Vision of Brechtian epic as post-tsunami stress therapy

Professor Sunanda Mahendra

THEATRE: "As a trained instructor of theatrical activities at home and abroad, I could collect some tsunami stressed children; I tried my best to rid them of it in both body and mind. Theatrical activity is the best form of communication that helps one recover the hopes of living.

"So I had several theatre workshops, and culminated our efforts through the epic of Bertold Brecht [1898-1956], The Mother Courage and Her Children (Diriya Mava Saha Age Daruvo), where I play the role of the mother. The mother roams in a cart; the symbol of long journey in life. The play spans to the thirty-year war starting a long journey through Sweden from 1624 to 1636.

"The mother has three children: two of them are boys; other, a dumb girl. All of them have severe social problems, but they try to overcome via the effort to live, and transform into a better world of living with others.

"These theatre workshops are known as 'trauma to triumph', and we managed to create a skilled group of theatre people, mainly drawn from tsunami welfare centres in the South and the East. Twenty of such talented young people are seen participating as performers in this stage production.

I am happy that I got this opportunity to be on the stage with these children, and I consider this as one of the most sensitive moments in creative communication."

busy schedule

Anoja Weerasinghe said so taking time off from her busy schedule before the play was staged at Lionel Wendt last week.

When we saw it, we felt that this is the ideal play for the time; the message embedded is significant in creative communication as regards the war and peace.

A pressing need to inculcate points to re-consider: the aspects of humanism, commercialising the fellow-feelings, the will to live, the religious susceptibilities that lay before the mankind, and the interpersonal links of the family, are some salient points bringing light into living conditions. These are not merely discussed, but dramatised in twelve scenes, each linked to other like a pageant.

The most remarkable performance came from the main actress Anoja who is instrumental in bringing this production to the forefront, and the live wire in the project where she depicted a whole array of human feelings from scene to scene with her dialogues, monologues, and singing.

Maestro Khemadasa, the music director of the play, said it was a surprise that Anoja had become such a good singer, and shows signs of becoming a better singer than some of our professionals. Maestro Khemadsa's verdict - I am sure - will go a long way.

Brecht's play communicates the message that even a foreign creative work of universal theatrical quality will stand for all times irrespective of geographical and political barriers, envisaging the message of the cross cultural need to understand the aspects of the human conditions, disarmament, and could be well be projected in the hands of a skilful director.

The credit - this time - should go to Sue Weston, the local director, for her sensitive understanding of the nuances, as depicted by Brecht and his translator Henry Jayasena.

audience

When this play was first translated and produced by Henry Jayasena, the playwright and director, as far back as early nineteen seventies, I felt that it was beyond the period concerned.

Though well done, it was too long for the audience, as they were not accustomed to the time frame and the nuances of an epic theatre. Then I had the chance of seeing a production in Croydon, UK. This - I felt - was shorter but more powerful than my local experience.

The message in the original text is one of the most important factors that should be transformed on to the local stage, and this was visible at its best in the local production under discussion. It is said that one sensitive depiction of a human condition via creative communication means is much more powerful than thousand words in a sermon; this is visualised and brought to reality via this production.

What is wanted and expected by the masses is not the war but the peace in its manifold forms.

human beings

In order to bring peace, the message should be implanted in the minds of the human beings. This play - while depicting the evils of war shows how people live amid war - also heightens the fact that the disasters are all brought via the war and nothing remains good in a war-torn world.

The fact - the human existence, is thousand times better than living in evil conditions - is depicted as in a dramatised sermon. This is the type of play - I suggest - that should be taken around all the higher seats of learning such as universities.

A fresh discussion on the subject of war and peace through the creative communication is one of the most fitting subjects that should be taken seriously by our scholars right at this moment of our history. This play no doubt - helps one to gauge where we stand in the war and why we look forward to the peace process.

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