Reframing Women and the Nation in the Plays of Jayshankar Prasad

Abstract

This paper explores rewritings of Hindu women and the nation in modern Hindi drama, as
revealed in the plays of Jayshankar Prasad (1889-1937). I examine the plays Candragupta
(1931) and Dhruvasvāminī (1933) from the perspectives of gender studies, nationalism
scholarship and ideological criticism. I examine the ideological implications of the
representations of gender and the nation, the ensuing glorification of the past and the remythologizing
of the heroines by the playwright. Throughout the paper, I raise questions
about the power of drama and theater to change reality and to shape our hopes, fears and
desires. Should we accept the representations of women in the beautifully mythologized
Hindu Indian world, which those plays present, at face value, or should we should
reimagine visions of a better world, which entails gender equality and social justice, not
presented in those dramas?