Nagamandala
– Girish Karnad
Girish Karnad as a Playwright:
Girish Karnad (1938- 2019) was an actor, film director, writer and playwright. He wrote his plays in Kannad language and most of them are translated into English. The most prestigious awards of Indian government – Padmashri and Padmabhushan were conferred upon him. He was a recipient of the highest Indian literary award – Jnanpith Award in 1998.
Major Plays by Girish Karnad:
1) Yayati (1961)
2) Tughlaq (1964)
3) Hayavadana (1971)
4) Nagamandala (1988)
5) Tale-danda (1990)
6) The Fire and the Rain (1998)
7) Boiled Beans on Toast: A Play (2014)
Major Themes in the Plays by Girish Karnad:
1) Identity Crisis
2) Hybridity
3) Incompleteness
4) Existentialism
5) Picture of Woman in Post-colonial Society
Nagamandala (A Play with Cobra)
Introduction:
Nagamandala is a myth-play by Girish Karnad. It was published in 1988. It was originally written in Kannada Language. It was transcreated into English by Girish Karnad himself. It could be called ‘A Play with Cobra’ in English. The story of the play is taken from a Kannada folklore. The playwright had heard the story from his mentor and famous poet – A. K. Ramanujan.
Major Themes of the Play:
1) Exploitation of Women
2) Mocking at the Idea of Chastity
3) Emancipation and Empowerment of Women
Major Characters in the Play:
1) Rani: Female protagonist of the play
2) Appanna: Rani’s rich husband. Appanna in English means ‘any man’.
3) Cobra: a Naga, disguises as Appanna and loves Rani. Rani remains pregnant from him.
4) Kurudavva: Old blind lady, offers Rani mystical roots to win her husband’s love.
5) The Story: the narrator of the story of the play.
6) Kappanna: Kurudavva’s son
7) A Man: Listens to the story of Rani, Cobra and Appanna from the narrator (the Story) and provides happy conclusion to the story of the play.
Summary of the Play:
Act – I
The story of the play “Nagamandala” is narrated by ‘the story’ (name of the narrator) to a man. Rani is a female protagonist of the play. She is married to a rich man, Appanna. But it is a loveless marriage. Because Appanna has a concubine. Therefore, he always keeps away from Rani. He spends most of his time with his concubine and comes to home for lunch only. He spends very little amount of time with Rani. He constantly shouts at her. He even locks up Rani into the home. In this way, married life of Rani is not happy.
Rani yearns for love from her husband. She wants to win her husband’s love at any cost. But she she gets neither love nor liberty from Appanna. There is no one to support her in the family.
One day, Kurudavva, a blind old lady, visits Appanna’s house to meet him. Her son Kappanna is with her. But they don’t find Appanna at home. They find the house closed. The mother and the son discuss Appanna’s notorious affair with his concubine. Rani remains inside and overhears their discussion. She comes to the window. Thus, Kurudavva comes to know about Rani’s pathetic situation. Kurudavva comes to help Rani to win her husband’s love. She offers Rani two love roots. She tells Rani to feed the roots to her husband. She tells Rani to try first the small one and if it does not make any effect on Appanna, Rani should try another big one. Rani first mixes the small root in milk and gives it to Appanna. But the small root fails to change Appanna. Then, Rani decides to use the big root. She mixes it in curry. But she loses hope to win her husband, Appanna’s love through this trick. Therefore, she pours the potion (the mixture of the root and curry) into an ant-hill. Cobra, a naga, resides there in the ant-hill. He consumes the potion. The magic of the root works on him. He falls in love with Rani and starts following her.
Act – II:
Naga disguises as Appanna and visits Rani at night. His behaviour with her at night is romantic. It surprises Rani. She gets shocked and becomes speechless. Afterwards, she considers her husband as a changed man and becomes extremely happy. She lays her head on his shoulder and in this way indicates her desire for love. They spend night together. Naga promises her to visit her every night. Naga leaves her at the sunrise.
On the next day, she finds Appanna’s behaviour with her as usual. He behaves with her rudely. Therefore, she considers the incident during the earlier night as a dream. But Naga again visits her the next night. They spend the night together and enjoy the pleasure of each other’s company. She asks him about his rude behaviour during the day and loving nature during the night. She asks him whether the incident during the last night was a dream or not? He tells her that it is true and he advises her not to suspect about his behaviour. Thus, she accepts it as a reality. She is convinced to accept it.
The next day, Rani notices blood on the Naga’s body. She wants to apply ointment on her body. Therefore, she goes to bring it. When she turns and finds a snake (Naga) in the mirror. It was sitting at the place of the Naga disguised as Appanna. But she finds no snake at the place of the Naga disguised as Appanna. She applies the ointment on his body. In this way, they spend the night together and the Naga vanishes in the morning.
Kurudavva and her son Kapanna come to see Rani. They see the Naga coming out from drainage of Rani’s bathroom. They scream at the sight of the Naga. They tell Rani about it. Rani tells them that there was no one except her husband in the house. At that time, Kurudavva tells her that they were outside the house for half an hour, but they did not see Appanna coming out of the house. Rani gets confused with their answer.
At noon, Kappanna visits Rani’s house and tells her that his dog is dead. On the very next day, he brings a mongoose to kill the Naga. The Naga gets injured in the fight with the mongoose. He does not visit Rani that night. He remains absent for two more weeks.
After two weeks, the Naga comes to see Rani and is informed that she is pregnant. He does not become happy with the news. After that he leaves. Appanna appears there after the Naga leaves. He becomes angry when he comes to know about Rani’s pregnancy. He raises doubt about her loyalty. He asks her how she could become pregnant although they were not together in the bed for so long. He calls her a harlot and tells her that he would take her to the Panchayat. He then locks her into the house and goes outside.
The Naga appears at night. Rani asks him many questions about his behaviour that day. Naga convinces her about his love for her. He advises her what to do on the day when she will be taken to Panchayat to prove her innocence.
The day of Rani’s trial before the Panchayat appears. Rani is asked to prove her innocence before the Panchayat. She pulls out Naga from the ant-hill and takes oath by keeping him in hands that she had not touched anybody till that day except her husband and that snake. Naga does not bite her. Instead, he makes a round around Rani’s neck. He even holds his hood on her head to protect her. The Panchayat concludes that Rani is not a common woman. They declare her to be a Goddess. In this way, Rani’s innocence is proved. Appanna accepts her along with the child.
Thus, Rani and Appanna start living happy life with their new-born child. One day, Naga visits Rani and finds Rani and Appanna sleeping together in the same bed. Naga becomes upset and decides to kill her. But he changes his mind due to his love for Rani. He takes to the form of a small snake and hides in Rani’s hair. When she wakes up from the sleep, she find her hair weighing. She combs her hair and finds a small dead snake falling down from her hair. Appanna looks at it. He becomes happy that their little baby is saved from the snake. He calls Rani Goddess. Rani requests Appanna to celevrate that of Cobra’s death as a ritual every year. Appanna happily agrees with her.
The story, the narrator, ends the story here in this way. But the man who is the listener does not accept the conclusion of the narrator. He provides his own conclusion to the story. His conclusion is that when Rani finds the snake falling down from her hair, Appanna tries to kill the snake. But Rani once again hides that snake in her hair. In this way, Rani, Appanna, their child and Cobra too live happy life afterwards.
