One moment Chavara Parukutty was a prisoner of her arthritic body, taking shallow breaths and struggling to move. But as the slow strains of Kathakali music filled the air, a strange radiance descended on her face. Her eyes started that hurried dance and her fingers dissolved into mudras, orchestrating an elegant interplay. Soon, she was standing and her stiff leg hit the floor with a thud, the trance broken. She was Kunti, a woman burning in grief’s eternal fire, and the septuagenarian stretched the limits of her body in a profound identification with the role. Movements sank into music with simple yet inexplicable ease, reminding you of her grand six-decade-long affair with the dance form.
But Parukutty, who passed away last month at the age of 75, was not just an artist extraordinaire. She was also the first woman to brave the professional Kathakali circuit, breaking all barriers of patriarchy.
Outside the school
Born in a goldsmith family in 1943, Parukutty grew up watching Kathakali, an art form ‘so elite and intricate’, as she said.
She was always drawn to dance, but Parukutty’s family could never afford formal lessons. Her passion was so intense that she would spend long hours outside Leelamani Nrithakalalayam, a dance school, observing the dancers through a broken window. Impressed by her spirit and talent, she was soon made a member of the group. A string of group performances followed, but by then Parukutty had found her true calling — Kathakali.
Chavara Parukutty channelled her own pain into her performances. Photo: C. Suresh Kumar
It was a complete male bastion then, yet she wasn’t the first woman who had tried to break in. What set Parukutty apart was her focus and perseverance, the way she challenged the demarcations of gender and patriarchy. While the others left their art halfway to fulfil the needs of domesticity, Parukutty, with no aristocratic roots to boast of, made it to the professional circuit. And she became the first woman to take up the classical ballet as a career.
Going nowhere
Muthuvilakkad Gopala Panicker was her first guru and she made her debut as Lalitha, the demoness-in-disguise who tries to kill the infant Krishna in Poothanamoksham . It was the late 50s and Parukutty, a mere teenager, began her long and uncertain journey from there. In the beginning, she got only minor roles, characters with no padams , even after she started training under the more renowned Poruvazhi Gopala Pillai. She remained an anomaly for long, and though she joined Poruvazhi Sreekrishnavilasm Kaliyogam, a professional troupe, she wasn’t taken seriously. Even after graduating to major roles, including male characters, the going was never easy. Festival brochures always skipped her name from the artists line-up, and on the rare occasion when it was included, it would be in the smallest font possible. Later, Mankulam Vishnu Namboodiri, a titan of the Southern style, took her under his wings, giving her art a new direction.
Though she had a Bachelor’s degree in economics, Parukutty never thought of another career. Even during her early years as a single mother, she wanted to be a full-time artist. Not all co-artistes or festival committee members were courteous to her and often she was the only woman in a green room overflowing with men. Performances started at night, and there were times when she had nobody to babysit her daughter. Together, they travelled from venue to venue — when the mother performed, the child slept backstage.
Her favourite role
Kunti in Karnasapatham was one of Parukutty’s favourite roles and she always portrayed it with cascading brilliance. She considered herself an eloquent interpreter of pathos and revelled in shoka , channelling her own pain into her performances. She strongly believed it was not possible for a man to decode the complex mindscape of a woman, and that the male artists played women characters, be it Damayanthi or Devayani, without understanding the true gravity of their feelings. She felt experience and identification were crucial in recreating an emotion in all its magnificence and poignancy on stage. While portraying her favourite tragic heroines, Parukutty always brought a visceral lyricism to it, creating her signature note.
A true feminist at heart, she always questioned the misogynistic practices of the art world. She wanted more women to embrace Kathakali, claim their space in its upper echelons. She expressed dissatisfaction over the pay gap, and hoped that one day women artists would be paid on a par with men.
While many of her contemporaries went on to achieve fame, Parukutty never received the recognition she deserved. Top honours and foreign venues always eluded her, but the artist strode ahead with her head held high. In the years to come, she will be fondly remembered as a pioneer who broke open some closely guarded doors.
navamy.sudhish@thehindu.co.in
