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Acts of Authority/Acts of Resistance: Theater and Politics in Colonial and Postcolonial India. By Nandi Bhatia. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2004; pp. vi + 206 pp. $49.50 cloth.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 October 2005

Ananda Lal
Affiliation:
Jadavpur University

Extract

There are few dependable books in English on political theatre in India. Professor Bhatia's collection of essays, therefore, fills a long-felt need. She introduces the subject contextually, followed by four chapters chronologically examining key areas (British censorship of nationalistic drama, Indianizations of Shakespeare as an anticolonial statement, the Indian People's Theatre Association as a mass phenomenon in the mid-twentieth century, and Utpal Dutt's reinterpretation of Raj history in his play The Great Rebellion 1857), and concludes with a short epilogue on contemporary activist theatre by women. Most valuably for theatre historians, she places in the public domain many primary sources previously untapped in English, and unearths much secondary material that has escaped academic attention. Not least of all, she writes articulately and readably.

Type
Brief Report
Copyright
© 2005 The American Society for Theatre Research, Inc.

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