Urban Ideology and Culture in Manjula Padmanabhan’s Lights Out

Abstract

According to Oscar Wilde, theatre is “the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what is to be a human being.” Theatre/cinema is the best medium to bring social change in the society. Theatre is helpful to highlight the various issues such as community, culture, ideology, social change, feminism in the Indian colours. We find women as the headlines of almost all the newspaper daily in India. They become the victim of male dominated ideology and culture and the issues like rape/gang rape, exploitation, harassment etc have become normal in the society. So the theatre is helpful to present the burning issues of female psyche and ideology in India. My research paper draws attention towards ideology, culture and social structure of urban India in Manjula Padmanabhan’s Lights Out. This play also highlights the female psyche and their existence at present in India and Indian literature.