THEATRER TRITYA PARISAR : hopefully a little stand-apart theatre journal

 

THEATRER TRITYA PARISAR : hopefully a little stand-apart theatre journal

Yet another theatre journal has been launched. This itself is on one-hand a gratifying news as it indicates an effort on the part of the publishers, who are basically theatre-workers to go in for some literary quest alongside their performance pursuits. On the other-hand there may be a factor of fright of experiencing yet another dreary exercise of going through articles that have little novelty in them. This apprehension of the reader is not unfounded as most of the theatre journals are stuffed with articles which are mostly ‘cut-and-paste’ stuffs lacking in originality.

Going through the first issue of THEATRER TRITYA PARISAR I believe that it would tread a diverse path in the future which may not be radically different, but would certainly be different, as the name suggests. The name THEATRER TRITYA PARISAR would roughly translate into ‘the third space of theatre’. As the third dimension gives a sense of volume – an extension to the length and breadth of anything we see, so one can say, it is in this case, too. The journal seems to open up a third space that is both an extension of the space we generally think about and talk about, as well as about the off-center or off-off-center perspectives of our theatre world.

But the most significant character of this periodical, quarterly, I suppose, is that it is not a mouthpiece, a term which some may resent, or a publication of a particular theatre group. It is a periodical on behalf of a group of young theatre talents who have their own theatre groups to manage, and who had joined hands to form a platform by the name of Jahanamer Samachar, which literally translates into News from Hell. The name itself suggests that these people seem to venture into areas where conventionalists would fear to step into. They are bent to go against the orthodoxy of the elitist mindset of the established. This platform was active during the Covid times with relief works and produced a very popular programme of interactions with people of theatre on the net called Anadhikar Charcha, which again loosely translates into Unwarranted Discussions. And on their completion of five years of camaraderie in Hell, Jahanamer Samachar has decided to go in prints with THEATRER TRITYA PARISAR which according to them is ‘an itinerant manifesto of Jahanamer Samachar’.

The foursome who are the mainstay of Jahanamer Samachar, Debashis Dutta of IFTA, Rakesh Ghosh of Dumdum Shabdomukdho, Atanu Sarkar of Thealight and Avi Chakraborty of Ashoknagar Natyamukh form the editorial board of THEATRER TRITYA PARISAR with Anshuman Kar, who has carved out a niche in the Bengali poetry world, as the Chief Editor.

This edition has a very important article on Badal Sircar by Rajat Das, which helps the reader to get glimpses of the person in this poet-playwright whose centenary year is in the offing. Four in-depth studies on the workings of four great theatre-makers like K N Panicker, H Kanhailal, Satyabrata Raut and Syed Jamil Ahmed give the reader a semblance of the first-hand experiences that Debashis Dutta, Atanu Sarkar, Avi Chakraborty and Rajib Bardhan, respectively, had acquired during their interactions with these four greats.

A reproduction of an episode of Anadhikar Charcha brings back a fresh memory of the rare talent of the Bengali stage Prasenjit Bardhan, whom we lost so untimely.

The third space is defined by a playlet by Chaitali Chattopadhyay; an enlightening article by Atanu Sarkar on a fringe theatre group, Mangrove Theatre and its mentor Sajal Mondal; Silchar’s theatre history in an informative article by Dipendu Das; and a review article of Candid Theatre’s Malyaban by Ashok Bose. Hindol Bhattacharya has reviewed an anthology of poems, ‘Theatre Bishoyak Kobita’ by Bratya Basu.

The journal, at least the first issue is not voluminous as is seen with some in circulation, and which poses real problems in handling the volume, let alone reading it.

Before signing off let me divulge my misgivings about the editorial which ends with a reference to Estragon’s ‘crritic’ insult in Beckett’s Waiting. And the editor dedicates the journal to ‘those spectacled college-teacher-critics’ of the Bengali theatre whose ‘roles had been perfectly guessed by Beckett seventy-five years ago’. I feel I am lucky not to be at other end of the brunt, though I am a bespectacled retired college teacher, but I consider myself a viewer who writes reviews, and not a critic (or crritic). But unfortunately, I am seen as one considered as one. May I humbly take this opportunity to inform my blog readers that the Wikipedia page on Theatre Criticism is written by yours truly. And there I have differentiated Reviews from Criticisms, categorically. A critic writes extensive articles which are deep analytical discourses of the play against the backdrop of the theatre-arts as a whole, and a reviewer simply expresses his/her instant reactions after viewing the work. I do exactly that, and what the critic does is an exercise that is beyond my capacity.

But I wonder why is there such bitterness in the minds of the editorial board of THEATRER TRITYA PARISAR against those who choose to write on the works that are staged for public viewing?