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The Christians wanted to have their version of the
kuravanji. So Vedanayagam Sastri wrote the `Bethlehem Kuravanji.'
He wrote hundreds of Christian kirtanas, and he also gave Christian
musical discourses, resembling a Harikatha, with abhinaya and hand
symbols! Another genre popular during the Maratha period was the bhana.
The word `bhana' is from the Prakrit word `bhanati,' which means `to
speak.' Bhana plays enacted in the temples of Thanjavur were risque‚
monologues, about the liaisons between Brahmin men and Devadasis. The
audience consisted only of Brahmin men. (Indira Parthasarathy in ‘The Maratha connection’ by Suganthy Krishnamachari, The Hindu, Jan 14, 2011) |
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The inspiration for locating a dance art for women has come from Natya
Sastra’s 10th chapter especially from the description of lasyangas and
even the name must have been constructed from lasyangas. (‘The story of lasya’ by Dr. Vibha Dadheech, Nartanam, Apr-July 2006) |
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Kavya and chitrakavya, in the class of uparupakas, are not to be
confused with types of poetry of those names known in Alankara Sastra.
The kavya is here a whole story composed into songs and danced. If the
whole song-poem is in one raga, it is just the kavya; if it is in a
variety of ragas, it is chitrakavya. Bhoja’s description of these two is
full of technical details concerning the composition, raga and tala.
Abhinavagupta gives it the clearer name ragakavya; it is sung and
interpreted in gestures, abhinaya. (‘Uparupakas and Nritya-Prabhandas’ by Dr. V Raghavan, Nartanam, May - Aug 2008) |
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