Cousins JH_The Play of Brahma - An Essay on the Drama in National Revival ([1921])

7/29/2019 Cousins JH_The Play of Brahma - An Essay on the Drama in National Revival ([1921])

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The A. D. A. Publication Series No,

THEPLAY OF BRAHMA

AN ESSAY ON THEDRAMA INNATIONAL REVIVAL


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA(AN ESSAY ON THE DRAMA INNATIONAL REVIVAL)

BYJAMES H, COUSINS


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BY THE SAME AUTHOR,"THE RENAISSANCE IN INDIA" \ coin

plementary volume to, "THF K. \v '>; CHAHMA "showing the cultural forces other that- thedrama that uic uc'ux in tlx- o.x-scHt \atumalRevival.

"THE KING'S WIFE" A drama on the liteof "RANI MIRABAI" conceived in the Indian spirit,and carried out according to the principles laiddown in the "THE PLAY OF BRAHMA."

Re. I.

Both published byGANESH & CO..MADRAS.

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NOTE

This book is the second of the AmateurDramatic Association Publications, the firstof which was the lecture on i Drama East andWest' by JVir.. C. R. Reddy. The contentsare an extension of a public lecture given bythe author in Bangalore on the 12th December1920, with Mr. C. R. Reddy, M.A V> Inspector-General of Education for Mysore State, inthe chair. The purpose which the AmateurDramatic Association had in view, in invitingMr. Cousins to deliver the lecture, was theeliciting from him, as a dramatist and produ-cer of plays in connection with the IrishDramatic Revival, of some principles and


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The Association takes this opportunity ofthanking Mr. Cousins, a warm lover of Indianart, and a gifted exponent of the IndianRenaissance, for his kindness in allowing itto include his valuable contribution as thesecond of the series.


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CONTENTS

I. The Play of Brahma An ancient story and amodern interpretation.

II. How the drama may help in National Revivalas nplifter and controller.

III. Wanted A History of Indian Drama, (with asketch of the Sanskrit Drama).

IV. Wanted An Indian Dramatic Criticism, (withan example of its application to the subject-matter of the Drama).

V. The Law of Dramatic Unity applied to theconstruction of the Drama.


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VII. The Law of Dramatic Unity applied to the cast.(with a criticism of the all-male stage).

VIII. Concerning elocution, gesture and grouping.

IX. Concerning dressing and mounting, (with re-flections induced by the Japanese ClassicalDrama).

X. A call for Devotees to the Yo.ua of Drama, withsome account of their necessary qualifications.


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMAAN ESSAY CTN THE DRAMA IN

NATIONAL REVIVAL.I

Indian drama, like other Indian arts, iscredited with a divineThe Play of Brahma, ^ Ancient scrip-an ancient story and ~ ,

7' tures tell how the God

'/ modern interpre-tation% Indra, at the instigation

of other Gods, who feltthe burden of celestial inactivity, approachedthe supreme Brahma with a request thatHe would create a play by means of whichtheir eyes and ears would find exerciseand enjoyment. The Creator thereupon wentinto meditation, and out of His meditationgave forth the Natya Veda, or Veda ofDrama. This fifth Veda was not a new Veda,but a compilation from the others. From theRig Veda (the Veda of Praise) Brahma tookthe dance ; from the Sama Veda, music ;


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2 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAfrom the Atharva Veda (the Veda of Evoca-tion.) When the Drama Veda was given forth,the divine architect, Vishvakarma, was instruc-ted to build a stage in the heaven of Indra.The rishi Bharata was made stage-manager ;and an ancient treatise on the dramatic art isattributed to him the Bharata Sutras which,whether we grant them earthly or heavenlyorigin, are assigned a remote date, the fourthcentury B.C., and find their highest expressionin the works of the immortal dramatist Kali-dasa in the sixth century A.D.

The parables of the founder of Christi-anity were defined as earthly stories withheavenly meanings. Here we have a heavenlystory with an earthly meaning, that is, ameaning translatable into terms of humanexperience and understanding, provided wetake the loftiest possible view of the natureand function of art, and especially rid art ofthe petty utilitarianism of mere amusement oreven instruction.


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 3commentary ; but intellectual conviction willperhaps profit if we turn instead for a clue to" The Philosophy of Fine Art " as presented acentury ago, not in Asia but in Europe, by theGerman philosopher Hegel (1770-1831).

Hegel visualised the manifested universeas a vast nerve-centre through which potentiallife passed to life realised. Both extremesare beyond human cognition. We have nodirect knowledge of archetypal life. We haveno direct knowledge of the perfected life. Butthese ultimates loom as vast Presences on thehorizon of the human consciousness, which cantouch only the process of the universe, theperpetual movement in time and space, and,out of this touch, infer behind the process aBefore, and beyond the process an After.This touch with the universal process is made,according to Hegel, by a principle of polari-sation (the maintaining of effort in a particulardirection without distraction) which is inherent


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4 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAaccording to their degree. To Hegel the artsare the most effective form of polarisation. Theyput us intimately in touch with the process ofBecoming. Through the arts we realisevividly that there is something pressingthrough the particular form of art from diffu-sion to definition. The arts are, consequently,to Hegel not matters of pleasure only, oraesthetic futilities, but means to the satisfac-tion of an essential and everlasting need solong as humanity is humanity.

The great artists have never moved farfrom this central truth. Tagore glimpsed thecosmic process when, in presence of one ofart's supreme expressions, the Taj Mahal, hesang of Life whose call is to the Endless, andwho leaves her memories to "the forlornforms of beauty. ' r The purpose of art to himis Divine realisation, and participation in theDivine joy, that is, the cosmic process. Astatic art is therefore to him a contradiction


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA ;>the universe perishes. The secret whisperedat the ear of Shelley when he sang, " We lookbefore and after, and pine for what is not." Inthat pining there is indicated the power ofresponse to the call to the Endless, to thepush of the Great Life as it passes from non-being to Being.

So far as we can judge, it is not until theelement of awareness that is in the universehas been elaborated to the state of humanconsciousness, that systematic organised effortsare made to come into conscious contact withthe process. These efforts are seen in thereligions, philosophies, arts and sciences,which are but so many methods of polarisation.They gather up certain related elements fromthe conglomerate stuff of life, and out of thesebuild a pyramid whose apex may peradven-ture feel the high invisible wind of the DivinePurpose, and draw to itself the flash of illumi-nation. All efforts at synthesis have the same


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^ THE PLAY OF BRAHMAwhose aim .is selfish, or a philosophy whoseexclusions vitiate its conclusions, or sciencethat runs to brain and reduces the vital Processof the Divine Life to a lifeless textbooksystem.

Among the arts, the drama appears topossess the highest synthetical power. Eachof the single-purposed arts (painting andsculpture, music and literature) may inviteus towards the secret by one or other of thegateways of the soul. But the drama knockssimultaneously at all the doors. It is itself a^/ synthesis of the arts. It draws together by itspolarising power a number of related elementsout of the incoherent welter of life, elementsthat are as little related in their points of agree-ment as in their points of conflict, and throughthe instrumentality of brain and heart, eye andear, it brings us nearer than the specialised artsdo to an apprehension of a creative power mov-ing through the process of the drama to fullerrealisation of itself. That dramatic is,


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA /apparently separate parts, and a miracle ofunity maintained by a controlling power whichworks both within and without the parts.When we wish to express in a figure of speechour sense of some large deprivation, whenthe main matter of interest has been takenaway from some event, we liken the occasionto the play of "Hamlet without the prince." Butthere is the other side of the matter. Whatwould the prince be without the rest of thecharacters of the drama ? We think of himas a whole and complete person, but howmuch of our Hamlet in the mind would remainif we took away all that we derived as to hischaracter from the remarks of Polonius andOphelia, of the gravedigger and Horatio, ofthe king and queen ? Very little, just as littleas would reamin of any one of ourselves if wecast away all that we have derived from others.We think of ourselves as separate and distinctpersons, whereas we are only fractions of


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMAout of the interplay and creative joy of hiscreator, Shakespeare. The stage is shiftedfrom the theatre to which our bodily vehicleconveyed us. It is set up in the high placesof the soul from which flow the streamsthat nourish and sustain the outer life. Ourindividual stage is in that bit of the " heavenof Indra" which is within each of us, just asthe heaven of Indra in the story of the origin ofthe drama was made the location for the Playof Brahma. Thus ancient vision and modernpsychology are at one. The puranas and theGerman philosopher speak the one truth.

So much for the true nature of drama ingeneral. We shall find these considerations,remote though they may at first sight appearfrom the noise and glare of the ordinary stage,of service in thinking how the drama may berelated to the spirit of national revival whichis abroad in India today.


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA

The drama only lives in its process ofbecoming. Stop your

the dnund m(u) reading of a play atthe first sentence ; close

your ears after the invocation that precedesthe drama in India, and the drama will remainnon-existent to you. The drama -flows intolife. Fixity is fatal to it It exists, as SriKrishna said the universe exists, by action,action prompted by the Lord himself, as theaction of the drama is prompted by the author*We see therefore that the drama can onlyremain true to itself by remaining disinterested'among all the conflicting elements that existin healthy struggle in national renaissance* Itmay expound tendencies in national andindividual action, and thus act as an aid tonational and individual realisation ; but itcannot, at the peril of its life, make itself the


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10 THK PLAY OK BRAHMAaction is a capital offence in the laws of thespiritual life. It is the same in the laws of thedramatic life. Hence the help which the stagecan give to national awakening must begeneral and supple, not particular and rigid.Thus only will it enrich the national conscious-ness and emotion ; and in return, the whole ofthe national life will enrich the drama, andimpart to it the joy that has marked all greatcreative movements in the arts. The great daysof Greek drama thrill with the joy of thediscovery and evolution of the art itself. Thespacious days of Elizabeth are aglow with theenthusiasm of the re-discovery of the dramasimultaneously with the discovery of thenational consciousness of England and of aworld beyond the dreams of the ancients. TheIrish dramatic revival, which began a quarterof a century ago and only recently died out,knew the high joy of the discovery of the soul,though in chains, and of the power of theimmortal self over the limitations of -matter,


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 11movement, with great wisdom. But his suc-cessors were not so wise, and the movementmoved not on but off.

" All India must walk the stage." This isthe slogan that will carry the drama to itsgreatest service to the national revival. Thespirit of renaissance does not work throughone aspect of the national activity only. It isa tension bearing down on all. It will equallyvivify opposing interests, as we see in Indiatoday. Drama, therefore, can only serve thewhole national purpose by rising above details.We may admire or condemn the particulars ofa landscape garden that appeal to or clash withour predilections. It is only from above thatwe can realise the whole idea of the mastergardener. On the ground we may come intomore intimate contact with the details otnature, but nature is probably more obliged tous when we take our stand on an eminence andget a glimpse of her whole intention. Fidelity


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12 THK PLAY OF BRAHMAfill to some other aspect of nature, and sounfaithful to the whole. Fidelity to nature inthe drama has too often, in other countries thanIndia, been interpreted in justification of anarrow actualism, and set her whose office isthat of illumination to the business of scaveng-ing. It is only as the drama rises towards theideal that its vision takes in all the elementsthat make for coherency and true judgment.This coherency is only attainable through thepursuit of some purpose that perpetually callsthe drama upwards. When that purpose fails,the drama fails, as it did in the age thatfollowed Shakespeare, when his "cloudless,boundless human view " was lost, and thedrama of the decadence took to the psycho-logical microscope, and to humourless analysesof people in various " humours." The lesson ofall decadent eras in the arts is that we cannotignore the natural law that the arts in renais-sance must have a purpose not a moral tag tp


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made ; an aspiration to see life steadily andsee it whole, and to present it with equalsteadiness and wholeness.

Besides this high purpose of givingexpression to the complete national life, thedrama that counts its stage as built in theheaven of Indra for the edification of the God-in-man may exert a chastening and restraininginfluence on the national activity, not only bythe balancing power of its whole presentation,but also by the subtle satisfaction which thevery nature of its process is capable of giving toboth the elements of disruption and continuitythat mix in varying disproportion in the humanheart and mind. We are all radicals andconservatives, in spots, in streaks, in turn,individually and in groups, and out of thestruggle of volatility with fixity arises evolution.When there is an: inartistic disproportion ofeither element there is exaggeration at ; onetime, and the exaggeration ' of reaction at


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14 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAit must move forward, and its movement musthe by way of the natural logic of event andcharacter. There can be no drama without theclash of human motive and desire, but if theclash ends in fragments there is no drama. Itsdisorder rooted in order must stand, or rathermove in lines of divergence and convergencetowards fulfilment. If Ireland had -been leftto the dramatists, things would be differentnow. For centuries the Protestant North andthe Catholic South were at religious enmity ;yet the simple human tragedy of my one actplay, "The Racing Lug," taken from the life ofthe Protestant North, drew tears from a Catholicaudience in Dublin, when a Catholic youngman acted with great insight and sympathythe part of a Protestant clergyman, BernardShaw's play, "John Bull's Other Island,'(that is, Ireland) drew applause from theoccupants of the theatre gallery by a hit atthe occupants of the dress circle. Five minutes


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 15the others in a great laugh at itself. At the endof the play everybody went home happy in thethought that everybody had got a share of thelaughing sarcasm of a cosmic mind. '* W allgot a bit of a dressing down and I supposewe all needed it," said one to another.

Ill

If the drama is to take its proper place inthe National Revival in\Vunti>~ HixhH'u of India as an instrument

Indian Drawn drith both Qf realisatiOn ofK/wtrh of tlic the national conscious-Drama.) ness and ot control otthe national activity, it must first perform thesame double service to itself. At present,speaking very generally, the Indian drama is


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16 THE PLAY OK BRAHMAdevelopment it stands where the English dramastood a thousand years ago. I am not referringto the actual state of the whole of Indiandrama from its origin until now. I am refer-ring to the present state of the Indian stage,which makes hardly any use of the dramaticmaterial which had reached a high level ofrea4 dramatic attainment before the Englishdrama was born, and little use of the dramaticmaterial of daily life. Two things are there-fore necessary if the drama of today is to bepurified and vivified a historical survey of thepast achievements of the Indian stage, for thepurpose of inspiration and suggestion ; and thedevelopment of an enlightened, balanced andfearless dramatic criticism. Both of thesematters call for the exercise of great indus-try, great exercise of the power of intelligentsynthesis and interpretation, great wisdom,great courage ; but they are worth all thedevotion that can be given to them, for


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 1?is the Divine Dramatist seeking those whowill worthily play their parts. Let us consider,then, these two matters of dramatic historyand dramatic criticism.

The Indian stage, as we historically knowit, began in much the same way as the Greekstage and the later European drama; Thetwo epics (the Mahabharata and the Ramayana)were read in Sanskrit in holy places. By andby the vernaculars took up the work. Musicand gesture were added. Drama at this stagewas limited to dialogues from the epics-dialogues between Mahadev and Devi Parvati,Sri Krishna and Arjuna,

Scholarship has not yet uncovered theline of evolution from these beginnings to thefully developed Sanskrit drama, which is usu-ally dated from Kalidasa in the sixth century

but the recent of the dramas


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18 THE FLAY OF BRAHMAFrom plays in the speech of the people

(prakrit), including " mysteries" enacted atfestivals, and Buddhist plays, the Sanskritdrama arose. Kalidasa and other dramatistsdrew their inspiration from the Brihat Katha,a collection of prakrit stories \vhich was amine of folklore. The evolution of the dramawas, according to scholars, free from Greekinfluence* Buddhism, notwithstanding theforbidding of its followers to attend theatricalperformances, used the stage for propaganda(as it is doing in Japan today), and betweenthe third century B.C. (the age of Asoka) andthe seventh century A.D., a period of athousand years, produced a large dramaticliterature, of which, however, little is at presentknown save the "J^agananda "The Rejoicingof the Snakes,

After Kalidasa, came the supposed royafauthor of "The Clay Cart," which is occasion-

on the fourteen centuries


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 19which was " Ratnavali " (The Pearl Necklace)which is .attributed to Bana, the chief authorof the time. Bhavabhuti flourished in thesecond half of the seventh century in Berar.He was a pure idealist, and took his themesfrom the Ramayana,

In the second half of the eighth centuryBhatta Narayan dramatised stories from theMahabharata but the Ramayana has proved amore inspiring source of dramatic material,and, by providing a central theme popularlyknown, has given to India a drama nationalin theme, though expressed in languages as farremoved as Nepal and the Tamildesa, which,in terms of the map of Europe, is from Londonto Constantinople. "The Little Ramayana" wasdone by Rajasekhar. The Sanskrit drama hasonly two prominent plays that deal withthemes outside the epics, that is, with histori-cal subjects, " Malavika and Agnimitra " byKalidasa, and " Mudra Rakshasa" by Vishakhardatta who is said to have been a contemporary


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20 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAKrishnamishra wrote "Prabodha Chandrodaya'(The Rising of the Moon of True Knowledge)in which he praised the Vedantic philosophythrough personifications,

The development of the classical drama ofIndia implies a fixed place of abode and liberalpatronage. These conditions, however, cannotobtain save in large centres of population,or in. small centres of special cultural activity.The vast majority of the vast population ofIndia lives in villages, and their demand fordrama (a very insistent demand today, as it wasin daysof old) had to be met by simple andportable means. The Mahabharata and theBrihat Katha tell of puppet entertainment*(marionettes), These began as wire-pulledexpositions of the two epics, but, being nearerthe people than the cultural drama, they freedthemselves from restrictions as to their matter,and branched out into subjects of contem-porary interest.


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 21comedies) of which " Dhurta Samajam ''(Rogues in Council) is typical. These werethe lineal descendants of the rough-and-tumblefarces associated with the sonut festival inVedic times.

The Indian drama had a period of obscura-tion in the thirteenth century, when the Muslimpower gained the ascendancy and abolishedthe theatre. But the fourteenth century saw arevival of the Sanskrit drama in the north. Itsquality, however, was below that of the dramaof the age of Kalidasa and Bhavabhuti. In thesouth, the development of the worship of SriKrishna brought artistic and emotional energyinto the drama. Dramatic representations inthe yatras, or processions, gradually migratedfrom the temple compounds to the villagetheatres. To this day the " Krishna-leela" isvery popular.

The value of the theatre as a means forthe propagation of religious ideas was


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22 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAdrama for the sake of its educational possibili-ties. His disciples, notably Rupa Goswami,poet and statesman, and Karnapur, whodramatised his master's life; contributed tothe Bengal stage.

These names cover fifteen centuries ofdramatic activity. They refer only to theclassical Sanskrit drama. Of it they refer toa mere fraction. Vast as the field of researchhere is, it is microscopic compared with thearea of exploration offered by the vernaculardrama. Five years ago I read in the ChristianCollege Magazine a series of articles on theMalayalam drama which gave me a hint as tothe work that should be done by enthusiasticstudents of the drama in all the linguisticareas of India. This work might be doneunder the auspices of a central body, anIndian Academy of Arts, which would guide,support and co-ordinate local study, and thenmake the results known all over the country.A monthy magazine would help the work and


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THE PLAY OF r BRAHMA 23of the Indian drama, and turn to the secondaid to the purifying and vivifying of thetheatre in India with a view to its fulfilling itsproper service in a time of national awakening

dramatic criticism.

IV

We have already touched by inferenceon certain importantWanted^an Indian matters concerning theDramatic criticism (with ,7 / j. tsiwject matter ofmi example of /As- apph- .. . , . C '-

. .. , ..', 7 comes the dressing andflections on. lift' and


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA ;>/the drama is remote from actuality, when it isromantic or mythological, that artistic -tastemust be used in the preservation of a trueunity between the soul of the drama and itsvisible body. I can conceive no splendour ofcolour too great for the expression of the gloryof God, ''Whose dwelling is the light of settingsuns " ; but I can conceive of nothing lesscalculated to express godly splendour than theglittering costumes that are put on the Godson the Indian stage. I admit that in this Imay be under the sway of a prejudice oftemperament or tradition. The English stage,with the exception of ancient and nowunknown Mysteries and Moralities, has nothingcomparable to the Indian familiarity withDeity. Its nearest approach to the innerworlds is a ghost. A Jesus-leela after themanner of the Krishna- leela would so outrageChristians that they would break every com-mand of their Master against violence, andleave the stage a mass of wreckage. This


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58 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAences, and it has earned for Deity the reputa-tion of an elderly gentleman, with no sense ofhumour, and always in a hypercritical mood.On the other hand it has led to conceptions ofgreat dignity and power in imaginative litera-ture which might not have expressed them-selves had the English stage, like the Indianstage, set the Three Persons of he Trinity inmovement, with speech and form, and so madethem concrete to the mind. There is inescap-able anthropomorphism in either case ; butthere is something fine in the lifting ofhuman qualities to the heavens and robingDivinity in them, and there is, it seemsto me, something not fine in bringing theGods to earth and clothing them in sequinsand tassels, pasteboard crowns and tin macus.It may be argued that these things are onlysymbols. This would be their completejustification. But a pasteboard crown is nota symbol, it is an imitation. A tin sword isnot a symbol of a real sword or of what


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THE PLAY OK BRAHMA 59taken as symbols of authority and power ;but the point I wish to emphasise is thatthere is an alternative, to imitation swordsand crowns which may be found to be muchmore convincing and moving, because itescapes the challenge of actuality ; that is, themethod of -simplicity and suggestion ; thereduction to a minimum of any clashingmixture of actuality with symbolism, and theindication of qualities by the power of noblesuggestion which resides in the lines of aflowing robe or a plain circlet about the head.In the mounting too, a far deeper effect canbe got by suggesting the presence of foliagethan by putting up painted trees whose leavesdo not shake in the wind but whose supposed-ly immobile trunks bend to the touch of thepassing actor.

I came to these convictions (and I passthem on, not as infallible dogma but as sug-gestions) by seeing in Japan the performance


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60 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAof Japan. As I followed the performance ofthe opera, I began to wonder what was wrongwith it or with myself. "The wonderingbegan," (as I wrote in a special article in'The Japan Advertiser') "with the stagecomportment of the performers, and I havebeen asking myself how it comes about thatevery little turn of action in a Noh play is fullof some queer overhanging significance, whilehardly a gesture or movement in the grandopera did not irritate .me. I think I havefound the reason for a friend's statement tome long ago that grand opera is not an art atall, but a mongrel affair of pictures tryingto sing and music trying to paint its face.Why then, I have asked myself, not have thesame feelings over the Noh drama ? It hasscenery and music and action. True, I replyto myself, but these things are reduced to astate of ceremonial simplicity and unity, withthe end in view of producing by suggestiona single artistic impression. The scenery is


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 61be a real pine-tree. The accessory music is abeat on a drum, a strain on a flute, a vocalcry. The actors chant in a deep gutturalmonotone, and move like beings in anotherspatial dimension. When a man has to bekilled, he retires from the stage some minutesbefore the fatal blow, leaving only his spacefor the symbolical death-thrust. The Noh playalso puts a mask over the vagaries of expres-sion in the bare-faced drama. The singlecharacteristic expression of the mask is always4 in the picture', and I was surprised to findhow lacking in the monotony which I hadexpected was this use of the mask. . . . Thismay be what some people call art, I said tomyself, but it is not life,

" And that, I think, is just the point. Weare constantly mixing up these quite differentfunctions of the human ego, and so tying ourthoughts in knots. Art is art, and life is life.There are subterranean connections between


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62 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAthat is, in line with the great fundamentalsof beauty and symmetry and repose, is nottrue life. But we make a great mistakewhen \ve try to thrust the one down theother's throat. If we try to put " life " onthe stage it will cease to be a stage, andwill simply be- a piece of life a few feet higherthan the rest for which we are foolish enoughto pay as witnesses. . . . And we cannotbring the stage into life, for life as ordinarilylived is (the definition comes from AmericaI believe) "one damned thing after another",while the present art of the stage is one thingpiled on another until a climax is reached andthe curtain falls. Grand opera as ordinarilymounted and acted (the criticism thoughoriginally laid against western opera appliesalso to a very great extent to the Indianmusic-drama) is a checkerboard affair of lifeand art ; and as each bites the other's tail,they are mutually destructive. It adopts the


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 63after the slow pace of music into a strut anda jerk (or in the case of the Indian opera intoduplicated gestures following the practice ofsinging each line twice for some reason thatmay lie in the art of pure music but is out ofplace on the stage). It has painted pillarsand real chairs and tables. It has simulatedglass in its windows and actual candlesthrowing light on, not through, the windows,

" Dramatic realism and artistic conven-tion do not r*un happily in double harness.They belong to an entirely different order ofcircumstances. One crawls along the -surfaceof the earth ; the other flies above the earthand sees it generalised on the flat, so tospeak. . . . Neither can you have realrealism on the stage ; I mean honest, unblush-ing, complete realism. The more real it is theless is it art. What, then, I ask myself, isleft ? Convention ? Quite so. And it is theconventional arts (the arts that make detail


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64 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAconventionalised scenery or rather lack ofscenery. Shakespeare was born, dramaticallyspeaking, on bare boards. It was in the con-vention y the ritual, of the drama of old that itspower and life lay, and that power and life canonly be touched again when we return to pureartistic convention.'

Let us remember (coming to the conclu-sion of our study) that,A Mfor Devotee* tvth,- however satisfied ^Yoga of Drama, with . ,

. ., . are with the rules andfsfttne account of their.^irirwaUjinitim*. regulations of art, wemust always be ready

to give elbow room to the genius, whose firstpressure will almost certainly be against ournice little perfect system. We should visualisethe purpose of artistic renaissance not as the


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 65the average, are stiff and self-satisfied. TheGreat Law (which we have groped after inthese pages) sends its emissaries into life fromthe shadowy hinterland of the soul just inaccordance with the demand and the prepa-ration here. In art, as in the life of the soul,the command goes forth, " Prepare ye the wayof the Lord. 1 ' In the vast outer world of un*awakened humanity, whose inhereat power ofpolarisation (to return to Hegel's key thought)is not yet capable of exercise towards the reali-sation of the cosmic Process, the preparationmay be through a debasement that reaches apoint at which necessity invites a Great Inter-vention ; or it may be through a generalupward tendency that is rewarded by the giftof Genius. In the little world of awakenedhumanity, the preparation is conscious andintensive, and moved by the will, not by thecompulsion of circumstance. A seeress,standing in the midst of the glorious rebukeof the ruins of Vijayanagar, cried, " Where are


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66 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAIn India we know the way (the 'yoga] to

the inner life, the way of devotion (bhakti)whether its immediate objective be power, orknowledge, or super- personality. We knowthe power of the wrord, the power of action,the power of the symbol mantra, tantra,ijantra. There are some who are beginningto realise that the drama is all three in one,and in the exercise of its triple power canbring a vast enrichment to the national life.To these the Spirit of India is sending out acall for the formation (not necessarily inorganisation but in aspiration and effort) of anorder of devotees to the Yoga of Drama, menand women of pure heart and clear head, thetrue amateurs (lovers) of the stage, who willmake the necessary oblation of means andenergy and time at the shrine of the DivineDramatist, seeking only (whether as authors orartists) to serve the end of creating man in theimage and likeness of God. The purpose ofthis Yoga (the attainment of a realisation of the


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THE PLAY OF BRAHMA 67story has it) is, if we have realised the full signi-ficance of what these pages have endeavouredto disclpse, not far from the supreme purpose oflife the union of human and Divine. Thequalities which this yoga demands of (anddevelops in) its devotees are no less highamong human attainments. They belong toactor and author alike but our last thought isof the author, for to him (and her) falls theinitial work of providing in the drama theinstrument of polarisation, the synthesis to-wards unity, the ladder whose top is in theHeaven of Indra.

To see the picturesque in' the ordinary,the dramatic possibility in the chaos of detail,this is the function of the artistic eye. Butno one can look with perfect art fhrough theeye who is not to a large extent a strangerin his own life, and able to look atit with freshness and wonder and detachment.The dramatist must have full of


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68 THE PLAY OF BRAHMAhis characters, but he himself must not beseen looking through them ; yet, while hisgaze is outwards along with the gaze of hischaracters, he must, at the same time bebeyond them, looking at them, otherwise hewill be unable to watch and guide theirindividual and collective behaviour, and sounable to fulfil the law of dramatic unity andevolution. The exercise of this subtle simul-taneous power calls for sight that can measurethe dramatic values of life, for insight thatcan unfold human character, and the characterhidden in events which are but impersonalexpressions of personal motives and impulses ;it calls for foresight which sees from thebeginning to the. end and makes all detailconverge to the end, for whole-sight thatsurrounds and permeates every atom of thebody of the drama from its first moment tillits last, that is immanent in the drama andyet transcendent to it. Herein does the


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** *THE PLAY OF RRAHMA 69

dramatist may not be able to explain thephilosophical doctrine of Divine Immanence,e may be ignorant of the controversies overranscendentalism ; but he can tell the philoso-pher that he knows both immanence andtranscendency, not as matters of discus-sion, but as living processes, for he couldnot create his drama if he was not inside everysyllable of it and outside the whole of it atthe same time.

The great dramatist is the Trimurthi ofthe arts the Creator passing His vitalisingbreath through chaos and bringing it to order,the Destroyer moving from phase to phase ofthe process as the action of his drama fallsbehind, the Preserver holding all together.When we understand these things in theirfullness, and shape our activities to our under-standing, the day of the coming of the newKalidasa will be at our doors.


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Documents

Cousins JH_The Play of Brahma - An Essay on the Drama in National Revival ([1921])