Re-Vision of Myths In Post-Colonial Indian English Drama As An Avenue For The Empowerment Of Women

Abstract

Literature is one of the devices of articulating culture whereby culture gets recognised through the adaptation of myths. The revision of myths has received unparalleled recognition as a discourse through which identity and relations of power are constructed and negotiated. Myth has been an innate and pivotal part of culture since antiquity. The reliability on ancient myths has been decisive to the level that the progress of a culture in a certain age could be amply sketched through the interpretations of myths. The postcolonial studies share a concern with the creation of novel and more empowering subjectivities for the women who have traditionally been casted as subaltern. The conformist narrative styles are too firm to challenge structural patterns. Thus the revision of myths is an endeavor to annihilate the misrepresentation of female subjectivity in myths. It also helps to offer fresh connotations to the myths, the meanings of which are shared by the society. Two of the most prominent post-colonial dramatists Girish Karnad, Chandrashekhar Kambar and Arun Mukherjee in their respective plays Yayati, Siri Sampige and Mareech, the Legend have succeeded in demystifying the feminine mystique created in the myths which distorted the concept of the Indian woman as an individual. These plays outline the course of the construction of female subjectivity which has continued right from the beginning of time.