BRHANNALA

By MTG editorial

Host-A-Performance | Schedule

Writer : Veenapani Chawla

Director : Veenapani Chawla

Cast : Vinayakumar

Adishakti's Brhannala draws on the episode in the Mahabharata in which the exiled hero Arjuna spends one year in the guise of a woman. The play dramatizes the consequences that accompany a dissolution of all rigid binary oppositions; bringing down thereby all polarities of time/space, reason/emotion, human/animal, right/left, us/them, self/other. Arjuna/Brhannala relates to Siva as Ardhanariswara - the Lord who is half woman and half man. Both Brhannala and Ardhanariswara are great dancers, both combine feminine and masculine elements, both have extremely erotic natures, but can be ascetics; both have strong cerebral Brahmin characteristics as well as warrior moods.

The Greek myths of Prometheus, Mnemosyne, the birth of Athena, and antagonism between the two brothers Apollo and Dionysus seem to explain the evolutionary process by which these polarities came into being. The discoveries of contemporary scientists and philosophers: Einstein’s space/time continuum, Bohr's theory of complementarities, and Sri Aurobindo's Gnosis: support the metaphor for the union of polarities which these symbolic figures from the tradition represent, and suggest that these images are merely forerunners of a new way to think about reality.

BRHANNALA Play Schedule(s)

No upcoming shows.

read / post your comments

Discussion Board

Schedule

	Theatre Workshops

Register a workshop \| View all workshops

List Your Play