Though her every performance helps sustain the flickering flame of Nangiarkoothu, Kerala’s centuries-old form of Sanskrit theatre, as one its foremost exponents, Usha Nangiar is stepping beyond the stage to safeguard the Sangam-era genre’s future.
Among the handful of accomplished Nangiarkoothu artistes, Usha Nangiar is in the process of creating for posterity a digital audio-visual record of the women-driven, solo act derived from Koodiyattam — an art form with an antiquity of over 2,000 years that was proclaimed by UNESCO in 2001 as a masterpiece of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity.
The Koothu Sampoornam will feature expositions of all the 217 verses of the “Sree Krishna Charitam”, the fount of all Nangiarkoothu plays, beginning with the Yadavolpatthi (or the creation of the Yadava race).
“I have planned about 35 episodes comprising footage of about 80 hours that will serve as a digital repository for performers, students and researchers,” said Usha Nangiar, who performed Akruragamanam at the Tantrotsav coinciding with the recently-concluded Maha Shivaratri festival hosted recently by Kalarigram, a Kalaripayattu training and research centre, near Auroville.
When complete by April-May, the Koothu Sampoornam would be another invaluable contribution from Usha Nangiar, whose quiet, but unrelenting, feminism, has made her a key figure in restoring the prominence of women characters in the Koodiayattam sub-structure.
As the first girl student in Ammanur Chachu Chakyar Smaraka Gurukulam in the 1980s, Usha Nangiar often wondered why it was that in spite of going through the same rigorous training for learning Koodiyattam as male peers, the role of women artistes on stage was relegated to tala support to the men who would perform away to glory.
She would ask gurus Gopal Venu and Ammannur Madhava Chakyar whether, given that the Sangam-era art form had moved out of temples to the public square, another revolutionary step could be taken by allowing women to play male characters — every time the plea would be summarily turned down citing a travesty of tradition.
Looking back, she is grateful that the idea was spurned, for there would be a better way to restore prominence of women characters. After rigorous research into ancient treatises on Koodiyattam, Usha Nangiar came up with incontrovertible proof that the texts never codified any bar on women characters; the side-lining of women characters in Koodiyattam plays had come about as an unwritten norm on patriarchal whim down the line. In the Koodiyattam tradition, characters like the panchakanyakas — Sita, Ahalya, Draupadi, Tara and Mandodari — were never performed on stage
Usha Nangiar even unearthed an ancient attaprakaram (stage routine manual) delineating the role of Mandodari in a Koodiyattam performance. “In fact, there was once a time when the Nangiar coming off a performance enjoyed the prerogative to go up the sopanam (flight of stairs) and ring the temple bell in prayer”, she said.
Today, on the back of newly penned attaprakarams, the five characters have become mainstream in the Koodiyattam repertoire. “As a woman, you relate to the remarkable resilience of these characters when they passed through phases of extraordinary tumult...that has relevance even in the modern era”, she said.
Before the revival efforts through the 1950s of Painkulam Raman Chakyar, Koodiyattam and Nangiarkoothu were on the brink of extinction when the temple-based Chakyar-Nambiar community which traditionally performed the art came under pressure from political reforms, land redistribution, the break-up of joint families and other challenges, said Usha Nangiar, whose father Chathakudam Krishnan Nambiar was a mizhavu percussionist in Iranjalakuda.
According to her, though the art form has moved out of temple precincts, accepted non-Nangiar performers, shortened the duration and features a pre-performance synopsis readout, for the few exponents who braved the odds to master the art form, it is gratifying that Koodiyattam and Nangiarkoothu have survived with a relatively remarkable adherence to classicism in the enactment proper.
“Even now, before the purappadu, the artiste pays obeisance to Siva and Pravathi, to Ganesha, the Ashtadikapalas or the guardians of the eight directions and three worlds of swargam, bhoomi and patala. In fact, the performer pays respect not only to all life forms but to all inanimate forms too”, said Usha Nangiar.
“The Nangiarkoothu exponent’s identity is one of an actor not a dancer”, said the artiste, who has authored a book, Abhinetri--Natyavedathile Streeparvam. As a solo act, Nangiarkoothu offers great potential for excursions into creativity and improvisation in the purappadu and nirvahanam segments that precede the main plot point or the pakarnattam (where the performer assumes the role of different characters).
“Even just a couple of slokas from the Sree Krishna charitam, can translate into a two or three hour exposition”, said Usha Nangiar.
