In the heart of a vibrant kingdom, a forbidden love story unfolds between a captivating temple dancer, Nalini, and the enigmatic Emperor, Rajaraja. Their connection ignites when Nalini's unconventional dance performance challenges centuries-old traditions, sparking a firestorm of artistic rebellion within the palace walls. Nalini, fueled by her passion for art and a yearning for freedom of expression, finds herself caught in a web of courtly intrigue. The Empress, Rajeshwari, a cunning strategist, sees Nalini as a threat and manipulates the situation for her own gain. Meanwhile, religious leaders, threatened by the potential erosion of tradition, conspire to undermine the Emperor's support for the newly established Sabha – a platform for artistic expression. As whispers of forbidden love and accusations of seductress swirl around her, Nalini must navigate a treacherous path. Torn between her devotion to her art and her loyalty to the temple, she embarks on a daring mission to infiltrate a secret ceremony and expose the plans of the religious leaders. This captivating tale of forbidden love and artistic rebellion explores themes of defying tradition, the power of art to inspire change, and the courage it takes to fight for what you believe in. Will Nalini's passion and defiance win the Emperor's heart and pave the way for a more progressive future? Or will the forces of tradition triumph, silencing her voice and extinguishing the embers of artistic freedom?
In seventeenth-century India, Maya, a high-priced dancer who has been bought for one of the most powerful men in Bijapur, faces dangerous obstacles in her caravan journey across the Mogul Empire to her new master.
TEMPLE DANCER is a spiritual enigma that, like a double helix, entwines the lives of two women from disparate times and cultures. Wendy, a contemporary American artist turned therapist, and Saraswati, an Indian temple dancer in 1938, mirror each other's shame, loss, passion for their art and ultimate triumphs in love.
The role of women and ideas of gender are fundamental components of all religious traditions. This book examines the representations of women within Tantra using a case study of a selection of Hindu Tantric texts from the 15th through 18th centuries in Northeast India.
Matilde Serao "The Desire of Life” is a fascinating exploration of the human experience, love, and societal expectancies. Set against the wealthy tapestry of Italian existence in the past due 19th century, the unconventional introduces readers to characters grappling with the complexities of preference and achievement. The narrative unfolds with Serao signature realism, delving into the intricacies of human relationships and the struggles of individuals in opposition to societal norms. The story revolves around the pursuit of a meaningful life, touching upon themes of ardour, identification, and the clash between personal aspirations and societal constraints. Serao storytelling is marked via vivid characterizations and keen observations, imparting readers with a nuanced portrayal of Italian society during this period. As a prominent parent in Italian literature, Matilde Serao showcases her literary prowess in "The Desire of Life," growing a timeless work that resonates with the standard quest for cause and happiness. The novel remains a testament to Serao contribution to realist literature and her ability to seize the essence of the human situation.
This book deals with various aspects of performance in India; especially that related to dance and dance-drama. Rather than being a description of the various dance forms of India, it attempts to discuss the social equations and cultural ideas that a performance attempts to portray. In this sense, a performance is a narrative. At the same time, performances also deal with well-known narratives from the religious traditions of India, often redefining and recounting them in the process of performance. A study of these aspects is important to understand the kind of equations that define these discourses on the performance narratives. Chapter I shows the different forms of dances that are described in the iconographic canons and also the famous dance treatise the Natyashastra, correlating them with the sculptures of dance available in the temples. Here, the temples of south India datable to 6th- 13th centuries have been studied for this purpose. Attempt is made to study the gender equations that are expounded through these dance images and texts, as also the correlation between the audience and the performance and how these ideas are intertwined with the religious images. Chapter II deals with four Sanskrit burlesque plays written in the ancient period, which reverse social equations and classical dramatic representations through the genre of satire. Almost every elite-class person, generally idealized in the classical Sanskrit plays, is lampooned here. Issues of audience perception and the reception of this kind of reversed images of the ideal figures of the society are discussed in this chapter. Chapter III deals with the aesthetics of eroticism that form the basis of many Indian classical dances, how they are intertwined with the notion of devotionalism in Hinduism and how they are negotiated in the Indian classical dances in our contemporary period. A case study is done here of Odissi, the classical dance from the eastern state of Orissa, which draws extensively from the temple sculptures of dance. Chapter IV shows that sacred narrative in India is not always a means of glorifying the divine. Rather, sometimes it is also used to satirize the established notions of religiosity and of divinity. This forms the basis of this very interesting semi-classical dance-drama form called Ottan Thullal from the southern state of Kerala. Kathakali, the classical dance-drama and Mohiniattam, the classical dance from Kerala have dominated the scene so much that this form of dance-drama has been overshadowed and it is little known to the world outside Kerala, even in India. There is not much scholarship on Ottan Thullal. This chapter deals with this form and the manner in which it uses the idiom of satire to narrate the religious legends. Chapter V is a study of the Mithila narratives from the eastern region of Mithila in Bihar to understand the ways in which gender equations in the Mithila society influence the making of these narratives. There is a discussion of the nature of “folk narratives” in this chapter. Chapter VI takes some folk forms of performance and visual narratives from different states of India to show how social equations such as power hierarchy, gender and caste dimensions are negotiated. All these use the traditional religious space to work out these equations. Chapter VII on one hand is a comparative study of two Hindi films made in 1960s, based on the lives of two women dancers from ancient India. One of them is a historical figure and the other is a figure. On the other hand, this is an attempt o show how the narratives of these women dancers are remodeled in literary as well as the cinematic medium, every time these narratives are retold. Effort is made to show how the cultural memory of the ancient history of India that the modern narrators of these stories have been received as a process of acculturation, which influences this recasting of narratives in literature as well as in film. It is also shown that this process of narration through cultural memory is not a new phenomenon, since it occurred even in the ancient period when narrative was being remodeled to present in a new form before the audience.
A quick glance at the headlines reveals a world plagued by violence, hatred, unrest, disease and death–a world without hope. A look into our hearts yields similar results: loneliness, anger, sorrow, and depression are companions many of us would rather not carry. What happened to the “abundant life” Jesus promised us? William Frey suggests that root of the problem is a loss of memory. In our haste to study and know the Bible, we have failed to experience the story of the Bible, and thus we have forgotten who we are. The Dance of Hope helps readers regain the Bible story as it reveals the fullness of our identity as God’s creation, recovers a biblically founded hope for the future, and equips the Christian community to be bearers of authentic hope to the world. When believers view the Bible story through what William Frey calls a “creation lens,” they discover a promised future of glory that can fill them with hope for today. Also included is a study guide that leads readers through times of prayer, reflection, personal assessment, and Scripture study, teaching them to view the world through hopeful eyes.
“Set in 1970s Bombay, the novel explores art, ambition, gender roles and class with the same shimmering prose of Swamy’s first book, the story collection A House Is a Body.” —San Francisco Chronicle “[A] sublime, boundary-pushing exploration of sexuality, creativity, and love.” —NPR In this transfixing novel, a young woman comes of age in 1960s- and 1970s-era Bombay, a vanished world that is complex and indelibly rendered. Vidya’s childhood is marked by the shattering absence and then the bewildering reappearance of her mother and baby brother at the family home. Restless, observant, and longing for connection with her brilliant and increasingly troubled mother, Vidya navigates the stifling expectations of her life with a vivid imagination until one day she peeks into a classroom where girls are learning kathak, a dazzling, centuries-old dance form that requires the utmost discipline and focus. Her pursuit of artistic transcendence through kathak soon becomes the organizing principle of her life, even as she leaves home for college and falls in complicated love with her best friend. As the uncertain future looms, she must ultimately confront the tensions between romantic love, her art, and the legacy of her own imperfect mother. Lyrical and deeply sensual, with writing as mesmerizing as kathak itself, Shruti Swamy’s The Archer is a bold portrait of a singular woman coming of age as an artist—navigating desire, duty, and the limits of the body. It is also an electrifying and utterly immersive story about the transformative power of art, and the possibilities that love can open when we’re ready.
Ethnography for Designers teaches architects and designers how to listen actively to the knowledge people have about their own culture. This approach gives structure to values and qualities. It does this by noting the terms and underlying structure of thought people use to describe aspects of their culture. By responding to underlying cognitive patterns, the architect can both respond to the user and interpret creatively. Thus, ethno-semantic methods can help designers to enhance their professional responsibility to users and, at the same time, to feel fulfilled creatively. This book is a practical guide for those teaching social factors and social research methods to designers and for those using these methods in practice.
This unique work is an annotated collection and collation of Western writing on Indian dance from the period of Marco Polo’s travels to India to the formulation of the anti-devadasi bill in 1930, and a little beyond. The book reproduces more than 250 extracts from important texts, which provide examples of how dance in India was perceived as an art, as well its position in the broader cultural, religious, social, and ethical environment. Though some excerpts from these texts are cited in other writings on Indian dance history, there is no other available work that reproduces such a large number of historical writings on Indian dance and places them in a fluid historical context.
