In contradictions we rejoice

“All the symbols of a nation’s cultural identity have come from somewhere else. What could be more English than a cup of tea, brewed with leaves from India and sweetened with sugar from the West Indies…”

This witty quote by Kobena Mercer, a cultural theorist from Britian, underscores that everything we read, eat or experience is a result of cross-fertilisation. When we say ‘she is as pretty as an English rose’, we forget that roses were first grown in China. Similarly, in popular culture, in the domain of food, sport, clothing and music, many things come from elsewhere. Like sponges, we absorb them and make borders vanish. Rather than experiencing life in fragments, we try to connect the various strands of the world into an intricate interaction of contrasting bites.

What we inherit culturally and what is borrowed becomes a futile debate! No one comes into the world empty-handed — we carry the weight of our inheritance that both liberates and limits us. But should we only define ourselves in narrow regional boundaries and crush the possibility of multidimensionality?

We rejoice in contradictions, in human complexity. But often, we get trapped in asserting a single story based on ideas of purity, authenticity and homogeneity, rather than acknowledging the richness of hybridity and eclecticism.

Most of my work has been adaptations and translations of western classics. I often ask myself what cultural space is and do the local and universal meanings found in the Greek classics, Sanskrit plays or in the works of Shakespeare not carry within them echoes of humanity? I believe that each work that travels from one culture into another goes through a shift, as it must. And does a work that speak in a universal tone belong to one particular nation?

This brings to mind the huge controversy that followed Peter Brook’s ‘The Mahabharata’, one of the most contentious examples on appropriating a nation’s cultural legacy.

The play premiered at the 1985 Festival d’ Avignon, one of the oldest and most prestigious theatre festivals in France. This nine-hour play opened as dusk dawned upon Avignon and ended at sunrise. It was set in a specially-created amphitheatrical stone quarry, with 250 tonnes of sand and 140 tonnes of clay. It had a multi-racial cast of 21 actors from 16 countries, with Mallika Sarabhai performing the role of Draupadi.

In his play, Brook celebrated the fact that ‘The Mahabharata’ is not just a monolithic story of good versus evil, a morality tale, but about the ambivalence that exists within human nature. Classified as part of oral tradition, with constant addendum and subtractions, it could be considered a living entity performed by traditional and folk artistes, balladeers and storytellers as well as religious leaders, philosophical commentators, TV producers, filmmakers and even communities.

This production drew a barrage of criticism, not only for its ‘borrowing’ of a sacred text, but also what was labelled as cultural imperialism. A heated debate insisted that a cultural text cannot exist outside its context.

Brook’s response was thus: “Cultural property is something the English have done without any hesitation over a hundred years in India, which is to take their objects and without paying for them, put them in a British museum. This is piracy. What happened in ‘The Mahabharata’ is that here is a very great work of art, which all the pirates ignored because there was no cash to be made out of it. You steal a Buddha from a temple and you can resell it, as people are doing all over the place. ‘The Mahabharata’, one of the great works of humanity, to this day remains a name that most people in the West haven’t heard, a totally unknown work, apart from a few scholars and specialists. Why has nobody accused the West of cultural plundering because it reads ‘The Odyssey’?”

Arguments flew back and forth and the fallout was that a production of great magnitude and austerity got mired in controversy. This led to the cancellation of a proposed show of Brook’s ‘The Mahabharata’ on the banks of the Ganga at Benaras.

Ironically, modern Indian theatre has been deeply influenced by western theatrical techniques — from the proscenium arch to training actors in the Stanislavski system — which have formed the contours of modern Indian drama. This happened despite India having a rich and living theatrical tradition of its own. When foreigners use Indian material, they are accused of being Orientalists and when Indians use foreign material in their work, they are accused of not being loyal to their heritage. A strange conundrum.

Where is this fear of cultural cross-over coming from? Is culture something like oil, a rare commodity? Furthermore, why shouldn’t there be a variety of interpretations of the same text? If no one objects to the thousands of productions of Shakespeare that take place across the globe, then why should one object to a variation of ‘The Mahabharata’?

And at what point do we draw the line regarding what is western and what is Indian? Is metropolitan life, with all its international brands and fast-food chains, also considered ‘foreign’, even though it is so inextricably integrated into the dailyness of Indian life?

Do we fear a mixing of culture? Can we choose a culture, a cuisine, a way of dressing that one is not born into? Is exchange possible? Like the barter system? Or should one be intimidated and resort to political correctness of not borrowing? Is my culture an inalienable birthright which disables me to traverse elsewhere? Can there be a culture of choice? Are the lines so tightly drawn that they’ve become frozen, calcified and pulverised?

On a personal note, I have taken classical texts from different parts of the world, which have been translated and adapted into Punjabi by Surjit Patar without any fusillades coming my way. From Lorca’s ‘Yerma’ to Tagore’s ‘Stree Patro’, I have adapted, re-interpreted, reshuffled. These plays have also travelled to the countries and regions where they originated, generating conversations rather than criticism. For centuries, the folk artistes and balladeers have sung songs and told stories from ‘The Mahabharata’, fearlessly taking in regional considerations, social imagery and conflicts within their fold. Why?

Generally, we imagine that when we talk about tradition, we refer to something frozen in time, obsolete and reproduced through an automated iconography. Yet, ‘The Mahabharata’ remains an eternal saga of human fragility — relevant, identifiable and alive ‘now’ as it was ‘then’. The great Indian family, with its gods and demi-gods, conflicts and jealousies, frictions and flaws, has been delineated in this epic with razor-sharp edginess.

Yudhisthira, the righteous man, becomes a victim of his own foolishness in a gambling game. Arjuna, the warrior hero, is besieged by doubts when preparing for war. Krishna assumes the role of a trickster as he prepares the Pandavas for a war against their own.

Peter Brook’s austere production gives a sense of timelessness. It gives credence to the verse from ‘The Mahabharata’: “Everything which is in ‘The Mahabharata’ is elsewhere; which is not in ‘The Mahabharata’ is nowhere.”

The question I wish to ask is: does a great epic belong to any race or religion, or is it part of the common civilisational pool? Like ‘Ulysses’ or ‘Iliad’. I have no answers. Only my personal belief that art transcends boundaries, co-mingles and enriches not only art but life itself.