Veteran playwright and actor Girish Karnad passed away in Bengaluru on Monday. He was 81.
He was conferred with the Gyanpith award, Padma Shri, Padma Bhushan, Sangeet Natak Academy award, Sahitya Academy and Kalidas Samman. Karnad – born in Matheran – graduated in Mathematics and Statistics, and studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics in Oxford as a Rhodes scholar.
Karnad translated his plays – originally written in Kannada – into English. His plays have been translated to many languages. His plays have been directed by renowned directors including Ebrahim Alkazi, Alyque Padamsee, B.V. Karanth, Satyadev Dubey, Shyamanand Jalan, Vijaya Mehta and so on.
Karnad initially started with amateur theatre in Chennai in his 20s and was part of The Madras Players. Some of his renowned plays are Hayavadhana, Nagamandala, Tughlaq, Yayati, Maa Nishaada. He has also translated Badal Sircar’s Evam Indrajit. Karnad has often drawn from historical and mythological sources for presenting the present day existential and philosophical conflicts of people.
His play Hayavadhana is based on the 1940 book Transposed Heads by Thomas Mann – a conflict also found in the 11th century Sanskrit text Kathasaritsagara. Karnad also used techniques and themes of folk theatre.
He has also acted in several plays, films and television serials, including the renowned Malgudi Days and Indradhanush on Doordarshan. He has acted in several Hindi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayali, Marathi films and won National Awards several times. Some of the renowned Hindi films he has acted in are Nishant, Manthan, Swami, Pukar, Iqbal, Dor.
Karnad has been director of the Film and Television Institute of India and chairman of the Sangeet Natak Academy. His autobiography, Aadaadtha Aayushya, was published in 2011.
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