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Greek Theatre Essay

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It was because the Sanskrit theatre was acting-oriented that it made minimum use of dramatic properties. With massive use of prose recitations, chorus, verses and songs the Sanskrit theatre gave greater flexibility to the dramatic speech and provide a multi-level organization of communication between characters. Another form of communication used in the Sanskrit plays is announcements or conversation from the backstage which is known as nepathaya or the use of oracles called akashwanis through which supernatural beings communicate. These create audio-visual attractiveness and instantly draw the audience into the play. For communicating some abstract, indirect and mental aspects of the dramatic plays, the Sanskrit plays resort to a number of inventive devices like swagata which is the Indian term for aside in the Western drama, janantika in which the characters exchange ideas which are not meant for others and apavarita, in which the dialogue spoken is heard by all the characters but for the person referred to. Of course all these expressions are meant to be heard by the audience. Other features of the Sanskrit theatre namely are poorvaranga or the preliminaries and rituals for propitiating the gods before the enactment of the play, generally observed behind the curtain. The Sanskrit play generally began with invocation of the elephant-headed god, Ganesha, by the sutradhar, accompanied by music and the play ended again with a prayer by the sutradhar called

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