Portrayal of Rani: A Feminist Reading of Girish Kanrad’s Nagamandala

Abstract

Girish Kanrad, a notable dramatist in Indian writing in English has represented Indian drama with its elements like Indianness, Indian ethos and tradition. His play Nagamandala is replete with such themes and it is based on two folktales of Karnataka.  In a developing country like India, patriarchy, stereotyped notions about women still exist as barriers in the path of an all-round upliftment of a woman. This paper attempts to study the portrayal of the protagonist of the play namely Rani who is also victimized by such taboo of the society. It is examined here how female sexuality is projected in the play. Also, it is critically explored how the concepts like ‘chastity’, ‘virginity’, ‘purity’, ‘pregnancy’ etc. are gender based and stereotyped. Furthermore, even the folktales are discovered to be male oriented. On the otherhand, the eventual development of the ‘mind’ of Rani against her ‘body’ is another pivotal aspect of study in this paper.