Analysis of Shakespear in India

Paul, Richard. “Shakespeare in India.” Folger Shakespeare Library. N.p., 19 Oct. 2016. Web. 14 Feb. 2017.

This podcast discusses the impact of Shakespeare on India in the 1800s and 1900s and how Indian theater shaped Shakespeare’s work and its understanding. The podcast goes beyond the goal to explain Shakespeare in Modern India and how the growing film industry has influenced the stories of Othello, Macbeth and Hamlet. The podcast also explains the move from Shakepeare productions in rural areas to more urban and then its transition to something that is performed at most colleges in India, which each have their own Shakespearean societies, with the biggest one being The National School of Drama. The Professors of English went into depth about the directors adapting the stories into something the audiences of India, especially Bengal in this case, can relate to. Professor Singh called is “Indianization” of the texts and the readings. This was necessary in order to allow the sudden acrophilia, but lack of interest in English drama production, to be handled properly. The dramatic forms, indigenous dramaturgy and classical Indian music was required to cross-pollinate Shakespeare with folk-theater that Indians already related to. In my own podcast, I will be able to use this transition and modification in not just India but other British colonies to expand upon it as I analyze Wasps or The Second Shepard’s Play.