Posted by arul francis on March 28, 2007 at 02:21:22:

 a friend forwarded this hilarious blurb. at first i thought it was a joke, but no, it's for real:

“uses the traditional movement … of Bharata Natyam … such contemporary themes as genocide, terrorism and war. … looks deep into issues where agriculture and politics meet”
- http://www.natya.com/-pages/-frames/calendar.html

so I googled on "bharatanatyam terrorism" ... it seems to be the trend:

“I used the time to choreograph a special number on terrorism and will premiere it soon”
- http://www.malabarian.com/ecstasy.html

since the notice on this board prohibits "derogatory comments" of any kind, I can only say: hmmm. poor silk sari merchants. they are going to lose a big section of their business. for these dancedramas on the new theme of terrorism, there will be a need for "authentic costumes". we will also need a dance scholar to look up suitable references in the natya shastra: disgust, fury, fear. perhaps there will be a panel discussion during the season to which actual terrorists will be invited so that they can testify to the cathartic value of such dance-dramas and how it turned them around.

but actually this has already been done at least once. i remember at krishna gana sabha watching a wonderful varnam, then came a padam, it was about rwanda and the hutus and tutsis and how they butchered each other. there was a row of maamis in front of me who were seriously confused. they stopped gossipping long enought to ask "ithu yenna ithu?" the other answered "it must be one of that avatars of vishnu padam". :)

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