The Many Lives of the Mahabharata: an online course (plus Akram Khan's "Until the Lions", a dance performance)

An announcement: my friend Karthika Nair (author of the superb, award-winning book Until the Lions: Echoes from the Mahabharata) and I will be jointly teaching an online course about the many treatments of the Mahabharata in popular culture: film, literature, performing arts. This begins next month and is an ambitious project that will cover a large range of tellings and retellings (including – but definitely not restricted to – the grounded, non-supernatural ones that Karthika and I are personally interested in), so we are breaking it up into different modules.

Module 1, which will encompass four classes of 90 minutes each (spread over four weeks), will be about the Mahabharata in film, TV and on stage: from Mani Ratnam’s Thalapathi to Shyam Benegal’s Kalyug, from the film version of Peter Brook’s nine-hour play to BR Chopra’s hugely popular TV show, from the classic 1957 fantasy Maya Bazaar to the performance of Bhasa’s Urubhangam in Bharat Ek Khoj, and beyond. Further, we will be discussing these depictions through the prism of specific characters and their relationships: e.g. Duryodhana-Karna; Hidimbi-Ghatotkacha-Bheema; and Amba-Bheeshma-Shikhandi. Along the way, we will of course also touch on literary retellings and perspective tellings of the epic, as well as commentaries and analyses by such writers as Iravati Karve, AK Ramanujan and Krishna Chaitanya.

Anyone interested in the course, please email me at jaiarjun@gmail.com and I will provide details.

Meanwhile, for dance buffs and Mahabharata buffs, here is a video that Karthika and I wanted to share: “Until the Lions”, a dance trio choreographed by – and featuring – celebrated artist Akram Khan. Adapted from one of the poems in Karthika’s book, and first performed to much acclaim in 2016, this is an interpretation of the story of Princess Amba and her long, tortured journey towards revenge – including her rebirth as Shikhandini – after being wronged by Bheeshma. Kathak, contemporary dance, martial art and folk expressions are the weapons deployed here, and all of it plays out against an elemental backdrop designed by Oscar-awardee Tim Yip (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon). The video of this performance will be available till September 10, so please watch it then – and spread the word to anyone who may be interested.

(And here is a long conversation I did with Karthika Nair when Until the Lions was published)