G.S Sahota - "The Little Clay Cart on the Way to Epic Theater"

Date
Thu February 6th 2020, 12:00 - 1:30pm
Event Sponsor
Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, Program in Modern Thought and Literature, Center for South Asia, Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages
Location
Encina Commons, Rm 123
G.S Sahota - "The Little Clay Cart on the Way to Epic Theater"

If, as one of his contemporaries claims, the classic Sanskrit play The Little Clay Cart planted the seed for what would evolve as Bertolt Brecht’s hallmark epic theater, one might ask what it was about the play that suggests alternatives to Western models? What were the implications of these alternatives in the revolutionary tumult of the Weimar Republic in which Brecht encountered and espoused Marxism as his primary political outlook?  Apart from attempting to answer these questions, this presentation will also look at how The Little Clay Cart and Brechtian form in general took off in postcolonial India under the auspices of the playwrights Habib Tanvir and Safdar Hashmi in particular.

When GS Sahota is not teaching at UC Santa Cruz these days he can be found either writing a book on the Indo-German connection or engaging in photographic projects with little immediate purpose.

Contact Phone Number