Prateek (April 22, 2022)

"Ibsen in the Bazaar: A Study of the Norwegian Playwright in British India." Prateek (Fulbright Postdoctoral Fellow, Northwestern University): This presentation explores the Janet Achurch and Charrington theatre company’s productions of A Doll’s House in Calcutta (1891), the first production of any of Henrik Ibsen’s plays in India, to document how the peripheral space of the British colony of India responded to the Achurch-Charrington company’s attempts to Ibsenise the English stage. I argue that at a time when critics all over the world were divided over Ibsen’s reception, as they read him either “as a prophet, saviour,” or a “literary carrion, dismal and repulsive,” Ibsen’s aesthetics could not find a home in the peripheral space of British India for three reasons: competition with theatrical and non-theatrical shows, absence of an India-centric entertainment model, and the audiences’ inability to understand Ibsen’s aesthetics. Overall, the presentation identifies the distinct nature of Ibsen’s aesthetics by exploring how his play was used for a political purpose in colonial India.