Girish Karnad: Shaping Of an Artist

Abstract

It may have something to do with the fact that in the small town of Sirsi, where I grew up, strolling groups of players, called Natak Mandails or Natak Companies, would come, set up a stage, present a few plays over a couple of months and move on. My parents were addicted to these plays. That was in late 1940s. By the early 1950s, films had more or less finished off this kind of theatre though some Mandails still survive in North Karnataka in a degenerate state. But in those days they were good or least I was young and thought so. I loved going to see them and the magic have stayed with me.¹