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Understanding Adya
Sriranga- A writer with a social mission
(excerpts from an article by Vijaya in the Sunday Herald, 15 th April 1990).
One can see three distinctive stages in his development as a playwright. For the sake of critical convenience, they may be categorized as Experimentation, Disillusionment and Reiteration. It is interesting to note that Dr. G.S.Amur called the last one Vishadayoga and has also considered it as a stage of Sriranga’s Atmavidya, or self-education.
As a playwright, Sriranga’s concerns were primarily political, contemporary and social in nature. The beginnings of such concerns can easily be traced to his student days when he came under the spell of Gandhiji’s Non- cooperation Movement. For example one of his plays he wrote during his student days, Dharmavijaya, compares Gandhiji and Shaukat Ali to Yudhishtira and Bheema. The British were of course the Kauravas.
Actor, playwright and director all rolled into one, he defied critics and current fashions all through his long life and thereby laid a strong foundation for amateur theatre in Kannada.
Adya on himself (excerpts from his autobiography, “Sahitiya Atmajijnase”, published by Akshara Prakashana, Heggodu. Translation by Shashi Desapande, Adya’s daughter).
Adya and the Marathi stage. “Of all the company dramas – both Marathi and Kannada- that I saw in the next few years, it was the Kannada drama Shani Prabhava that appealed to me most. One of the reasons for this was the “transfer scene”. To the village kid that I was, it seemed like magic. Now there was King Vikram’s palace; the next moment – bang- and the stage was dark A moment later we saw trees instead of pillars, boulders instead of a throne and Vikram clad in rags. This was the result of the curse of Shani! This scene fascinated me every time I saw it.
Once however something happened. As usual the scene changed. “Oh, what is this!” Vikram cried out sorrowfully. “Has my palace indeed vanished and become a forest?”
To this a spectator from the very back of the house called out, “Look! There’s one pillar left. Hold tight to it”.
The house exploded with laughter, but an uncontrollable rage filled me at this shattering of my mood. When I next looked at the stage, one of the hands ran across, turned the pillar round and ran out again. Now I understood the secret of the transfer scene. There were pictures of the pillar on one side and of trees on the other! After this the curiosity, the expectations and the joy with which I had watched the scene left me. However hard I tried to forget it, to look at the pillar was to know that there was a tree behind it. And my mood of enjoyment dissolved.
He continues :
It was a matter of pride for us as high school students to see Marathi dramas; it was considered “fashionable”. This was the attitude of adults and we naturally followed them. However, I had the good fortune of seeing some great Marathi actors too at that time.
Firstly Bal Gandharva. I was, as I have said ignorant of the language. But the moment this actor stepped on the stage, he filled me with joy, the eyes triumphed over the mind and the fact that it was a man playing a female role didn’t occur to you at all. His dress, his facial expressions, the way he walked spoke and laughed – they were easily and naturally a woman’s. Ignorant though I was of both the language and the music, he made me understand him through the modifications in his tone and expressions – such was the skill of this great man.
There are two other Marathi actors I saw on the stage at about this same time. One of them was Ganpatrao Joshi. Now that I am a writer with a large vocabulary at my command, I can describe his acting with a shower of adjectives. But that wouldn’t please me. Actually it is possible that it would work against my purpose, for perhaps my words would make more of an impact than his acting. And therefore I will speak of Ganpatrao Joshi through the memories of the happiness that overcame the boy I was then – a boy not so skilled with words.
The first sight of the short stout man with sunken eyes was not impressive. But as soon as he began to speak, you sat up. By the time he had completed his first sentence, you lost sight of the world outside. What a voice his was! What awesome control he had over it! When you heard him your hair stood on end. Joshi had the power to evoke different expressions even on the spectator’s faces. They used to say he drank a lot, that very often he was not in his senses. Let that be. The world has is wise, he will give him enough to drink in heaven too, so that he can witness a rare acting skill.
The other Marathi actor was Ganpatrao Bodas. There was a time when actors flaunted labels like “heroic actor”, ‘comic actor’ and so on, but when I saw Ganpatrao Bodas, such a categorization did nit exist. According to their traditions, company used to have shows on Wednesday and Saturday night and Sunday afternoon. And so Bodas who wrung our hearts on Saturday night made us laugh on Sunday – so much that we could not sit still in our chairs.
Frokm”Down the corridors of Kannada Culture” (The Hindu, 15 th December 1985).
Adya Rangacharya , who wrote under the pen-name of Sri Ranga, is perhaps one of the most brilliant playwrights of our day. All aspects of our society, its hypocrisies and its virtues have been dramatized by Sri Ranga
