Our times have seen the emergence of an enormous superpower, proud of its overwhelming military strength, its riches, its great cities, and its trade. Even the most liberal and learned of its citizens see its way of life, and its almost religious belief in trade, as somehow defining modernity, as a path that others must follow to be counted amongst civilized peoples. The so-called comity of nations is dominated by the G-8, who find a place in that elite club solely on the basis of wealth and power. The rapid proliferation of Information Technology and the universal dependence on computers has reinforced belief in wealth, by creating an immediate breed of the super-rich and the mega-rich, skilled in computer language, young, confident of their own ability to solve all problems, because they are rich, and demonstrably because wealth respects no boundaries of nation-state or of culture.
This plutocratic hierarchy is finding a new threat in religion - which after the Enlightenment was thought to exist only on Sundays, and politely in the private spaces of some individuals, who seek consolation from sources other than the psychiatric couch. But now, when it seemed that all opposition to the ruling ideology has been obliterated, an attack on the values of the superpower has been launched by people termed 'religious fundamentalists,' and the ensuing conflict 'the clash of civilizations.' But looking round, we see such fundamentalists in abundance, belonging to all persuasions of religious belief. Apart from the militant Muslims, we see a rising tide of Southern Baptist Christian fundamentalists holding appreciable power in the United States of America, at least enough to put a stop to many lines of path-breaking scientific research. The 'mild Hindoos,' as Kipling called them, have also produced a ferocious breed, more than willing to commit atrocities. The monks of the Theravada Buddhists in Sri Lanka have not been far behind in calling for the most violent military response to Tamil separatism.
The learned reaction to the rise of such lumpen violence has been a louder call for scientific temper - a call voiced in elite learned circles since the time of the Enlightenment, and seen by all, even the most unlearned, as the voice technologically supporting the very basis of comfortable consumer-oriented modern life. Despite the megascale violence of war in the 20th century, which could never have achieved the heights of barbarity without the committed support of millions of scientists, our modern elite opinion-makers, even to the far left, accept implicitly their assertion that scientists work selflessly only to ease human suffering.
These globalizing issues may seem unique for our times. The play challenges this assumption, by taking us far back to the beginning of the fifth century. History as taught in the English-speaking world thinks little of this period, terming it as the beginning of the Dark Ages, since in 411 CE the Roman Emperor Honorius ultimately called back the protecting legions from Britain, leaving that island open to the barbaric attacks of the Angles and the Saxons, who later would re-colonize it after driving back the natives into Welsh and Scottish fastnesses. But Honorius had little choice, since Rome and its empire was being ravaged in all directions by the Huns, the Vandals, the Goths, and the Visigoths. Roman civilization, from which imperial Western scholars draw their proud lineage of supremacy, was finished, broken in two, from then on ruled by at least two emperors at any one time. The Western Emperor soon removed to Ravenna, and Rome was left under the stewardship of the Vicar of Christ.
But this Vicar presided over a diverse ecclesiastical landscape, where two great heresies, The Arrian, named after Arius, a theologian of fourth century Alexandria, and The Manichean, named after a shadowy founder, Mani, of third century Babylonia, contested the ground with the main orthodoxy. The Arrians held that Jesus was only an adopted son of God, while the Manicheans said he was pure light. Thus, both disagreed with the difficult compromise reached at the Second Nicenean Council that Jesus was fully both divine and human, a point pressed home by Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, who was later exiled for defending the Trinity! This very fact shows the political nature of these disputations, under weak imperial rule. A terrible fallout of this struggle within the Church was the inhuman murder of the great woman scientist-philosopher, Hypatia, at the hands of a fundamentalist mob in Alexandria in 415 CE, stage-managed by Cyril the bishop, merely to prove his authority over the pagan Prefect, Orestes.
Despite such political disaster, Western civilization still had a proud moment of existence in the great city of Alexandria, far enough away from Rome and its turmoils, capable of buying peace by sending tributes of grain from the rich Nilotic basin, and being able to assimilate into its polyglot, cosmopolitan culture the best of science, craft skills, learned disputations, and gracious living that the rest of the world had to offer. It boasted of the greatest library in the world, till it was destroyed by fanatical Christians, who also wrecked the great teaching centre, known as the Mouseion. Alexandria at the height of its greatness showed that military power was hardly necessary to create a great age for humanity. Perhaps, its very lack of military capability enabled the leaders of that civilization to benefit by non-violent contact with the other two great civilizations that existed far away on an equal or greater footing.
Hindus have for long considered the Gupta period as the finest moment of Hindu ascendancy. They of course conveniently overlook the codification of the Manu Dharma Shastra in that period, which not only pushed all women into the seclusion of their homes, making them dependent on father, husband, or son -very much in the imperial Roman manner - but also created in a final iron format its caste laws which have continued to cripple Indian kingdoms, nations, and communities, in almost all spheres of life, from military defence to scientific advancement, to achieving a modicum of civilized social justice, enjoyed periodically by other cultures. What they are proud about is, of course, legendary stories of the wealth and graciousness of the great Indian cities of that period, as enjoyed by its 'beautiful people.' Ujjayini certainly was such a very great city, possibly the greatest in that period, out-rivaling Pataliputra, since it was at the crossroads of two great trade routes; one between the north and the south of the country, and the other leading to the ports of Gujarat that exported to the West. Though, of course, if we look at the Ujjain of today, this claim is hard to believe. It was most probably the western capital of Chandragupta the Second, better known in legend as Vikramaditya, an emperor who remained unrivalled in all the dominions that his forces could control, and in any case certainly after his forces meted out a signal defeat to a Scythian army. He drew around his wealthy Court the best of poets, musicians, scientists, and philosophers from around the empire, who came to be known as the 'navaratnas,' or the nine jewels, a form of patronage consciously imitated by the Emperor Akbar more than a thousand years later. Kalidasa the poet playwright, Varahamihira the mathematician, and Aryabhatta the astronomer were numbered among the chosen few.
Long before the fifth century, the Chinese had come to regard their world as the 'middle kingdom,' and an equally vast, complex, learned and rich civilization had been built up by them. Many Western and Chinese scholars argue convincingly that China was superior to the rest by that time in astronomy, metallurgy, textiles, agriculture, and architecture. Jian Kang, where modern Nanjing stands, was a very great city, perhaps, already the most populous. In the first years of the fourth century, a star map had been perfected by the astronomer Chen Zhuo. In the same period, coal replaced charcoal in the manufacture of cast iron, and within a hundred years, the Chinese knew how to make steel. The fourth century also produced a detailed botanical survey of China, Hsi Han perhaps being the first ecologist to recognize the role of predator ants in controlling pests in orange trees. In 369 CE, the Chinese astronomers spotted and recorded for the first time the birth of a 'new star,' or the supernova phenomenon.
So, at the beginning of the fifth century three great civilizations, in touch with each other, but not at war, represented by their three great cities, rivalled each other in wealth, crafts, learning, and good governance. Could a few of the great persons known to history from each of these cities have come in contact with each other at any time? This is the whimsical conceit the play deals with. It locates this coming together in Ujjayini, at the very theatre of Kalidasa's - what could be more appropriate for a play?
It chooses for such an epochal event the year 416 CE, possibly the coronation year of Kumargupta, the son of Vikramaditya; and chooses the chaitra purnima New Year night of that year for the opening of Kalidasa's great play, Shakuntala. It brings to the theatre Hypatia, known even in her time as The Philosopher of Alexandria, the Promethean woman scientist converted into an iconic image by modern feminists. Of course, history has it that she was torn to pieces by a rabid mob of Christian fundamentalists in 415 CE, but the play rescues her by a more worldly stratagem than used by Euripides to rescue Iphigenia from Agamemnon's sword. Could she have been rescued by the willing sacrifice of a doting friend? Historical plausibility is provided for this assumption by the fact, very curious in itself, that her friend and disciple, Synesius, Bishop of Ptolemais, is heard of no more after her death. By strange coincidence, the Chinese sage, Fa-Hsien had visited India at about that time to collect rare Buddhists scriptures and returned to China only by 414 CE. However, one of his companions, Dao Jing, had stayed back. Could he have taught at some stage at the great university of Nalanda that was being built? Could he also have come to Ujjayini in 416 CE and met with both Kalidasa, and Hypatia, whom the play has so deftly rescued?
It is through such a chance meeting that the play explores once again the pressing issues of today, of imperial vanity, of misguided fundamentalism, and the hubris of scientists. Moreover, it hopes to point out the sad neglect of Indian history itself by Indian students, since there is little money in studying history, and its politicization for electoral reasons. There is, then, little real appreciation of the momentous events that produced Indian culture. It is my belief that this disconnect between school learning and cultural reality in itself provides room for the rise of Hindu fundamentalism. No other people, while vainly boasting of their heritage rubbish it in reality with such callousness. The new adoration of the suddenly wealthy, and blind belief in their unlimited powers to set everything to rights, including stopping the feared AIDS pandemic in India, adds poignancy to our situation, and is explored in comic relief - since there is no other way - in the play.
The play imagines that Kalidasa, in a humorous mood, gave his characters the names of people around him, placing them in the mythical times of King Dushyanta, whose son Bharata, after whom India is named, was born out of the king's great romance with Shakuntala, herself a love-child of the heavenly nymph, Menaka, and the great legendary sage, Vishwamitra. The play opens and ends with a set of characters in present-day India, also all with names very similar to Kalidasa's characters. They are elite IT experts, gathered in modern Ujjain, to create street theatre for AIDS awareness as their corporate social responsibility towards slum dwellers.
In the first scene, the IT experts, bravely pitching their tent near a slum, on the banks of the sacred river Shipra, now no more than a smelly drain, have a party on the night before their show. The leading lady, the Chinese expert, and the visiting scientist from WHO, a lady with a Greek name, all discuss the rings they acquired that day in Ujjain under strange circumstances. They are visited by a proud high official, with a name very similar to that of a royal minister's in Kalidasa's time, who sings the praises of the government, but the experts continue to remain rather contemptuous of the city and the people. Soon after, a policeman haughtily orders a 'Dalit' slum leader to assemble all people from the untouchable slum for the show next day. From the 'Dalit' they learn about the disastrous environmental conditions of the city. In the second scene, an affable general assures them his support. He also has a name similar to the one during Kalidasa's time. In conversation, Kalidasa's play is mentioned several times, and the IT experts, tired and rather drunk, get confused about their play and Kalidasa's, and retire to bed.
The third scene opens magically on the opening night of Shakuntala in Ujjayini, transformed into a great city of ancient times. Kalidasa tells Hypatia and Dao Jing that his beloved city is the greatest in the world and the centre of civilization. It is then that the policeman drags in an untouchable and threatens to mutilate him for venturing into the theatre among high-caste people. Kalidasa cajoles in vain; finally Dao Jing protects the untouchable by making him a Buddhist, and prophesies that one day he will go to China as the great monk, Bodhidharma. Dao Jing gives him his jade Buddha ring.
In the fourth scene Hypatia challenges Dao Jing about his religious beliefs, and says she has none. Finally she breaks down and relates how a fundamentalist Christian mob came to kill her, and that she was saved by the self-sacrifice of her trusted friend, Synesius, and his wife. She was smuggled out of Egypt by faithful Arabs, and brought to Ujjayini as a refugee. She has left with her only the golden ring of friendship in memory of her faithful friend. And her firm faith in science.
But in the fifth scene Hypatia meets the affable general of the armies that had destroyed the Scythians, and he thanks her profusely for her inventions which helped him achieve victory. Kalidasa pleads with her not to feel guilty about the Scythians' death, and finally offers his love in consolation. The scene ends in a flurry of theatrical activity, with the director assuring the leading lady that the famous ring she has to wear becomes her beautifully. It is to be the token by which Dushyanta ultimately acknowledges his love for Shakuntala. The king arrives in the audience, and the curtain rises on Abhijnanashakuntalam - or The Recognition of Shakuntala's Ring.
The final scene brings us back to the present day, on the morning after the party, when the leading lady speaks of a vivid dream she had during the night of acting in a play long ago in an ancient city. She and the Greek lady both talk of their attachment to their rings; but the Chinese expert, Dao Jing, gives his away to the Dalit, who leads them on an early morning walk round the river to look at its real environmental crisis.
In the Indian story telling tradition, the play has a story within a story, and that story itself is at the beginning of another story - told by Kalidasa himself, based on an even older story! The play is best produced as a prelude to Kalidasa's great masterpiece.
Contact Vithal Rajan
