Kathakali of Kerala
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“We wander the streets of Fort Kochi with its houses influenced by the waves of its colonial histories, from Portugal, from Holland and from Great Britain. The 500 year old St Francis Church, the original burial place of Vasco da Gama, tells the history of trade in this part of the city”.
We are here to look at something that also has deep roots in Kerala’s culture, a story dance performance, the highly stylised dance drama called Kathakali.
Fort Kochi also has its tourists and its antique shops, in which, at least some of the dismembered beauty of Kerala’s historic buildings lie, ready for export to Los Angeles or London. Although there are many beautiful things to buy the scale of what is going on here worries us. We are told over and over again by various shop owners -
"Oh the families can’t be bothered to look after old houses now, they just want something modern".
And so on to the Kathakali performance. We arrive early and watch the preparation for the performance, a complex task as we watch the performers make up each other and then work on the finishing touches to their own makeup and costumes.
In the performance, facial mime and movements and dance are accompanied by music and song. Each contributes to the story telling. In earlier times performances could be an all-night event. More commonly today, performances are extracts from the traditional works and are therefore considerably shorter than the original versions.
The performers are conveying emotions, leading the audience to feel those emotions through gesture, through expression of thought, song, sound and word, by costume and deportment. The performance, because of its many elements, is very demanding and there is great skill in delivering a high level performance.
The performance we attend is The Mahabharata: Kichaka Vadham (The killing of Kichaka) staged at the Kerala Kathakali Centre in Fort Kochi. Our performance of The killing of Kichaka, is an hour or so long. In this performance Kichaka attempts to seduce Malini, in the end this act costs Kichaka his life.
“Ha, she spits and snarls like a wild cat, yet I am certain of one thing, I will have her”.
Kichaka uses force to seduce Malini, she fights back and attempts to escape. Full of lust Kichaka assaults her. Malini escapes the attack. Later Kichaka is lured to a meeting with Malini and there he is killed by Princess Bhima (in disguise).
The Mahabharata is of course much longer, very much longer, the longest known epic as a poem, in its longest form a work of slightly less than two million words. The Mahabharata is also an epic of great age and a literary work of significance but this story is not for here.
The centre describes the early history of Kathakali:
“Elements of the art of Kathakali are found in the ancient ritual plays of Hindu temples and various dance forms that are believed to have been gradually developed in Kerala from as early as the 2nd Century until the end of the 16th Century. Many of its characteristics are very much older than its literature, as they are a continuation of older traditions, but these did not crystallise until the 17th Century when the Rajah of Kottarakkara, a small principality in central Travancore, wrote plays based on the Hindu epic "Ramayana" in sanskritised Malayam, which could be understood by ordinary people. Before this, the stories were enacted in pure Sanskrit, which was known only to the learned few”.
What we like about Kathakali performances is that they make the audience work hard in following the ‘signals’ of the performance, this is an art form that grows on you as you learn more and more about it.
Our warm thanks to the Kerala Kathakali Centre.
Fort Kochi also has its tourists and its antique shops, in which, at least some of the dismembered beauty of Kerala’s historic buildings lie, ready for export to Los Angeles or London. Although there are many beautiful things to buy the scale of what is going on here worries us. We are told over and over again by various shop owners -
"Oh the families can’t be bothered to look after old houses now, they just want something modern".
And so on to the Kathakali performance. We arrive early and watch the preparation for the performance, a complex task as we watch the performers make up each other and then work on the finishing touches to their own makeup and costumes.
In the performance, facial mime and movements and dance are accompanied by music and song. Each contributes to the story telling. In earlier times performances could be an all-night event. More commonly today, performances are extracts from the traditional works and are therefore considerably shorter than the original versions.
The performers are conveying emotions, leading the audience to feel those emotions through gesture, through expression of thought, song, sound and word, by costume and deportment. The performance, because of its many elements, is very demanding and there is great skill in delivering a high level performance.
The performance we attend is The Mahabharata: Kichaka Vadham (The killing of Kichaka) staged at the Kerala Kathakali Centre in Fort Kochi. Our performance of The killing of Kichaka, is an hour or so long. In this performance Kichaka attempts to seduce Malini, in the end this act costs Kichaka his life.
“Ha, she spits and snarls like a wild cat, yet I am certain of one thing, I will have her”.
Kichaka uses force to seduce Malini, she fights back and attempts to escape. Full of lust Kichaka assaults her. Malini escapes the attack. Later Kichaka is lured to a meeting with Malini and there he is killed by Princess Bhima (in disguise).
The Mahabharata is of course much longer, very much longer, the longest known epic as a poem, in its longest form a work of slightly less than two million words. The Mahabharata is also an epic of great age and a literary work of significance but this story is not for here.
The centre describes the early history of Kathakali:
“Elements of the art of Kathakali are found in the ancient ritual plays of Hindu temples and various dance forms that are believed to have been gradually developed in Kerala from as early as the 2nd Century until the end of the 16th Century. Many of its characteristics are very much older than its literature, as they are a continuation of older traditions, but these did not crystallise until the 17th Century when the Rajah of Kottarakkara, a small principality in central Travancore, wrote plays based on the Hindu epic "Ramayana" in sanskritised Malayam, which could be understood by ordinary people. Before this, the stories were enacted in pure Sanskrit, which was known only to the learned few”.
What we like about Kathakali performances is that they make the audience work hard in following the ‘signals’ of the performance, this is an art form that grows on you as you learn more and more about it.
Our warm thanks to the Kerala Kathakali Centre.
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