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 THE DRAMAS OF RABINDRANATH TAGORE
Br AMAR MUI{ERJI, MA., rho.
Tu n dramatic creation of Rabindranath Tagore com-
p-:sci about forty-five slender volumes ; and yet, the
varie'y of it is so considerable that it would be almost
impossible to say anythic,g generally, about his dramatic
works, to discover a standard of judgment that would
Meet such Widely diverse plays as Valmiki Protibha and
Hu ar)wi, Sarodolsav and Rakfukaravi, Natir Piija and
Sesh Rak.ha, ?obin and Kaler•yatro, Banuari and
Nrityanntya Shyama. It would be definitely futile to
make a general characterization of his plays ; to any
whether his plays are plays of ideas, or action sym.
bolical or allbgoricil, realistic or romantic. They
present such a wonderful spectacle of diverse form and
technique, of subject-matter and method, even of
attitude to life and towards the dramatist himself that
a broad statement is liable to border on the point of
absurdity.
For, the sources that Tagore drew from, the
cxpcnences that moved him to write plays and his
method of writing and re-writing them, had been
wonderfully perplexing. If he had followed the Irish
melodies and written Valmiki Pratibha, he had also
k^.own the Greek ideals and written Malini ; if ho had
a:tempted the Shukcspearean technique and produced
Bisarjjan, he had also developed the tragedy of silence
and written Grihap ►aucal: if he had tackled the
Javanese technique in Tashtr Desh, he bad also culti-
vated the problem drama in Bansari. Many strains and
impulses had operated on him to produce complexity:
realism and idealism ; allegory and symbolism ; objecti.
cation of mood as well as depiction of action;
development of an idea as well as Immersion in a
theatre movement that sought fulfilment of now values.
Rabindranath in his characteristic way had sought to
fuse external action with internal calm, his poetic
personality with his dramatic characters; and the
barrenness of plot with the creation of a most difficult
dramatic illusion.
For. Rabindranoth'a artistic being, as he himself
ecafcsscd in one of his letters, was never aaticd with
cne literary form. From form to form he 'ceaselesslY
went forward, from the most complicated technique to
the barest depiction of mood he cocstantly changed.
And so, to say that, drama being entirely the conflict
of characters, Tagore's genius is not dramatic, is to
leave out of eoosideration at least a dczen plays that
show Tagore not J y going through his apprenticeship.
but at the heighf of his dramatic achievement. It is
tzae that Tagore's most successful ploys were those
-
whores ho did not inflict a severe blow on the dramatic
tradition of Beppl that Madhusudan and Dina-
baadbu had left behind, authors whom Tagore had
ualoualy road. It would be 'Indeed an interesting fact
to know that . Taoore in his early yot1th read and even
^ wlated Shakespeare--and. of all plays. Macbeth-
,^ ^a
'.t*. t -profound effect in the intimation of a eenti-
>Q► s iilaau! was bound to be stimulating. The techniq ue
of Shakespeare was the same as that which most of
Tagore's predecessors were trying to emulate, bringing
in it touches of - the heroic-romantic drama of the
Elizabethan period. The predominance of one stood.
as was in the classical Sanskrit plays, give Way to : the
conflict of characters Which showed themaelVes in
prodigality of action that tended to be external bring-
ing in its trail a complicated, though not efeetiv '-Plot ,
In the social playa it was realism that was to'ing to
instil itself—a realism that degenerated often.: kto a
moralising straightforward statement;. _But the Sanskift
tradition had not entirely disapp d, and llree . Vie' the
indigenous theatre called_ yalra, which was undergoing
a considerable eculari ation, while its pro(us#op,' of
songs, its continued action, and allcgoriml if not
symbolical treatment, were getting grcdually;. abiprbod
into the main trends of the Bengali d.i ►ma. 'r'tia:open-
air stage and the emphasis on the poetic .temper of the
play rather than on its realistic appeal were the; raoeti
characteristic features of the palm.
Rabindranath who grow in a mos • congenial
dramatic atmosphere naturally did not a1101- himself
to be led away entirely by the Western standards and
quickly seized the technique of the indig_aeous, drama
which was very much consistent with his ow,-poetio
temperament and for which be had cnnaidrable
admiration. Tagore's earliest plays did not therefore
thrive on the Shakespearean model ; as a matter of '
fact, he seized most eagerly the musical drsmar-thsn_ka. ,
to his acquaintance with the mitts t =elodiott—and.. bi*.:
,
Valmiki P,atibha and Mayor Rliaa were musical playL
Tagore's chief concern as a dramatist had boon 'the
mingling of Eastern and Western styles, an objective
that. as he himself said in his Reminiscences, ho had
achieved :
"From this mixed cultivation of foreign and,
native melody was born the Vnirniki Praribha. The
tunes in this mu"seal drama are mostly Indian. but
they have been dragged out of their classic dignity;
that which soared in the sky was taught to run on
the earth. Those who have seen and heard it pet'-
formed will. I trust, bear witness that the harnessing
of Indian melodic modes to the service of the drams
has proved neither dcrogsto.v nor futile..Thi: con-
junction is the only special feature of Valmi ci
Pratibho * - i
The other important feature of that play was that
there Rabindraniith for the first time saw the true
emergence of blot dramatic genius, particularly at a
time when it was undergoing a tremendouA uphenv"l In
the poetic field. The poet in Ribinoranalh suddenly
saw the dramatist in himself just as the robber in.
Valmiki saw the poet in himself ; and I'nlnriki Pmtibha
fructified a long struggle to be more objective than it
was possible to ie in the lyric. Its technique of
construction has nothing of the eomrlicat%l stn etutre
of a Shakespearean play: it was 'a simple story with
suspense based . on the principle that the dramátlo
I. Nj 1asMlseiae. , L.wt=# 1l17, p; 1*
 478 THE MODERN REVIEW FOR JUNE, 1949
surprise had ultaady bct•:a half-told at the beginning.
The construction was rather in the mould of the
Katbakae where "speech takes on tuneful inflexions
whenever emotions come into play." The play naturally
•
bad a single knot that had to be opened—n loose knot
technically viewed from the point of vier of the
iidmi'w ion to theatres by ticket iuu started) who
^ etuaudcd a full-blooded draw ►► that must iauludr
vehemence of passion and fine outbursts of poetie.d
frenzy . 'file stage conditions too which permitted the
multitude of ehtfting scetuc» demanded a long descr ► 1--
t ion which the audience would gluilly lirteu to were it
,

drama—but a difficult one viewed from the angle of clothed in the fullest of poetic form, The dramatic
the poet's own soul. The framework was indeed simple structure of the numerous plays that wee then lxe ► ut;
though the struggle was sharply inten.e—a characteris- written had become loose and the emphasis wits rot
tic that was so patent in Tagore's later plays. Valmiks always on the main action and the single ,ituation but
Piutibha ana Kul MrTpaya broke the tradition of the' on a variety of side-lights and by-scenes that catered
Bengali drama, not only because they contained a for the auditor's demand for spectacle. Tagort naturally
considerable projection of Tagore's own personality, but apprehended the danger of such a movement toward-
because they defied the ,taudard of action that Na. an episodic plot and felt that chutucterl:ation and not
,

laid down by tladlwshudan. .Mayan Kheia too be. merely plot would be the chief iuterc t of drams. Hi
longed to the mine genre. though of a -lightly different had not yet, acquired a romnrnand over the 'i w
type. technique which was also not suited to his lrrir.il
"In this the songs were tnir,)ortuut, not the L peramrnt anti the reM1It. of the attempt that lu.
drama. In the others it serie*' of dramatic , ituntion,. made to fit himself in the dramatic tradition was the
were strung on % t.hrcad of melody ; this was it play Raju 0 Rani where he tried to shift the degree• of
garland of songs with dust a thread of dramatic plot emphasis from plot to character. Raja 0 Runi howev+l.
running through. The play of feeling, and not of
action, was its essential feature. In point of fact, t as Tagore himself admitted, was not a great dratn.
was, while composing it, aturated with the mooit though it had rich dramatic possibilities. Maybe thi'
of song." was because of Tagore's inherent dislike for that type'
By leaving aside the type of drama which Tagore'- of drama ; maybe it as because of Tagore's lack of
predecessors had practised, he gained to subtlety and mastery over the form that he was going to use. Rt1,
alepacc what he lost in nuts and power. 0 Rani therefotc, beesme is "mixture of melodramn
But Tagore wanted it greater measure of stage and superb tragedy, of carelemurm and subtle art, a,
success than what his previous plays could secure and disordered a close as ever a good plot gave.' 'Fhcre is
he very soon realised, because of his close association only a little differentiation of character with is good
with the theatre, that this was in►poaible without dot of "secondarily relevant material" and unequal
aoobpting the Shakespearean technique that Miudhu- distribution of emphasis in the scenes. The subplot is
shudan had introduced in the Bengali drama. Jyotir- there too as well as the "tragic loading" of the last
Elizabethan
indranath, Rabindranath :s brother, was in his own way scene which are reminiscent of the
continuing that tradition and it was really erabarrn.3sing dton.
for the public to witness performances bssed on any In the next play Birorjan, Tagore had revealed a
other approach. Realism was against Rabindrunath ; greater mastery of the technique which he had
employed in Rays 0 Rani and showed what he could
the use of romantic motivation was against blur; and
achieve in dramatic characterisation. The underplot
the five-act technique was against him too. The result
which was bequeathed to Tagore by the Shakespearean
wets that Rabindranath himself became inclined towards
depiction of character through its many stages and this convention was undoubtedly there' but the characters
he did in Raja 0 Rani, Birarjan, 4%fal;ni, which had in existence. t heastructure
came fo have more differentiated and independent
of the plot was more rigidly
them all the elements that the Bengalis had recently moulded while the conflict a force that was
acquired from the British playwrights. The tradition unknown to his predecessors.attained Reflection made way for
of the tiEfed verse-drama of the heroic-romantic
• type action whose free development was not hampered by
lived with the Bengali auditors and there brow too a any exteriuI power. Biaorjan had, therefore, ever been
da v tion to political causes which 1e4 dramatists like a tremendous maccees on the public stage specially
Jyotindtanath to seek a correlation bt seen drama and because "the paation and the ao^gtnifeent emotion"'
national life. There was also the purrs ° enthutlam for that the pl*.v contained catered to lfj demands of the
dramatic statement, for 'showing events' as wall ae auditors. Rabindranath however in his next two PliY8
telling them. Shakespearean ideals had degenerated in Matsui and Chitrangadaauried the tienhniquc to its
the .bands of Bengali imitators into some kind of an logical conclusion and achieved it simplicity of form
gdarnal action and a conflict that was not the outcome that was almost Greek. The emphasis was now on
of an inherent shortcoming. in the ebarattter, but 'A r single action while the plot was bereft of adds oo^otpl
the resultant of an external forge! The four or five ` cation* and even of Tagore'a erstwhile favourite sub-
player of this period show Tagore's coma-back to the
traäitiop of his predecee^dn who relied on an abundant a 8.U.^.^. A rtes t Poo
hire: of át.1 action ? and varied -incidents. The t ,^,, ^, . !'w are►. i 9 ibp
,

^idlm
,-
- m. wu_ now a mixed body' of .spectttorr (for the
,
3. 1614.. pass
 THE DRAMAS OF RABINDRANA'H TAGORE :479
Plot. Tegorc we in thcsc plays bodily form to the the action-sequence that p ve eoltte kind 0 aD
noblest capacities of man and to be thought that approach to the external life yielded plsoe to • m°re
Waudern through oturnity'—all with the intense fervour perplexing pattern that communicated a lPirltU5
ui a toot's vision of life. Yet this period of Rabindra- insight. Has not Tagore himself said in sonde of his *Wn
path a dracnatre activity shows him paying his allegiance statements about his Plsys that the PhiloeoPhical
to a form tliaL waus not entirely his own ; oven the use approach to We that was Will was unconaiO4 1y hatter'
of blank verse that he made, him introduction of the formed into a conflict that belonged to the oho!tem
duueru„turnl in Chitrangada , his use of too many and if his plays and so became dramatically relit t But
not very' justifiable deaths in Raja 0 Rani and even Tagore never tried to deduce this drsmttio, ooàliat
ui eome'horror tr'gcdy in tluilini were in keeping with consciously from his philosophical doctrines, :which too
the demandsof his age. Tagore undoubtedly used these he could not, entirely forget. This ' was iadee4 a difficult
devices with considerable excellence, but the main position, made all the snore difficult by an attempt. at
difficulty was that he was ever contending with his own reconciliation that must be made between t► _ 4l1roati0
subject, to ev'olvo a technique that could meet his form that involves the dramatic e datmtee'of:- his
demands on the drama. It was not an easy job to dramatis personae and an underlying idea wb,o .!&tare.
diecov& a dramatic medium for such poetic soul as his, would seem intt^mpatib$e with that forth.• This Idea'►'
and there were no models before him. He had mote- must have es 4iially a philosophical bash (in,
over to compete with the main tenc:eney of realism widest sense of the term 'philosophy') ttnd' bat not
of his age as well as of his own attitude to life which Tagore himself said with reference to his p a-
was burdening into a definite philosophy. sing with Sarodotsav that the etellil ebnflic '.id. the
and
Of it, Rabindranath had already given a hint in 6oul is betw n its joy that is its inherent u*
his Prukntir Pariaudh, of which he later wrote is his the facts of sorrow, ousts of ieaa, hatred, IDdi a nee
Rrmirn. ccnces thus: and doubt that prevent us from attaWng.., .infinite
bliss ? This conflict- fundamental. in its natOre—'
"This Pro ll-ritir Parisodh may be looked uPM naturally involves many more tbinp than. the 1►lisd-
as an introduction to the whole of my future
literary work ; or rather, this has been the subject Lion of a philosophical conflict in the dramas. A ieoond
on Which all my writings have dwelt.-the joy of conflict runs scram the fiM ; the closure of man's
attaining the Infinite within the unite." senses by man's own injunctions and a pPetites t^criwr '

This statement has perhaps led some critics to the urge of nature through the.call of seasons to open
opine 1 hat Tagore's playa are mainly plays of ideas. the senses in order that man may meet one another
: lays of iieas, they like most plays, are. But the more intimately! These two conflicts praoti" '!Y
question is : Is it necessary to stop by labelling involve everything that a good tragedy oge aontaia.
Riibindranath's plays like that? If Rabindranath in an Ultimately they are reduced to a conflict bWtween the
introspt ctive and reminiscent mood had said that he vision of the cosmic unity where everything from
had symbolised a certain idea in a certain play or even dust to galaxy is held together, and the impulse of the
that a certain quasi-philosophidal approach is the individual to fulfil its unity by breaking away from
burden of his plays, can we over-state the point and the separations of life, is time and space. In this
infer that his plays lack the qualities that are dramatic? pattern, action is sometime 'an element of the seen We
It is not enough to say that because a certain casual of human relations but it is an eleflent of the unseen
relationship between two concepts run through` his life too particularly when Rabindranath's relationship
plays, they erase to be effective dramas particularly between the individual and the total is not always q
when we know that this approach may well.ierve to a ground level, but between the individual sydUle p
link his plays with his other creations. Such is funda- of various human powers and the supertotality in which
mental approach to the universe may at best become the powers sub use'
:ate theme of his playa where the idea ultimately There are natstratly, as Prof. Cousins kas pointed
emerges not as an abstraction but as a deeply imagined out, two"&direction of movement--one'towai+8e the
picture of the relationship of man with the absolute material and the external, the other towards the
and speculative questions that face him in his Bail. internal and the piritual ; the outward-movement with
life. The conflicts f mood, matter and thought and its emphasis on that
at pertain to the senses
the various jutions of these in the life of an and the internal movement with its intuition of natural
individual ultimately tell us of the connexion of a and inescapable unity. Action under such condition
soul with the all-enveloping mystery of tl^e universe. comes to have the force of a symbol--and has not
Tagore Afforded himself the spacIousaeae of a phil000- Rabindronath talked of Smovement' frequently In his
shawl 'doctrine undoubtedly but when he came' to the plays'--which conversely assumes the character of
rritiag of hip p!aym bo seceded this doctrine to the • t, r r... n r a. P. M.kJ VN. n. too.
Jackgty . old created men and women about. wbote 8. "Tgwv 'in Twp.,v ' hf I. N. Crwd.. Is C wept T
.a lstenee and about wham. rela000shtp with the r• •a,
6. Cl. "WU1« Use 'lad• philebob•tn Ts r. bill,,.to 1M
•e•►•.
VtsO there could be nO scope for d011btn At bf it
mod sett«tIM at t^IhYwi. till du Mail is Stia end. TUa rw►t.
Ze 1ba Tagore, dealt with a theme that .

eltmPt to,. the borderline of drama, epedslly when w

a w . ,a,..ib aa.r $I t»r r. ra.. ,.t I. ,.,.b„e.
tmmot, Testy. t r a.dt,.rRlx,,,, p, o,
„ PeL.., y :
4
484 THE MODERN REVIEW FOR JUNE, 1949
action. A good instance of this is in Sarodotsau itself
•as well in llaja, where in the story of the transforma-
tion of the personalities to states of complete fultil-
went, is concentnited The infinite action that is
-necessary to attain the infinite being.' The songs too of
the plays of Tagore's second period are remarkable not
merely for their structural use bu for their suggestive-
ne often as pure epitomes of spiritual truths.
Such an unforeseen use of 'r,ction' tug led many
critics to say that Tagore's middle plays have no
action. They say that there may be philosophy i3
Tagore but of action there is none in his plays, ever
missing the fact that Tagore*s technique of life is in
fast so much dynamic that 'action' becomes its in-
betent property and does not writ for external impetus
and even canalization. The world that Tagore creates
is art an unreal or too real one, though it is consider-
ably different from the world we are accustomed to
find in drama. As a mental world it had its own
standard of truthfulness ; as a world of tTagore's own
personal experience, its own modicu m of truth.
Iiabindrnnnth's means may often be of utter suggestive-
ness, but his end was to depict a world that was true
and exceedingly proximate ; it standard of emotional
and spiritual reality that he had himself felt and
experienced. The Post 0icc, for example, presents a
feeling of an acutely intense world, a play that has a
veiled truth at the back of its eternal elusiv,ness. The
Cycle of Spring too is not a cycle of spring whose
revolution can be seen with physical eyes, it contains
essentially the exuberant high spirits and fun, the
itz+eprea: ible abandon of eternal youth. The beauty of
- lyric poetry and with Tagore particularly the distinc-
Babindraaath's symbolism lies in the use of irrealities
as symbol' of as intensely real word.
The difficulty however arose when Tagore found
that his technique was not successful on the public
stage and that even scholars d ffcred vastly in opinion
about the success or failure of his plays. The first and
apparent reason for such a mixed reception was that
kis auditors had never seen anything of this kind
before. The second reason is a more psychological one.
Tagore perhaps residing in his own plane of conacious-
neas did not have a correct ides of his auditor's plane
of eonsciouseecss with the result that his reality became
his auditor's fantasy. Queen Sudarshana's trouble will
Tag f# 'own trouble ; his public could b>St discover
the teal king. Tagore's demand on the sensibilities of
bli audience was more than they cold reciprocate and
so his plays like Nabin, Riau-Utshet), etc., failed once
to be popular successes. To be 'more precise, Tagore 'a
real shortcoming was not that his plane of reality was
entirely wyoud the comprehension "of• the common man
but that he sometimes reflnd the material world
rather too mucb--adding to it occasionally a very
Zywc.. tone. The meaning would be more clear it It
i , pointed out that In the re-written version of his
pieys. Rabladranath achieved a larger meawre of
pular :ilueccs. by gitinga more concrete touch totthe
fr u lwte by .
,
ice.:his. Imapery more
rational thad mystical. Again, the limited success that
came to his Nature dramas where the spirits of nature
have been symbolised to an almost unforeseen extent,
was not because people understot'd their meaning; but
because the show attracted the eye and the car muro
than Ilia intellect. Flowers like maiali, mad4av,, cc.,
were Sometimes invested with a h ►.man touch to give
some kind of an appeal to an ethenul sy wbol ►sai ion.
Again, in some plays the unreality of the action has
been matched by an intensely poetic dialogue, and au
inwgery that is more human than can be reasonably
expected in such plays.
Another reason for such it confusion about the We
of 'action' in Rabindranath is the recurrence in some
shape or other, of the same theme and of the lyric
strain which, as Tagore himself admitted, disturbed the
dramatic texture of his plays. It is a;ro true that the
germ of many of his plays can be seen in his lyrics. And
-.-moreover, the over-use of songs which people always
took to be lyrical without caring to appre iate their
dramatic propriety' provided another source of confu-
sion. What Tagore essentially did was that, particu-
larly in his later plays, he used it kind of vocubulnry
that was well known in his poetry with the ine%it- ble
consequence that his' public which had been humming
his strains of music failed to detect the dramatic is
the songs'. The emotion was naturally the same but
bis dramatic emotion was different from the poetic
emotion in the sense that the former had a movement,
u direction and also a crisis which the latter had not.
It is said that the drarr.a is more objective than the
tion was sharp like a razor's edge, and movement from
one stage to another was merely it matter of degrees.
Sarodotsav, for example, is one of the most original
and delicate of Tagore's plays, one with the most
attenuated action, one of which it will be easiest to
say that it is undramatic. Yet the play is essentially
drynatic in conception and tone, as the beginning song
itself would suggest, Its emotion is the most delicate
of emotions, an idea of which' has been given in
Tngor0s lecture on the Philosophy of Leisure. Yet the
drama develops not merely on one central 'emotion' but
on a chain of 'emotions' that clash with each other is
a way that becomes dramatic. It involves essentially
a refinement of method that has often been mistaken
as a confusion of form. The same is almost true of
Achatayatars where the dramatic intensity .p1 the climax
lies in the perspective that it unlglds--the proe; ►ect of
a free communion with Nature which 'not only destroys
but creates.
• What Tagore. unlike some oiler creative writorg,
wonderfully combined' • in his plays Were . attitude. that
had been for long, accepted to be antaseNhc spfn'
^ 7. and M. Far lac.►.. rawest elM. ^Md It. rte! ^ to
.— ;
1vt art domMic. nee T.lars. Wyk of lad4a. vw$ n " L. _ .
I
twit .N 4r si's N►pas., aid b" bow is.qaWl/, ! !!^7`M
my Re"h "foram, /. 110, Is sass' át'thii^ s ia> al
Tp^i wd. fwt 4t+N .
 Tht bI AMAS O1 tNbWA ° 1AC E dot
(ua]. dramatic and poetic values. Tagore had a life eddies of 'tears and doube and hatreds that he. 0 sates
to express; he was acquainted with a powerful drama- around himself. The conflict of petsonalt0ee t^lt."Mily
tic tradition rind so had an acute sense of the dramatic recedes to the baekg roand, though It is the bumaia , soft-
form; and yet he was a poet with his personal stan- flict on which this Inner conflict is 'Sought to f,e o .

dards of valuer and individual conflicts. An inter- grafted. The result was that the human belts that
action, or rather, it fu.ion of thcce it wai, that sought Tagore created in the plays of this period became not
fulfilment in hLM drums--n kind of a det elopment that only eternal types, but beings shoe: nature$ a of
involved a constant movement away from rcali>an. thoughts and passions became Of lasting tree for
all times. An undying quality of mankind wu -aY bo-
Tagoro's plays, therefore, became bo distinctly original
that they di cpensed with the accepted manner of lired in them—symbolised in such a way that their
dramatic writing, anti involved the conflict and subse-spiritual signifcancep appeal to us not thtron ! the
puent, fusion of so many contrary tendencies of feelingmedium of reason, but of feeling. It Was A'fotrn of
tycabolism that was beyond the competene =ad the
and viFeneei of the spirit that are prolongations of the
poetic sensibility (Piakritir Pariaodh); of a personal common man who was unable to stow _up liii aenn- .

kinship with the strand of thought of his country bilities to the same tenor to which Tagore *aft d, h int
(Bieurjan) ; of an endeavour to discover a dramatis to do. The profusion of songs and the use of everyday
statement of emolions and tnoodn that are porsonal speech carried to its perfection of utterance bdpd. the
(The Cycle o/ Spring) ; and finally, of an acceptance creation of the necery atmosphere—an *hfdephece
of soul-existence as contrasted to mere pbyakal';being.
within the orbit of drama of the various socio-political
causes that Were slinking the age in which he thrived In The Cycle of Spminq which is the last play,;.oi thin
(AchalaUalan and the Machine dramas). There were period, this use of symbolism was carried to iti
moreover, many nrpec.ts of Rabindranath's own per- theat point. In that play particularly , iymbolla^a, eon;
sonality, the various aspects of his creative self thatgusted in regarding the whole natural world- At a iq^b VI
delighted in experimenting with practically all forms of an inner spiritual reality, of a spiritual tsnth that'
of literature. The latter particularly together with hisverges on the right side of pantheism. Datb and
lyric inclinations, had their effects on the dramatic birth; resurrection and destruction; these tianImded
texture of his plays--an influence that made him doubt- the Poet's being and gave it a glow that was. almost -

ful about the force of the effect that his plays would mystical. The result is that the plot is reduoed^ to its
ultimately produce on his audience. barest simplicity and the dialogue comes almost to
Dramatically speaking too, the difficulty was be- the point of silence, imparting a magnificent solemnity
tween the diverse demands of characterisation, and the to his plays, and effect that Tagorob recently developed,
stage-craft sought to fulfil. Wit formal pattern tended:
depiction of mood; the demands of intellect and feeling.
If in the playas beginning with Rnja 0 Rani, Rabindra- to be more commensurate with the basic idea; the ,

nath depicts the conflict and decay of character, the continued action, the minimum stage devices and the
characters develop because they are driven to seek successful enhancement of poetic expre ion, all further
freedom for themselves through self-knowledge, through ing the effect. The dramatic action had been minimised
without disturbing the artistic impressiveness of alter!-
the realisation of the truth that the avoidance of sorrow
cannot entitle you to the supreme bliss. The ideal% and ing, ultimately identifying the dramatic action with the
faiths of the chmnctr have been shaken, as in Raja dynamics of his philosophy'.
0 Rani or Mali or Biaarjsn, shakeny the know- In the next series of plays beginning with
ledge that to vger round the smaller-1 in us is not the Mukladhara, the symbolic pattern which is mostly
rumnurni bonum of human existence. The socio- atmospheric, has tended to disappear while his plays
political background of the age also came 49 have its seek to assimilate within themselves some of the vital
full play and Biaarjan and Achalapatan belonged trends of the age of machinery. To make machinery a
considerably to the tyranny of a dogmatic age. The protagonist had been the objective of drpmatista like
conflict of the plays apparently started as the conflictCapek and Rice and Taller. They showed machinery
of warring men, though fundamentally speaking, they as an active agent that directly moulded the behaviour-
grew to be conflicts of a different and more elemental of the characters and the order of the society they ,
order. lived in. But 'T'agore allegorized the machinery aid
The plays beginning from Sarodotshov laid greater Instead of making it stand before wo as a living bring
emphasis on this fundamental concept, which in kept it at a distance (as in Mukfadhara) as an object
Tagore's own woMs was something like this: of terror and perhaps, hatred. Its influences on men
"The soul's exprr'ss:on is Joy for which he were shown to us--or rather, a manifestation of the
(man) can accept sorrow and death; he who avoi4s influences--at work in a society which had not fortottijfl.
the path of sorrow In fear, or n l*ineer or doubt the intimations of immortality. On the one hand, we
in denied the Joy In the word.
The conflicts in B'Sbindrmgth's tragedies then grow have the sense of feeling of the joys of free existence ,

to be conflicts between the narrow' wot,id of selfbood while on the other the sense of an intellectual eomn e-
that man has 'created for himself and the Joy in hension of the evils of machinery. The two faculties.
u i ice v1 soul that be can ever secure for himself, but of ratiocination and feeling have to work together iq
friibieh be Unfortunately avoid- because of the 'wall 9. $8460 , sbpur as is Acdar, pip tlf at ass

p
.4Z THEMODE&N 1VIEN R JUNE, 1940
unison if we expect to understand the plays—a combi- background or create an atmosphere as in Sarodoterav Or
nation that does not produce symbolism of the highest Phaiguni; she has a distinct existence that thrives on
type but an allegory of the common variety. That human affinity and human response. For, with
Tagore understood this, is evident from his two explana- Itabindranath natural beauty is not merely one of the
tory statements in which he sought to clarify his mean- many forme of beauty that tie loves, it is an actor
leg--a comprehension of which in itself is more int.eel- recognised by us, an actor who has the pulsation of life
lecttul than it was in his previous plays. When Tagore and rhythm of movement as much as human beings
had sought to lass the world of ratiocination and lave. The most important point about ILibindranath's
actuality he did it by means that belonged to the world treatment of nature, particularly in the season-playa, is
he was seeking to slash; the occasional immortal visita- that he has intensified the almost mystic appeal of
tions that Nandita and Abhijit gbt err washed off by Nature by the profusion of songs and by all other
the many lines in the plays that read like Shavian means of suggestion which he with it prolonged at:sge
propaganda. Moreover, the plays give only one side experience could think of. As in the plays of Synge,
of our experience of machinery and though the inner Nature here does not reveal herself in terms of character,
struggle was there, the outer struggle took the upper thought and fate, though Nature without human touch
hand. The treatment that Tagoro gave to the theme has no significance either.
was the result of a conscious effort to accommodate From the point of view of dramatic technique too,
certain trends of international thought into drama. Or, to this period is remarkable for its plentiful use of song,
be more precise, it may be said that in the plays of this even at a jeopardy to the dramatic moment or momenta.
period, there is a mixture of allegory and realism, where The prose dialogue was also being reduced to its barest
the machinery is an epitome while the characters are minimum and the dance was being employed to clarify
catural, preserving in between them an artistic cocSis- the delicate moments of emotional tension that the
tency that is remarkable. songs contained. The tempo of the drama concentrated
In the next cycle of plays, we notice Rabindranath itself in song to seek its outlet again in dance.
celebrating the seasons of the year, giving to N; ► ture a The development from the drama of the seasons to
dramatic scope different from what he had given her in dance dramas was therefore logical. In technique it
his earlier plays. In his previous plays, Nature was asserted in a new way the virtue of convention and
used to suggest the world surrounding the acton ; now formality, exploiting to the full the expressiveness of
Nature came to have the importance she had in the design in speech, movement, stage-setting and music.
Sanskrit drama 0 . Here be gave to Nature the expres- Tagore's ambition was naturally the enhancement of
sion of certain emotions by means of his peculiar expression that sought its freedom from the conflict
imagery and discovered in her a certain human affinity between the lyric poet and the dramatist. The verbal
that was the product of a deep personal contact. The contents of the play came to be concentrated in songs
playlets of this period have, therefore, little action in from which it again wanted to go out to the dance and
the common sense of the word and have rarely the the following statement is fairly indicative of the
catastrophe that belongs to tragedy. Rabindranath here change: "The events of human life in their outward
for the first time shows the extent to which Nature can aspects are all displayed as movement. So when any
through the call of the seasons help us to regain our event of an outstanding importance has to be portrayed,
lost bliss and to mingle with the Infinite that is within it is but natural that its movement should be given
ns. The festive appearance is already there, and also a corresponding dignity by the addition of rhythmic
the sanctity of the ritual ; Rabindranath could very grace. The dance here is just giving of rhythmic
conveniently in plays like Besantousev, Bars hamangaf, prominence to the events of a story, keeping in the
Seshbarshon, Nataraj, Nabin and Sunder use a kind of background or leaving altogether the words. In drama
symbolism that transcended the limits of allegory and where the words are metrical, it is surely inconsistent
lived not only by its atmosphere but by a musical re- to leave the movements realistic. Our very word for
petition of intensely poetic images and imageries. Sal drama or play nataka shows that the dance was its
trees, bokul trees a •d Sowers sing in chorus at the ad- essential feature." This not merely involved the
vent of the spring or at the commencement of the rains. acceptance of a now dramatic technique born out of a
These natural objects have sometimes been associated consideration for the poet in the theatre but of a
with arbitrary qualities but very soon they have been .fuller accepanee and realisation of the use of embolism
enriched by tender human values that endear these in the theatre. As regards 8abl ad' n't a attitude
reasons .to us. It is then converted into a mystical toward. the theatre It would be wise to recollect that
aperienee where Nature breathes the spirit of joy and almost from the very .commencement of his dramatic
freedom in mankind and does not become, as in Synge, a career, be was nev e^a admirer of the modern attempt
ptotagoniat. Mature remains a. continuously surprising at making scenic eptesentation usurp the Place of
nonrce of imageries whore combinations conjure up ideas imagiaatton. His opinion was that the deliberate
that do not entirely belong to the region of dram& but
-
pursuit of scenic realism was antagonistic. to the law
(

of lyrical poetry. Nature does not merely develop a of dramatic art and that the dramatic illuion must
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 1 IAC0RE
THE DRAMAS OF RABINDRMT1 '
ulthmately spring from the active and unrestricted ShYamo, it was through the dam lflOY5S1tg that
exercise of the imaginative faculty of the author, realistic 'action' was sought to be portt'ayed'-'as 4
actor and audience combined. Such an approach to matter of fact it went so tar that, as Mr. D. P. Mukerii
the theatre was perhaps because of the influence of has admitted, in certain scenes "dancing atteined INK'
the Sauakrit tradition, on the one hand, and of the government." In these plays Tigers gyre - through
demands of his poetic temperament on the other. dance, as Yeats did in some of his plays, the euPteeaOn
But it was essential that an equilibrium was established to certain emotion in a tray that seemed to strike at
between the poetic drama of his type and the craze the roots of dramatic convention. But, "to have been
for 'action' that was in Bengal without which no more dramatic in the conventional sense would have
drama could be successful on the public stage of done less for drama."
Bengal twenty yearn ago. Moreover, the Dramatic Yet, in spite of all these Tagore'a plays. were half
School at Santiniketan was bubbling with a new as much successful on the public stage of Beugit • as
enthusiasm for fine arts, an enthuaimm whose outcome were the plays of some of the second-rate d4t11tl1te.
was in the shape of highly collaborative plays like his This has induced critics to ssy, that in spite of all
dance-dramas where the poet, the dancer and the theoretical peculiarities that we might have In Ttgoie'e
musician combined to make the plays what they were. plays, they are fundamentally deficient is oeetiain
'Action' in these dance-drama, came to be inherent in qualities that are theatre's peculiarly own. It .Ia a
the character of things and the realistic fidelity made difficult point to face yet a point that, has to be
way for the profundity of emotions that exist only in squarely met. The answer would however be dears -if it
solitude and in silence. And the Poet's effect flowed is recognised firstly .that by one straight jump Ta ors
finally from an imagery of emotion that is intense to carried the dramatic tradition of Bengal so much
the complex use of different media towards a single forward that the people could not equally advance in
end-and effect about which Tagore bad very little tim&-a statement that is substantiated by the ping
doubts himself, thanks to his acquaintance with the popularity of Tagore'a plays -today. The other reason
Javanese and No plays. r' more complicated and'technical than tire f. one.
Such an approach to the theatre and such an Tagore's plays reveal a peculiar progress in the deve-
use of 'action' immediately necessitated a peculiar lopment of form in the sense that instead of going to
assembling and ordering as symbols which as noted p a sion and characterisation for the making of his p1*ys,
already added in its turn a function to action itself. F4O relied on a kind of a symbolism which thrived on
Instead of treating a plot as something that illumi- suggeadon. It was perhaps also because of the fact that
rates human character, Tagore identifies action with against the real world of drama that his contemporaries
emotion—action that does not flow from and is not used in their plays, Tagore used In his, a pursl
entirely dependent on character but invoks,, instead mental world where the progression was from outward
of
some of the most subtle emotions of the soul-life, to inward, from a world of intellect to a world
mood or perhaps, an ideal world of the spirit. The
Truly speaking! Tl gore dwells on mood, the mood of
suspense, of suffering, of beauty exprced in terms of other difficulty with the plays of Tagore was the
personal conflict that they
the submission of the soul to the all-enveloping dominating Interni of a
mystery. Not that 'action' was, really speaking, con- contained—a conflict whose true appeal is not of the
centratod in the very movement of thought, in the nature of a mass appeal, as we have in theatre, but
progress of mood, which in their turn created an of the type of a contact that an individual establishes
element of the unseen life of the soul presented not with his pers0nal deity. This personal feeling the poet
only in an atmosphere charged with symbolism but can hardly share with the audience, particularly when
through a medium of expression that is remarkably the "tragedy does not become the tragedy of a corn-
symbolic—we mean, dance. Of this form Tagore munity but remains the tragedy of the individual.
A poet, as R. Peacock has admitted, "trying
indicated some now poesibiliticw in his dance-dramas to create his own tragic values enters the arena of
where dances, unlike some of his previous plays, were opinion ; his audience loses its cohesion and
not merely illustrative of the verbal contents of the emotional unity ; we disagree with his opinion and
xlay or its soap, but became a complete imaginative are insensible to his tragedy:''
symbol of all that Natarsja rymbolisea. Natir Puja is The difficulty is much more intensified when the
perhdps the most important play from that point of :conflict rains between the poet's imagination and his
view because there The dance is a part of the dramatic auditor's - intellect. Rabinrirenth's contribution to
incident itself and 4o becomes a crucial factor In the world's dramatic technique would, however, be always
development of the play. Dance there is not merely a remembered.•
peg on which the motivation ,hAnt is a symbolism -
of the transcendence of an seat) world. Dance, u. Resdu v..,ot 3 TA. P,.. U a. ra.«,.. s. Us.
poetry, long and colour form a complete harmony 0 This stay M k .i se s,get,'. Mo..t sur• to sown
vW* do "s"' we i,.mlir tvs. oI tks 5im1à v.es1>M
. ^rhicb affects the complex aesthetic • life of Srimati
t^a-'tbat site Is herself freed from her own limited being ^ ^t 0 tray .t e a,. seat cowagars, . n
ttad ` iecoma a part of ' the univ t al existence. Tatar gel twt,t r...d.uo.^ a, ,..^ttjee "Nt....t *. o^,tftt 1,t r^,
In tTt. dtmol era nu of GA prda CllandaWk. and sew. do ass u •nsas- n st ..vs iias a^. t#.^r .t^. sec