Girish Karnad's influence on Indian theatre and Indian English literature

Abstract

Girish Karnad has a noteworthy position in the Indian English Drama. He had an excellent understanding of Western dramatic aesthetics and skill while remaining strongly rooted in the cultural traditions of his native land. Karnad believes that India has a rich and magnificent tradition of folk arts which Indian English writers should incorporate in their writings. He was against blind imitation of western writers which was popular at that time. In this generational effort, he made a unique contribution by using myth, history, folklore, and modern urban life as four distinct narrative elements that he could draw on throughout his career. Among contemporaries such as “Dharamvir Bharati, Mohan Rakesh, Vijay Tendulkar, Badal Sircar, UtpalDutt, Habib Tanvir, G.P. Deshpande, and Mahesh Elkunchwar, Karnad is a writer whose work demonstrates a deliberate and self-conscious effort to create a new Indian theatre.” This research seeks to examine Karnad's contributions via the lens of our vibrant Indian folk cultures, which have existed from the beginning of human civilisation, to the Indian English Theatre.