ABSTRACT
Modern Odia drama as a literary form began taking shape in the 1870s. Before this, dramatic art in Odisha consisted of forms of popular entertainment. Modern Odia drama, like its counterparts elsewhere, withdrew from open spaces into indoor stages and catered to the changing tastes of the English-educated audiences. The new form in Odisha awaited a literary historian, who would trace its origin and chart its progress. This task was accomplished by Girija Shankar in his ground-breaking book Odia Natyakala (1943). In this chapter, he enumerates and examines various sources of influence – English, Sanskrit, Bangla and indigenous folk performative traditions – on modern Odia drama in its earlier phase. In doing so, Girija Shankar develops a comparative perspective from which Odia literature could be fruitfully approached. He also goes on to convincingly show how imitative dimensions of Odia plays in their early phase gradually give way to a lively portrayal of the socio-economic life of contemporary Odisha. Thus, Girija Shankar adroitly maps the movement towards realism in the emerging genre. Plays now sought to dramatize the unfolding of social and political change in Odisha. Many important contemporary events such as the auctioning of feudal estates, an imminent famine in 1880, the vote war caused by election to the Governor General’s Council, Madhusudan Das setting up a factory, the Non-cooperation Movement found their way into modern Odia drama. The playwrights also display an acute sensitivity to the cultural shifts taking place in the world around them. Their plays presented characters who spoke Odia mixed with English and Bengalis speaking a mangled Odia, and deftly capture the new forms of corruption taking root in modern institutions like law courts and government offices. In other words, to Girija Shankar, modern Odia playwrights actively engaged in writing the history of the present.
