Nati binodini biography

Kali for Women has published the English translations by Rimli Bhattacharya. These two books, and Nati Binodinia jatra-play by Brajendra Kumar Dey whose birth centenary nati binodini biographies this year, formed the basis for three plays screened at a theatre festival in Kolkata between November 1 to November 4 dedicated to the memory of Nati Binodini.

Academic Theatre, an organisation founded in to conduct research into the history of the Bengali stage in general and its music and lyrics in particular, put this festival together with the hope of reviving interest in the history of theatre as a dynamic form of performing art that defines an integral part of the cultural history of Bengal.

The festival offered a major retrospective through the tragic life of Binodini, tracing the evolution of the Bengali stage in terms of its craft, the genres it threw up, its of choice of subject and theme, its melodious music and meaningful lyrics. Perhaps the festival also made the viewer draw parallels between a woman's life as an actress and her life as a woman deprived of the experiences of mainstream womanhood where the two worlds sometimes meet, overlap and then part, never to meet again.

Does this hold true of the actress of today? Based on Rimli Bhattacharya's English translations of Binodini's two autobiographies, the play had a strikingly original conceptual design. Five different actresses portrayed Binodini, representing different ages, present on the stage at the same time. Except the seniormost actress, the other four were dressed and made-up identically.

Structured in the flashback mode with the telescoping of the present and the past, the play opened with the octogenarian Binodini writing out her autobiography. As she reads what she is writing, the past unfolds different layers of her life, segments from plays she has performed in, her interactions with her mother, a prostitute who forced her daughter to become a mistress, her relationship with her guru and mentor the famous Girish Chandra Ghosh, and her constant conflicts between her personal and professional life forced on her by none other than her peers on the stage and by her mentor himself.

The acting cast performed brilliantly though to begin with, the structure was confusing with five actresses on the stage playing Binodini. The focus was more on the actress' sexual and emotional exploitation than on her genius as an actress whose range, under the guidance of Girish Ghosh, was phenomenal. Binodini played the title role in Prahlad male.

Her other famous plays are Sri Chaitanya where she once again played the title role. Her last performance in the same theatre was in the play, Bellick Bazar on 1 January The only thing that diluted the performance was the emphasis on the overdoing of the weepy element. It was more multi-lingual than Hindi since there was a lot of Bengali in the dialogue and the songs, while Girish Ghosh used a smattering of English now and then.

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Texts Video icon An illustration of two cells of a film strip. Binodini lived in utmost poverty and trauma especially after the death of her brother throughout her growing up years.

Nati binodini biography: Binodini Dasi's exceptional career as

Their house was given out on rent to several tenants and the money incurred from the same sustained her family. In her autobiography Binodini describes these tenants in so many words:. I was a bit distant, because since childhood I had quite despised the behaviour of our tenants, the ones who lived in the thatched rooms. They were not husband and wife, but lived together as a couple.

They lived off their daily earnings and from time to time fought so fiercely that it seemed that they would never again exchange a single word. But then I would find that the very next moment they would be eating together, laughing and joking all the while. Bhattacharya When Binodini was nine, she was encouraged by her mother to learn music from Ganga Baiji, a famous singer and a professional theatre artist who was staying with them at that time.

Gangamoni, as Binodini would call her, would take young Binodini along to her practice sessions and rehearsals. During her days spent observing Ganga and her theatre companions, Binodini was exposed to theatrical forms like geetinatya opera and plays like Sitar Bonobas The Exile of Sita.

Nati binodini biography: In her autobiography, Binodini

In her autobiography, Binodini has spoken at length about play rehearsals, as well as dress rehearsals, which would be held at natya mandir. A critical turn in the theatre history of India: The staging of Neel Darpan. Since one of the aims of this module is to trace the history of nineteenth-century popular theatre in Calcutta with reference to the lives of actresses, especially Binodini, at this juncture a little focus on the Dramatic Performances Act ofwhich was a turning point in the pages of modern theatre in India, is necessary.

Thus, the discussion on Neel Darpan becomes unavoidable. Binodini with her National Theatre group performed the play at Chhatramandi, Lucknow, in Bhattacharya writes:. Almost all the sahebs of Lucknow city came that evening to see our play. At the point where Rogue Saheb attempts to assault Khetramoni, Torap beats him with a door he has broken down and then Nabimadhab takes Khetramoni away.

The play was being performed quite brilliantly; in addition, Babu Motilal Sur played Torap and Abinash Kar saheb played Rogue Saheb with unusual competence. The Sahebs were extremely upset at this particular scene. A commotion arose and one of the sahebs actually climbed up the stage intending to beat up Torap. We were in tears, our instructors were frightened and our manager, Dharamdas Sur all a tremble.

We stopped the performance and somehow putting together our costumes and the sets, fled the scene. Only after we left Lucknow, early the following day, could we breathe normally. The play which Binodini and her theatre co-workers went to perform at Lucknow became one of the most controversial plays in Indian nati binodini biography history. Neel Darpan The Indigo Mirror — written in the year by under Dinabandhu Mitra, an inspecter of the Post Office department under British colonial rule — was published under a pseudonym from Dhaka in and was in circulation thereafter.

Nati binodini biography: Binodini Dasi (–), also known

A vehemently critical account of the indigo trade, Neel Darpan has become one of the foremost plays which reflects on the inclusion of realism in form and content in the theatre history of India. In the nineteenth century, almost 20 million sq. Revolts against indigo trade oppression and injustice started taking place from the late s and took violent turns byoriginating in the Nadia district of Bengal, around the same time when Neel Darpan was first published.

James Long, and printed by C. Manuel at the Calcutta Printing and Publishing Press. The reaction to this play was extreme as it has been believed from both sections—the colonisers and the colonised—of theatre-going masses. The play particularly had a huge impact on the middle class, given the period saw a considerable rise in nationalistic sentiments of the newly educated bhadralok community.

The effect of staging the play, which was a critical commentary on the real events of the time, on the native stage lingered throughout the suceeding years as a momentous occasion, in turn leading to one of the major historical turns in theatre history—the Dramatic Performances Act of At this point, with the restriction of their expression, these middle class men overcome with the spirit of nationalism turned towards Hindu mythological texts in order to generate and establish a new value system.

The mythological theme was already prevalent in the Jatraa domimant form of performance or mass entertainment prevailing in the contours of rural Bengal. With the aid of transportation and development of new locomotive means, especially the train, a heavy migration pattern could be observed in the nineteenth-century cityscape of Calcutta. As a result of this rural to urban migration, a cultural transportation of traditional forms started taking place during this period.

Nati binodini biography: Binodini Dasi () was also known

She was one of the first South Asian actresses of the theatre to write her own autobiography. Her sudden retirement from the stage is insufficiently explained. Her autobiography has a consistent thread of betrayal. She violates every canon of the feminine smritikatha and wrote down what amounted to her indictment of respectable society. Ramakrishnathe great saint of 19th century Bengal, came to see her play in Contents move to sidebar hide.

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