ABSTRACT
Ramnagar Ramlila takes place across the Ganga river from Varanasi—where because of a bend in the stream, the ordinarily northern bank is on the east; this "other side" is ritually polluted. And yet Ramnagar is within the sacred circle of Kashi as determined by the Panchakroshi pilgrimage route. The Ramlila spaces-places are mytho-theatrical entities. A unique thing about Ramnagar Ramlila is how the physical act of making a journey is knitted into the dramaturgy. The Ramlila begins, against the west wall of Rambag, Rama's pleasure garden. The night scene of the first lila is as placid as the day scene is chaotic. The rush of Ravana's outrages are met by the deep calm of Vishnu reposing on the belly and under the hoods of Sbeshanag, the thousand-headed cobra whose name means "what remains" when the universe is destroyed at the end one of the yugas or cycles of creation-destruction.
