Inside the Drama-House: Rama Stories and Shadow Puppets in South India (review)

As an actor I often had to face audiences that were smaller than I would have liked—sometimes as small as two people. To have done so regularly might have led me to question my profession even sooner than I did; however, the South Indian puppeteers that Stuart Blackburn describes in his book Inside the Drama House perform lengthy versions of the epic Ramayana story for virtually no one but themselves. That they do so is one of many provocative facts provided in this excellent book.

Blackburn’s book is a much-needed study of this neglected form of shadow puppetry: the tol pava kuttu or “leather puppet play,” which is performed in temple festivals dedicated to the goddess Bhagavati, in the Palghat region of Kerala, South India. The version of the Ramayana story used in the performances is the Kamparamayanam of the Tamil poet Kampan (ca. 12th century). Performances of tol pava kuttu—which, the author cautions, are growing increasingly rare—can go on for ten, twenty, or even sixty consecutive nights.

The overall argument of the book is straightforward, although the author assumes basic knowledge of the Ramayana story. There are two introductory chapters. The first dramatizes the moment of the author’s discovery of the audience’s absence, and goes on to sketch out his research methodology. Chapter 2 places the puppet play, and Kampan’s poem, in the context of regional history and geography, as well as the Ramayana tradition.

In subsequent chapters, Blackburn introduces substantial transcripts of actual dialogue from performances. These translations (from performances by a variety of performing troupes) are colloquial and full-bodied, and convey the impression of a folk theatre studded with verbal plums and humor. The translations are followed by further detailed commentary. These chapters allow Blackburn to explore at fascinating length the twisting relationships between text, performers, and characters in the shadow play. He shows how the puppeteers freely alter the images of the characters—even Rama himself—from the Kampan version, making them in many ways more complex and human. Occasionally these demonstrations involve rather recondite excursions into the differences between Rama bhakti, or worship, and “folk” Hinduism, but the author wisely grounds much of the discussion in dramatic issues.

Blackburn maintains that the lack of an audience has, in effect, turned the focus of the performers inward, making the net of relationships between characters, text (or texts), and performers a peculiarly rich one. The actual medieval text of Kampan (which the puppeteers recite from memory) recedes behind a veritable tidal wave of commentary, comic episodes, folk verses, and other ornamentation. Blackburn states fairly flatly that “unlike other storytelling traditions that use marionettes, scrolls, cards, puppets, and other props, the aesthetic of the Kerala puppet play is not visual; it is verbal” (193). He therefore devotes full and rewarding attention to the ways in which the puppeteers’ commentary weaves in and out of the actual verses of Kampan’s poem, creating multiple levels of meaning. A spectacular, if characteristic, example of this narrative inscape occurs when the virtuous demon counselor Vibhisana, after quoting one of Kampan’s verses, begins a long digression by saying “Notice, Rama, that the poet calls you ‘ariya,’ or ‘noble one’” (139). In another episode, the discussion of the etymology of a particular word (tumi) leads to a retelling of the story of how Kampan came to compose his poem—from the mouths of characters “within” that very poem. Blackburn considers this an “illustration of the commentary’s power to create coherence” (132).

Though this is a rewarding book, I am somewhat in conflict over Blackburn’s treatment (or lack thereof) of the actual puppetry involved here. Numerous references to puppets being “pinned” to the shadow screen support the overall impression of a static, talky form, an impression which Blackburn confirms in the penultimate chapter: “even in the War Book . . . the puppets are very often at rest, pinned...