Assamese Bhaona to make an English debut in Abu Dhabi

Assam Art and Culture

01-Nov-19

In News: Three siblings seek to take the folk theatre form to a global audience in Abu Dhabi. They are set to stage two Bhaonas – Keli Gopala (Playful Krishna ) and Ravana bhaona (Slaying ravana) on November 1.

Abu Dhabi Festival is an annual cultural festival in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; established in 2004. The festival is presented by the Abu Dhabi Music & Arts Foundation. The event has been held under the patronage of His Highness General Sheikh, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, Sheikh Nahayan Mabarak Al Nahayan, since 2007.

Almost 500 years after saint-reformer Srimanta Sankardeva experimented with the literary language of Brajavali, Assam’s Bhaona has now reached foreign shores in an English avatar.
Entertainment played a major role in the neo-Vaishnavite movement that Sankardeva started in Assam. He wrote his prose in Sanskrit but used Assamese and Brajavali to develop Borgeet, a new form of spiritual music, and Bhaona, a mythology-based theatrical performance, and monastic dances that evolved into the classical Sattriya.
Concern: Conservatives are critical for deviating from the pure form of Sankardeva and his disciple Mahadeva’s creations with their “ English misadventure”.
However, Intellectual assets cannot be kept within narrow confines of a particular language and it has to change with times to connect with new generation.

Additional information

About Bhaona:

Bhaona (Assamese) is a traditional form of entertainment, with religious messages, prevalent is Assam, India.
It is a creation of Mahapurusha Srimanta Sankardeva, written in the early sixteenth century. He created the form to convey religious messages to villagers through entertainment.
There are some special characteristics of Bhaona like the plays, dialogues, costumes, ornaments, entry and foot-steps of the characters. These characteristics helps to differentiate Bhaona from other plays.
Brajabuli was not the language of the common masses and therefore knowledge and practice of the language was consistently on the decline. Also, since most of the popular scriptures such as kirtan and dasam were written in old Assamese, a move towards old Assamese in Bhaona resonated more with the masses.

Types of Bhaona

About Sankaradeva:

Sankaradeva was a 15th–16th century Assamese polymath: a saint-scholar, poet, playwright, social-religious reformer and a figure of importance in the cultural and religious history of Assam. He is credited with building on past cultural relics and devising new forms of music (Borgeet), theatrical performance (Ankia Naat, Bhaona), and dance (Sattriya), literary language (Brajavali).

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