This book deals with the interface between identity, culture and literature. It aims at studying questions of cultural identity and gender in Hindi plays of the 19th- and 20th- centuries and the interplay of poetics and politics, as revealed in the work of several influential playwrights. The book explores questions related to the ways in which seven representative playwrights imagine India and its identity and the ways, in which this concept is revealed in the "narratives of the nation", its postcolonial contentions and the politics of identity, as revealed in the production of various cultural discourses. The chapters explore various aspects of the ongoing process of constructing and narrating culture, gender, the nation and identity. There has been no monograph on the questions of cultural identity in Hindi drama. This is a pioneering project and a desideratum in the field of Hindi literature, South Asian Studies, and broadly, in the study of theatre of India and of South Asian cultures and literatures.

This book deals with the interface between identity, culture and literature. It studies questions of cultural identity and gender in Hindi plays of the 19th- and 20th- centuries and the interplay of poetics and politics, as revealed in the work of several influential playwrights.

This book brings together several important essays examining the interface between identity, culture, and literature within the issue of cultural identity in South Asian literature. The book explores how one imagines national identity and how this concept is revealed in the narratives of the nation and the production of various cultural discourses. The collection of essays examines questions related to the interpretation of the Indian past and present, the meanings of ancient and venerated cultural symbols in ancient times and modern, while discussing the ideological implications of the interpretation of identity and “Indianness” and how they reflect and influence the power-structures of contemporary societies in South Asia. Thus, the book studies the various aspects of the on-going process of constructing, imagining, re-imagining, and narrating “Indianness”, as revealed in the literatures and cultures of India.

"The present book seeks to provide a generic introduction to the contemporary theatre scenario in different parts of India. Researched and written over a period of nearly a decade, it adopts an approach that may be best termed as quasi-academic and quasi-journalistic. Primarily, it affords understanding as well as interpretation of the trends, experiments and major works; but, in the process, it takes up serious issues for closer scrutiny. Nevertheless, the overall tone and tenor continue to be rather informal throughout. the book was born of interaction with both established and uprising exponents of the theatre arts -- playwrights, directors, performers, designers, critics, etc.; but it purposefully eschews critical or technical jargon. Ultimately, what we get is a phenomenal attempt to build a comprehensive as well as a perceptive overview of the complex and ever-growing dynamics of the contemporary theatres of India as practised in various regions, languages, cultures." -- Back cover.

"This book addresses the political and aesthetic concerns of modern Indian theatre, tracing its genealogies, and looking in particular at its appropriation of 'folk' theatre, as it sought to constitute itself anew after Independence."--BOOK JACKET.

This book explores the representation of Hinduism through myth and discourse in urban Hindi theatre in the period 1880-1960. It discusses representative works of seven influential playwrights and looks into the ways they have imagined and re-imagined Hindu traditions. Diana Dimitrova examines the intersections of Hinduism and Hindi theatre, emphasizing the important role that both myth and discourse play in the representation of Hindu traditions in the works of Bharatendu Harishcandra, Jayshankar Prasad, Lakshminarayan Mishra, Jagdishcandra Mathur, Bhuvaneshvar, Upendranath Ashk, and Mohan Rakesh. Dimitrova’a analysis suggests either a traditionalist or a more modernist stance toward religious issues. She emphasizes the absence of Hindi-speaking authors who deal with issues implicit to the Muslim or Sikh or Jain, etc. traditions. This prompts her to suggest that Hindi theatre of the period 1880-1960, as represented in the works of the seven dramatists discussed, should be seen as truly ‘Hindu-Hindi’ theatre.

This is a book that examines the nineteenth-century cultural history of Orissa from the postcolonial angle by drawing primarily from literary sources. It focuses on issues such as feudalism and colonial modernity, language politics and the rhetoric of progress, westernisation, nativity and border crossing. It brings the archival material to centre stage and employs theatrical tools from the fields of gender, translation and culture studies. The book shows the intersections between colonial subjugations and postcolonial longings.