Grace Ewals

Theatre History II

3/25/2020

Dr. Heather Hamilton

Indian Storytelling and Puppet Theatre Paper

This week's topic was Indian Storytelling and Puppet theatre. The reading discussed

Gombeyaata, which is a string and rod puppet tradition of India. In this form of theatre there is a

connection between performance practice and religious worship. The puppeteers use the art as a

spiritual exercise. It is performed in a proscenium like playing space, but there is a cloth dropped

about four feet above the floor. The puppets perform in the space between the cloth draping. The

audience experiences a visual effect of sculptures moving against a neutral background. Many

puppets portray kings, heroes, princesses, dancing girls, demons, clowns, sages, and gods. The

string and rods on the puppets work in a way that allows the puppets to mirror the puppeteers.

The performance begins with a presentation scene that takes place in a king or god’s

court. The bhagavata asks the characters to identify themselves. Scenes later include spoken or

sung narration, dialogue, action, dance, music, and song. After each of the scenes, the puppets

perform choreographed dances that last one to ten minutes. The dance moves of the puppet are

exaggerated by arm movements up and down or side to side. Their feet move in geometric

patterns.

The idea of Indian Puppet theatre is that puppetry can be a vehicle to transcendence-

people view the deity, they see effects on the physical world, and use a tantric practice in image

making. The people that move the puppets identify with their puppets by contemplating the

figures before performing. They experience a connection in movement of each part of their body
with the image of the puppet. The relationship between the puppet could be seen as god image

and the puppeteer as priest. The central act of Hindu worship is to see and be seen by the divine.

The idea of showing deities in the puppet theatre links to this religious idea.

Overall, when watching the videos of puppet theatre I felt like I knew there was supposed

to be a connection with the performance, but I personally didn’t feel one. After watching the

video of the somewhat graphic puppet show from australia, I did have a big emotional reaction to

that. It was almost disgust but also intrigue. Watching that video made me understand the

different effect that puppets can have on people. I feel like having something so unrealistic but

still connected to something we understand the art is able to reach a different level. Realism has a

different kind of power. I feel like viewing deities and things religiously connected maybe should

have a different emotional response, but one just as strong. My religious background consists of

attending church services that I always felt bored and unconnected to. Different cultures with

practices like this always interest me because it is so different. I feel like in that culture I might

feel more inspired religiously because there is a different king of connection and religious

involvement in everyday life. This was a very different type of performance than the Chinese

Shadow Puppets we learned about even though they have a similar method of delivery to the

audience.