history of English drama. The dramatist known as “Shakespeare‟s
Predecessors” exhibit common characteristics which may be marked as reflections
of the national life of the times, and the conditions of inn yard and roadside
representations. Thomas Kyd (1558-1594) is remembered primarily for “The
Spanish Tragedy”(1587), the most popular play of the 16th century. Its reception
established the vogue for tragedy previously given almost entirely for aristocratic
audience John Lily (1554-1606) wrote primarily for boy‟s companies catering to
aristocratic audiences. His most characteristics works are pastoral comedies that
mingle classical mythology with English subjects.
ELIZABETHAN
THEATRE
The delicate pastoral works established the tradition upon which Shakespeare built
in „As you Like it‟ and „A mid summer Night‟s dream‟. Robert Green (1558-1592)
also wrote romantic comedies. Last among the Predecessor of Shakespeare and
most important the only true genius among them is Christopher Marlowe. Had
there been no Shakespeare after him, there would have been ample reason for
calling him the Elizabethan theatre genius. Above all. Marlowe was a great poet
and did more than any of Shakespeare‟s predecessors to perfect blank verse as a
medium of drama. William Shakespeare (1564-1616) is probably the greatest
dramatist of all time. As a play Wright, actor and share holder in acting troupes and
theatre buildings, he was directly involved in more aspects of the theatre than any
writer of his day.
Second chapter deals with Shakespeare theatre. Shakespeare borrowed
stories from many sources (history mythology, legend, fictions, plays) but
reworked them until.
THE GLOBE
THEATRE
They become distinctively his own. Typically, situations and characters are clearly
established in the opening scene and the action develops logical out of this
exposition.
SHAKESPEARE
Shakespeare‟s large cats are composed of well rounded characters that run the
gamut from the inept and ridiculous to the commanding and heroic, from the
young and innocent to the old and corrupt. One‟s bewilderment arises not so much
from the number of plays that may justly be termed master pieces and immortal –
there are hardly a half dozen of the thirty seven that we would willingly omit from
any compilation of the world‟s best half hundred dramas. It is rather the infinite
variety of them, the extra ordinary gallery of human portraits formed by the
characters for who should say that Hamlet the most played figure on the world
stage, noble, complex, grievously mad and terribly sane is more theatrical and
more familiar than Falstaff drunken braggart and beloved sensualist, that tragic
Othello or piteous lear is more immortal than Rosalind or Portia or Viola. What
other figures crowd into the mind‟s eye- clear, human bringing dark shadow or
smiling reminiscence as brightly etched as if we met them but today: Romeo,
Juliet, The nurse, Shylock, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, The Witches bottom,
Puck, Logo, Desdemona, Dog Berry, Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Malvdio, Petruchio
and kate, Ophelia, Polonius, Ariel, Prospero, Ceaser, Cassius, Brutus, and merry
wives. Even then one has not mentioned the gallery of noble historical portraits in
a series of chronicle plays that lifted the form to a place beside human life tragedy
and yet what an amazing variety. What unforgettable characterizations. These
figures have gone into everyday currency are of our daily living as no other save
these of the Bible- every school boy knows them, philosopher sustain themselves
by re-reading their adventures year by year and the plays in which they appear are
performed quite regularly in those countries where the artistic sensibilities of
audiences are keen and mind eager.
The third chapter deals with the modern Indian theatre which occupies a
major place in the realm of theatre belongs to people. The balance between drama
and theatre is same as the balance between the individual and the society that he or
she belongs to. These words acquire a new kind of significance in the context of
Indian drama- especially so in the context of modern Indian drama. After the long
and glorious period of Sanskrit Drama, there was no drama in the interim period in
any of the regional languages. Drama survived only in the folk form.
MODERN INDIAN THEATRE
The experiment of Parsi theatrical company during the middle of the
nineteenth century was responsible for the growth of the genre of the drama in
many Indian languages. The newly emerging middle class patronized the new
theatre activities. But very soon, films began to allure the people and the support of
theatre dwindled. Professional theatres that modeled themselves over the Parsi
Theatrical Companies are still alive in many parts of the country and will survive
so long as they fulfill the needs of the people. It is indeed very difficult to explain
the psychology of the masses but it is true that the theatre mirrors the need felt
deep down the psyche of the people. The society realizes its own self through its
theatre. The second important experiment in our theatre was the introduction of
genre of the literary drama. In the beginning of this century, literary drama
attempted to create a new kind of theatre which was necessarily different from the
model provided by the Parsi theatrical companies.
Many new play wrights rebelled against the pomp and show of the
professional's theatre. They mocked at the theatrically of the theatre and
championed for west. They firmly believed that the function of drama was to
reflect the social behavior and to expose the follies of our own people. They were
fascinated by the new image of man whose dynamic consciousness would
invigourate the dull roots of our society. Thus, the message became more
important than the form or the language of theatre or art of theatre. There was a
conflict between the message and the art, a controversy of what is true and what is
false in art and the new dramatist engaged themselves in the search for the true
identity of the society. Thus, the choice was between what was false or what
artistic or what was not artistic.
Literary drama considered theatre as only a crude medium. The
dramatist didn‟t give enough attention to the concept that theatre creates and
translates the dramatist reality in its own terms:
These new dramatists banished music and dance from the stage and
what remains was the verbal reality of the written play. As a result of this extreme
stand, and this wrong definition of realism, there was no difference between
reading a play and watching it on the stage. The drama was divorced from the
theatre and this separation caused a cultural crisis, but our interest in the folk
theatre was not lessened. The folk theatre not a medium for anything else but a live
context where the actors and the audience participate and share common theatrical
experience. The theatre of the literate has not been able to achieve these aspects of
total participation in theatre. Thus, in recent years there is a search for developing a
total theatre a complete in itself and rooted in its regional culture. Modern theatre
took a long time to understand the relation between the dramatic text and the
theatrical performance. The National School of drama was established to invest
and create this discipline; Shri E. Alkazi, the former Director gave NSD a form
which would appeal to whole of India and gave it a National Character. Modern
Indian Drama has been developing during the last fifty years in a steady way and
now it has come of age. It took time to cross the initial phase of experimentation
and then develop its own form. So the third chapter deals with the writers of the
contemporary Indian writers.
The fourth chapter deals with the relevance of Shakespearean theatre to
modern Indian theatre. Shakespeare built Globe theatre in 1576 and at the same
time English entered into India in the form of East India Company. Britishers made
their centres in Big Cities only. Shakespeare usually performed his pays in London
and the English people used to entertain themselves with theatrical performances.
As the result of this, when Britishers established their own rule in the big cities of
India, English theatre companies also arrived and began to perform English plays.
The Urdu playwright like Agha Hasher Mohammad Shah Kashmiri, Ashan Mehndi
Hasan and many others wrote Urdu plays but the format was taken from English
plays, Specially plays written by Shakespeare were adapted by Parsi theatre play
wrights. Gradually, plays were written in other Indian languages other than Urdu.
The regional language playwrights also adopted Shakespeare, Moliere and Beau
mount as their ideal and wrote plays. After Independence, Indian theatre touched
new heights. Shakespeare‟s tragedies deal with human psychology, his deeds and
the ultimate repentance over the misdeeds committed in the life. Even his comedies
are full of wise wordly saying w.e.f. In Merchant of Venice, Portia‟s speech of
mercy has universal appeal. Similarly, In „As you like it‟ Duke Senior‟s division of
life into Seven Stages. The post Independence Writers mainly focused their plays
on the psychology of men. They deals with the social and ethical problems faced
by the modern man.
Mohan Rakesh‟s play “Adhe Adhure” deals with the aspiration of
„complete‟ man by a woman- in the form of Savitri and the same theme is dealt in
his another play “Ashadh ka Ek Din”.Again the some theme is dealt by Girish
Karnad in his play “ Hayavadna” and Tughlaq. „Padmini‟ aspires for a complete
man bodily as well as intellectually sound person. In her aspiration the lady breaks
the barrier of the society. In an other play “ Tughlaq”- Karnad used historical
characters. The basic idea from History like Shakespeare‟s historical plays.
Tughlaq uses his all resources to fulfill his ambitions. Another powerful pay by
Vijay Tendulkar “Ghasi Ram Kotwal” deals with the psychology of man.
Shakaram Binder breaks the family ties imposed by the society in order to fulfill
his sexual needs keep different women who can fulfill his domestic as well as his
body needs. Silence, the court is in session by Vijay Tendulkar again focuses on
human psychology. All the plays are being performed by different directors using
Shakespeare‟s theatrical devices on the proscenium stage. Shakespeare‟s plays are
relevant to a times. That is why our modern film industry is deeply affected by
Shakespeare‟s plays.
„Maqbool‟ movie based on Shakespeare‟s tragedy „Macbeth‟, Omkara‟
based on „Othello‟, „Kamine‟ based on „Merchant of Venice‟ has been adapted by
modern Hollywood directors and producers.
In the fifth Chapter, the comparison between Shakespearean theatre
and modern Indian theatre has been discussed. Shakespeare‟s theatre and Indian
theatre are not different from each other as theatre is an unbroken chain. The
reference of theatre is found even in the glorious epics also. Shakespeare‟s age is
the golden era of theatre and it has effected life and provided new direction not
only to Indian theatre but world‟s theatre also. Shakespeare‟s wrote in the sixteenth
century in different socio-political conditions. Then different kind of cultural
conditions prevailed and the problems of a lay man were different from today. No
doubt, the presentation of that time was of different type as today we have more
advanced techniques. Today, the lazer technique has brought drastic changes in the
presentation of any play but the science will invent new techniques everyday and
these sort of differences will always prevail, the role of director has completely
changed the world of theatre. Today, a play is solely what a director wants to
make it. Badal Sircar has given a new concept of theatre known as “third theatre”.
Proscenium was the most popular form of stage for Shakespeare and his
contemporaries but today, Indian performances are happening in the basement
theatre, in the corners of the street, in arena, in thrust stage with the new concept of
music these differences are discussed in the fifth chapter.
The Last Chapter discusses the conclusions based on the
present study. To conclude, we can say that theatre being a living and direct
medium and always operating on human level with its audience can never die.
Even after innumerable obstacles and upheavals in history, it has always emerged
as a winner in the end.
It can be said that Shakespeare‟s theatre is root and the modern.
Indian theatre is the fruit. Perhaps Shakespeare saw the dream of nourishing theatre
but he would have never imagined that the plant he has sown would not only grow
into a full blossomed tree but would be laiden with so many fruits. Today Bengali
theatre, Marathi theatre, Punjabi theatre etc. all are the off springs of Shakespeare
theatre. Shakespeare formed the basic form of drama and wrote drama keeping in
view of his own needs and limitations and perhaps the need of his contemporary
audience. But with the writings of the future dramatist like Ibsen and Bernard
Shaw, the art of drama further evolved. As far as, the question of Indian Theatre is
concerned, India being a vast country with 22 languages and as many different
cultures, the theatre cannot be identified with one uniform element. In India, the
concept of National Theatre has to be seen purely in regional terms. In the post
independence period, conscious efforts were made to evolve the concept of
National theatre by breaking these barriers of language and region. Slowly, many
writers crossed these barriers of regionalism and produced many good works at
National level. Badal Sircar, Girish Karnad, Vijay Tendulkar, Mohan Rakesh,
Adya Ranga Acharya, and Dharamvir Bharti are the few among them.
Thus, theatre continues to show its survival instinct in the
contemporary times; as it has been doing so since the time immemorial.
Shakespeare will always be first theatre personality, no matter, whenever and
wherever the discussion of theatre will occur. Shakespeare died on the anniversary
of his birth, April 23,1616. On his tombstone the following lines are inscribed;
“Good friend for Jesus’ sake forbear
To dig the dust enclosed here,
Beside the man that Spares these stones,
And crust be he that moves my bones."
Thousands of people visit Shakespeare‟s tomb every year. His tomb has become
almost a place of pilgrimage for his admirers.