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29 April 2007 -
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The greatest story ever danced It is the world's longest book, 15 times the length of the Bible, and the full Sanskrit text stretches to 100,000 verses. The tales it tells, which took several centuries to compile, run the whole gamut of human feeling - exultation, bitterness, loyalty, lust, compassion. So how do you make a stage version of the Mahabharata? "Instead of a concept, I began with practicalities," says director Stuart Wood. "It couldn't be 12 hours long, and it couldn't be just a text version otherwise it would just end up as a trivialised mini-Mahabharata. But it still needed text to give it depth. In the end, a dance-based or a physical-visual theatre work seemed the way to go." He began looking for collaborators, the first of whom was Olivier award-winning lyricist Stephen Clark. The central story of a warring family attracted him, in part as it makes no ready distinctions between good and evil, and victory is not simply aligned with righteousness. "The paradoxes and contradictions make it so rich - and very human," says Clark. "What I distrust, especially in politics and religion, is that terrifying black-and-whiteness." Next on board came Nitin Sawhney, the prolific composer who operates as comfortably in the world of pop as he does classical music. He agrees with Clark: "People then set themselves up as bastions of right and wrong and dictate the moral high ground. But the Mahabharata is more about ways of being and thinking, about choices." Choreographer Gauri Sharma Tripathi, who dances Kathak (an Indian classical dance style), brings experience of producing the Mahabharata. She appeared in BR Chopra's mammoth 94-episode TV version, broadcast from 1988 to 1990, which emptied India's streets for 45 minutes each week. It broke records when it was aired by the BBC in 1990 - 5m for an afternoon subtitled programme, and Tripathi remembers packed arenas for the cast's live tie-in performances. But that audience was largely Asian, and Wood's team are aiming for a wider audience who won't have the same cultural reference points. The Mahabarata is a textual sprawl within a single story, telling of a feud in a warrior dynasty between the five Pandava brothers and their 100 cousins, the Kauravas. Played out in an expansive narrative fugue, it escalates to a devastating battle that, though ends in a righteous victory, also heralds the beginning of a dark age. Wood and Clark chose to focus on one character, Draupadi, a woman who is the catalyst for the war. "We had to find a line that would allow us to edit and explore the material," explains Wood. "Even if you don't know the backstory, you are in the moment with her, following her journey," adds Clark. The cross-cultural questions the production faces are the same as those Peter Brook came across in his nine-hour stage version of the Mahabharata, which premiered in 1985, and toured the world. Widely interpreted in the context of the cold war, it was as praised for its dramatic vision as it was damned for "cultural piracy". It remains a landmark in western theatre. Were the collaborators anxious about the shadow it still casts? "God yes," says Wood. "But it's been years since Brook's piece. And there wasn't much he did that we were also doing." "[The Mahabharata] is not for the faint-hearted," agrees Clark. "This is an evening of risks. I think nothing else can be justified with the Mahabharata. It's not a piece to be safe with".
'Heady times' For India And the U.S. While Iraq and Iran have dominated recent headlines, the United States and India have quietly forged the strongest relationship the two countries have enjoyed since India's independence in 1947. For most of the past 60 years, the Cold War and vastly differing ideological and governing philosophies kept us, at best, fitful partners. That all began to change a decade ago, when President Bill Clinton's efforts led to the first great opening in our relations. In 2001 President Bush launched an even more ambitious drive, culminating in impressive agreements regarding civilian nuclear power, trade, science and agriculture with India. The pace of progress between Washington and Delhi has been so rapid, and the potential benefits to American interests so substantial, that I believe within a generation Americans may view India as one of our two or three most important strategic partners. The symbolic and public centerpiece of our new partnership, of course, has been the nuclear agreement, which Congress approved by an overwhelming bipartisan majority in December. When fully implemented in 2008, this initiative will permit American and international companies to begin peaceful civilian nuclear cooperation with India for the first time in more than a generation. This would bring India out of its self-imposed isolation and into the international nonproliferation mainstream. It would help alleviate the chronic power shortages that hinder India's economic growth. It will also reduce greenhouse gas emissions. We expect American companies will be among the first to invest in and profit from the opening of this gigantic energy market. We hope India will move quickly to help us complete a final bilateral agreement to make this a reality. While the civilian nuclear initiative has garnered the most attention, the U.S. and Indian governments have launched joint ventures in agriculture, space exploration, global pollution reduction, science and technology development, and efforts to combat HIV-AIDS. And there is more we should do together. Our first priority is to continue giving governmental support to the huge growth in business between the Indian and American private sectors. The United States has reduced the time it takes Indian travelers to get visas by almost three months. India is undertaking tough reforms to its economy to sustain the country's economic boom. India has also challenged the United States to help launch a second "green revolution" in India's vast agricultural heartland by enlisting the help of America's great land-grant institutions. There are two more giant steps India and the United States must take to achieve a global partnership. First, India seeks U.S. assistance in helping to counter the wave of terrorist bombings of the past two years. The United States is ready. We are both victims of terrorism and need to work harder to establish the kind of trust required for effective joint work. Second, we can also do much more to create a stronger military partnership. After the 2004 tsunami devastated parts of Southeast Asia, our two militaries, along with Australia and Japan, led global efforts to help survivors. American companies had their largest presence ever at the recent Aero India air show in Bangalore. We need to build on an already impressive series of joint military exercises by improving the interoperability of our armed forces to respond to global contingencies. We also aim to complete a series of defense sales that meet India's needs and complement our overall defense relationship. Finally, I am confident the United States and India can work closely together on the key foreign policy challenges in South Asia. Indian investment and infrastructure assistance is helping Afghanistan in its hour of need. We are working with Delhi to encourage energy-rich Central Asian states such as Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan to establish oil and gas trade with Afghanistan, Pakistan and India, thereby reducing the lure of long-term contracts with Iran. We are working together to try to stop the increasingly bloody civil war in Sri Lanka and to bring stability and, I hope, real democracy to Nepal and Bangladesh. In some ways, our ambitious government agenda is merely playing catch-up to the recent explosion in business and cultural ties between Indians and Americans. There are more than 2 million people of Indian origin -- many of them now American citizens -- in the United States, making extraordinary contributions in academia, health care, information technology and business. It is one of the best educated and successful immigrant groups in our recent history. There are also 80,000 Indian students studying here, more than from any other country. These are heady times for India and the United States. Every day I see signs of the strategic benefits our efforts can bring our two countries. With hard work and vision, we can realize the potential of a key 21st-century partnership of two great democracies.
Bold new world of India's evocative spice
blends Growing up in Austria, the only exotic spices I ever knew were the savory cumin and paprika we used in traditional goulash and the sweet cinnamon and ginger that almost always appeared in baked goods. The concept of curry was completely foreign to me. During my first culinary apprenticeship, however, I learned to cook what I thought was an authentic Indian curry. We sauteed apples and onions together in a large pan. Then we sprinkled in some curry powder from a can that sat on the pantry shelf. Finally, we added chicken broth and let it simmer. Voila -- curry sauce! We spooned it over cooked chicken and rice, and our guests ate it up. At the time, I thought curry powder came from a single plant. Little did I know that what we in the West call curry powder refers to a wide range of different complex spice blends, which Indians seldom refer to as curry. (The term, though, probably comes from the word kari, meaning side dishes in southern India; 19th Century British colonists respelled it to describe any spicy stew.) Self-respecting cooks in the subcontinent would never dream of cooking with curry powder out of a can or jar as Europeans and Americans do. Following taste and tradition, they make their own spice blends for every dish they cook, starting with whole dried spices that they toast to develop maximum flavor before grinding them to a powder. That's the approach I now take when I prepare garam masala, literally, "hot spices," a seasoning mixture that's popular in northern India. I use the blend (which will remain potent for several months stored in an airtight jar in your pantry) to add rich, complex, not-too-spicy flavor to a traditional chicken stew. For the best results, start with small dried chilies, peppercorns, cumin, coriander and cardamom seeds, as well as cinnamon sticks, which you'll heat and stir briefly in a dry skillet until their aromas blossom under your nose. Once you've tried the curry, start experimenting with the spice blends. Add more or fewer chilies if you want it hotter or milder, for example, or a few more peppercorns if you like their pungent bite. Feel free to play with the other stew ingredients as well. Adding some canned coconut milk to the broth will produce a milder, creamier flavor. Or saute some sliced apples along with the onions for results that might just be reminiscent of the first curries I used to cook -- but a whole lot more authentic! |
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