Asia - Female Storytelling and Drama in the 18th & 19th Century
Muddupalani
The Indian poet, writer, musician Muddupalani should also be acknowledged in drama because her writings were
performed in dramatic ways often with music, dance and acting. She was born probably
born in 1750 and was a devadasi (a
woman dedicated to worship and performing rituals and sacred recitations)
attached to Maratha, King of Tanjore.
Muddupalani spoke and sang
in both Telugu and Sanskrit and from a young age had memorized tens of
thousands of verses, traditional dances and songs. She was a consort to the
court of Pratap Singh who was a great patron of the arts. The work she created
and performed was sometimes spiritual and sometimes secular. Her Rādhikā-sāntvanam reflects on the nature of sexual and
interpersonal relationships, and some suggest it may have been based on aspects
of her life at court. It explores the marital relationship of Krishna to his
new wife Ila. Here is a quote from that dramatic erotic poem which would have
been recited and performed with dance in court:
Which other woman of my kind
has
felicitated scholars with
such gifts and money?
To which other women of my
kind have
epics been dedicated?
Which other woman of my kind
has
won such acclaim in each of
the arts?
You are incomparable,
Muddupalani, among your
kind.
… A face that glows like the
full moon,
skills of conversation,
matching the countenance.
Eyes filled with compassion,
matching the speech.
A great spirit of generosity,
matching the glance.
These are the ornaments
that adorn Palani,
when she is praised by
kings.
Muddupalani probably wrote and performed thousands of dramatic
poems, song cycles and dances. Another one of her works Astapadi is sometimes used as the basis for Indian films and
television programs.
Mah Laqa
Bai
The Indian poet, courtesan, writer and performer Mah
Laqa Bai was born in 1768 and wrote
and performed primarily in Urdu but she did produce works in Arabic, Persian
and Bhoipuri. Her writings, performances, dance and songs were performed in the
court of Hyderabad. She trained in poetry recitation, singing,
dance, archery, horse riding and javelin skills.
Mah Laqa Bai was the first woman writer in India to author a diwan (a collection of poems which is
meant to be sung, set to music and sometimes accompanied by narrative dance or
symbolic movements) named Gulzar-e-Mahlaqa, which is made
up of 39 ghazals (each ghazal has 5 couplets) and this was performed during her
lifetime but not published until 1824. In the 1790’s she recited and performed
her Diwan e Chanda which comprised 125 Ghazals. She compiled
and calligraphed this text in 1798 and gifted it to Captain Malcolm in 1799
during a dance performance of the piece in 1799 at the Mir Alam’s residence.
The text is now preserved and displayed at the British Museum.
Mah Laqa Bai was first female to organize Mushaira (performed poetry and verse
symposiums). Here is a translation from some verses from one of her Diwan, the
ghazal ‘Hoping to blossom (one day) into a flower’ translates as:
Hoping to blossom (one day)
into a flower,
Every bud sits, holding its soul in its fist. Between the fear of the fowler and (approaching) autumn, The bulbul’s life hangs by a thread. |
Mah Laqa was accomplished singer and musicians and she played Thumi music, sang in Ghazal styles using raga, taal chautala and khayal tappa styles. The movement and
dance styles she mostly performed were in the Deccani style of Kathak. She set
up a cultural centre to train over 300 girls alongside masters. Although she
was a practicing Muslim, Mah Laqa wrote and performed Hindu verses, stories and
songs. She died in 1824 and bequeathed her properties that included land, gold,
silver and diamond-studded jewels to homeless women.
Women in
Chinese Theatre in the 19th Century
The Cambridge Guide to
Theatre (Banham ed. 2000) writes of how the growth of provincial Chinese
theatre troupes in the 19th Century sees the rise of all male and
all female theatre troupes (Banham, 2000, p.204). Banham describes how the kungu companies were comprised often
entirely of females and some women of ill-repute. He also describes how
male and female actors were held in low esteem in society.
Women in
Japanese Theatre in the 19th Century
The banning in 1629, of women from performing on the stage was
maintained for at least 200 years in Japan. It is possible that women in
villages may have performed in some Bunraku puppet shows through the 17th
and 18th Centuries and also some more provincial puppet forms in
Japan where the performer is hidden and does not appear on the stage, may have
had female performers.
The beginnings of the Shinpa (also known as Shimpa) is a form of Japanese melodrama which evolved out of political movements and agit-prop theatre in the late 19th Century in Japan. The form developed around 1879 and involved the portrayal of contemporary events or ideas from Western stories and plays such as from the works of Shakespeare and Dumas, being performed in a melodramatic way. Unlike the Noh or Kabuki forms, the music for Shinpa was normally performed off stage or from instruments at the side of the stage. There are accounts of women performing on stage and as musicians in Shinpa performances in the 19th century. More realistic contemporary Japanese stories started to also be told on the stage in the late 19th century and it is possible that women may have written some of these stories since many contain stories of women. The Shinpa became a form which was adopted early in the 20th Century by Early Japanese cinema (Cody 2007).
Women in
Theatre and Performance on Bali, Java and Sumatra in the 19th
Century
Legong Dance Drama – Bali
The Legong Balinese dance drama form is characterized by precise finger
movements, defined foot movements, dramatic gestures and expressive facial
expressions. Some people believe that the Legong Dance Drama has its origins in
the ancient religious Balinese Hindu trance-like Sanghyang dedari dances where pre-pubescent girls dance in a trance
in a ritual. Others believe the Legong has its origins in the early 19th
Century. One story goes that a local prince in Sukawati (north east of modern
day Denpasar) was on death’s door. Then, one night he had a strange dream where
he saw two young maidens dancing to gamelan music. Upon his recovery, he
removed a ban on woman dancing and started to direct and choreograph the dances
he saw in his dreams. The directing or choreographing of these dances started
to be passed more on by the female dancers themselves, so a tradition of female
teachers and directors of the Legong started to emerge. This tradition is still
alive and popular today on Bali.
The stories shown in Legong Dance Drama are traditional stories often
based on stories from Hindu culture but many popular Balinese stories are used
such as The Tale of the King of Lasem derived
from the Malat, a set of dongeng (stories/fables) or cerita rakyat (people’s folktales) which
were passed down for generations through oral traditions. Legong dance dramas
normally involve two female actresses/dancers who enact different characters in
the story and a third dancer named a condong
who is an attendant who sets the scene, passes the actor/dancers props and
also plays small parts (mostly animals). Over the course of the 19th
century, eight forms of Legong evolved. These are Legong Bapang Saba, Legong Jebog, Legong
Kraton, Legong Kuntir, Legong Lasem, Legong Raja Cina, Legong
Semarandana and Legong
Sudasarna.
Some
people may regard the form of the Legong as worrying because it was initially only
performed by young girls. Yet when one sees a Legong live, one is struck by the
other worldly quality which the form has. Also the fact that the form is
regularly performed and passed down by women of all ages today, suggests that
it has evolved as an important Asian performance tradition which is driven by
women and potentially can act as a form which has great agency and advocacy for
female traditions and forms.
Srimpi Dance Drama – Java
Although
many Javanese performance forms such the Wayang Kulit and the Wayang and the
Wayang Topeng remained primarily male forms until the 20th century, some
Javanese performance forms were primarily forms performed by females in the 19th
century. Srimpi is a ritual stylistic dance drama form which originated
in Central Java in the royal courts of Yogyakarta, Indonesia which has its
origins in bedhaya form such as the
which has its origins in the 17th century. The Srimpi is a Javanese form of
rituralized dance drama which is normally performed by four female dancers who
normally use synchronized slow movements and stylized hand movements to
describe an event, story or human attribute (Brakel-Papenhuijzen.
1995).
The Srimpi
form is less sacred and more conceptual than other ritual Javanese dance
forms.As a dance drama form, the Srimpi involves stories of characters
such as the mythic goddess of the South Sea. In a Srimpi dance drama
form, normally four dancers performed before the Queen of a kingdom and the
princesses, dance stories in slow synchronized motion which show folk stories
or often ‘secret women’s business’ stories which are done slowly and with
grace. These dancers were often to performed by female dancers to an all-female
audience to gamelan music played sometimes only by female musicians.
Randai Dance Drama – Sumatra
Although Randai dance drama is normally known as a dance drama
that involves martial arts accompanied by music, which is predominately performed
by men, there are some records which seem to indicate some women performed in
adjuncts of this form in the 19th century. The form tells the
folktales of the Minankabau
(the largest ethnic group in West Sumatra). Randai is performed in a circle.
The dancers (galombang) perform in a
circular formation with 8-16 performers, 2 singers and a flute player. Females
had sometimes been involved in the form as commentary or narrator singers (aluang jo dendang) in randai theatre and during the 19th
century some started to replace the male narrators or storytellers and they
started to introduce more female subject matter and love stories. Also, during
the early 19th century male performers impersonating females (pondang or surai) started to introduce female characters and scenarios. By the
late 19th century females were involved in the randai both as storytellers/singing narrators and as characters. It
would take until the political movements in Indonesia of the 1960’s before
female in this performance form became more prominent.
Women
in the Thai Laknon Dance Drama Forms in the 19th
century
Although dance drama in Thailand existed for
many centuries, the 19th century saw great changes in the forms.
Lakhon is a generic name for a number of dance drama forms in Thailand. The
major forms are the lakhon nai and lakhon nok. The Lakhon nai’ is also known by its
full name lakhon nang nai (ละครนางใน) which means ‘Theatre
of the women of the palace’. As a form of dance drama, it is normally only
performed by women of the court and involves slow stylistic movements telling
stories from four epics – Ramakian, Aniruddha, Panji and Dalang. As a
form Lakhon Nai even has females
playing male characters although when females play male characters the graceful
fluid movements are toned down and movements are more angular.
During the early 19th century, under the reign of King
Rama II, Lakon Nai still thrived and King
Rama II and his first wife even wrote their own versions of stories from the Ramakian. New dance manuals were written
during this time by lead female court performers. However, when King Rama II
died and King Rama III became leader, bans and controls were put on
performance. King Rama III was particularly religious. Court performers were
meant to leave court. Some ended up in the courts of Cambodia and some moved to
the Siamese countryside and helped to morph this female court dance drama into
more provincial forms even using local stories. This also gave more autonomy to
the female performers and the female makers of these dance dramas. When the
great reformist leader King Rama IV (1851-1868) started his reign, Lakon Nai, was revived again as a form.
One of the other reforms brought into the performing arts in
Thailand in the 19th century by King Rama IV was his endorsement of
females also performing in the lakhon nok
form. This genre mostly uses Buddhist Jataka
stories and folk-tales. The introduction of women meant that changes
started to happen to the characters, costumes and sets. Costumes started to
become more elaborate, sets more ethereal and illusionistic and some of the
plots and characters started to even include some more comic forms.
Further reforms happened with the reign of King Chulalongkorn or
King Rama V (1968-1910), who banned slavery, outlawed opium and built both
Siamese and Western style theatres. King Chulalongkorn himself loved theatre
and he even wrote plays himself. Thai traditional forms thrived during his
reign and women became more prominent in both the performance and the directing
and writing of these forms. Also, he introduced Thai, Chinese and Burmese
stories and forms into the repertoire. Western stories, plays and popular
stories from other cultures such as the Arab One Thousand and One Arabian Nights were performed. The importance
of females in the performances and mounting of these productions cannot be
calculated. King Chulalongkorn also was found of the new movement in theatre of
realism. The eclectic tastes of King Chulalongkorn meant that the style and
stories of Thai traditional dance drama forms started to change and expand in
so many ways.
The Vietnamese Ca trù Performance
Form in the 19th Century
There are many forms of performance,
drama and theatre in Vietnam. Some forms of Vietnamese performance are
dominated by females. The Ca trù is a form of song drama where stories, poems
and tales are sung by a female singer who plays a small percussion instrument
known as a phách and is accompanied by a man on a three string lute known as a Đàn đáy and an important audience
member who beats a trống đế or praise
drum. Other forms such as the Tuồng (also known as hát bội) eventually
during the Nguyễn dynasty (1802-1945) developed to have a significant number
of female performers.
19th Century Development in the Vietnamese Tuồng Performance
The Tuồng is a Vietnamese performance drama first
developed during the 13th century which uses singing, dancing, stock
or archetypal characters and the telling of traditional folk stories. During
the Nguyễn dynasty, the Tuồng started to adopt many of the
conventions of Chinese opera such as elaborate costumes, intricate makeup,
intricate stage design and stage effects. With the building of the first
purpose-built theatre and Tuồng performance space in 1810, permanent
performance companies started to emerge attached to the courts. Emperor Tự
Đức (1847-1883) kept 150 female performers for performances and it is believed
that some of the operas, plots and Tuồng were written by some of the lead
female performers (Brandon 1967:73).
The further inclusion of women in the Tuồng saw an increase in the diversity of subject
matter. More Vietnamese folk stories and stories started to be included and is
likely that many of these were provided by and even written by women. It is
impossible to know the exact nature of their contribution since the convention
at the time was that the male master scribe would receive all credit for the
plays performed.
Vietnamese Múa rối nước Puppet
Performance Form in
the 19th Century
The Múa rối nước is a
water puppetry performance form which is indigenous to Vietnam and was
initially developed in the north of Vietnam during the 11th century.
The form involves puppeteers who stand in water manipulating puppets while
obscured behind a split-bamboo screen. Mua Roi Nuoc translates loosely as
“puppets dancing on the water”. It is a rural village puppet drama form from
the Red River Delta region which originated around the 11th century but by the 16th century had developed into the form we
know today. Originally it was only performed after rice harvests when to thank
and appease local spirits rice paddies were used as the ‘stage’ for plays of
thanks and hope. Around the 16th century,
stages started to be erected on rice paddies or shallow ponds and wooden
puppets on sticks started to be used. Eventually puppets were supported under
the water by bamboo rods. A little later the convention of erecting a screen
(usually painted with the image of a temple) behind which 6-12 puppeteers were
hidden developed. The puppets can appear from either side entrances or from
beneath the water itself. Around the 16th century, a traditional Vietnamese orchestra
was incorporated using drums, bamboo flutes, gongs and dan bau. This music is largely used in an
atmospheric way but it also accompanies the chorus singers who sing the story
in a cheo style. The stories in Mua Roi Nuoc are normally local folk tales and
legends but some works can include comic routines and even political satire.
During the 19th Century,
women started to for the first time, to be allowed to perform some parts in the
Múa rối nước. The first aspects of the Múa rối nước were involved
in most probably the making of the water puppets and then the operation
of some puppets. The fact that during the 19th century more local
and regional folk stories which included female characters started to become
part of the repertoire of companies seems to indicate that females started to
have more of an influence on the form. Also the changes in the cheo singing
form to higher registers seems to also indicate that females may have become
more involved also as singers in the Múa rối nước in the 19th
Century.
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