1. The Theatre
The Sanskrit drama of the theorists is, despite its complexity, essentially intended for performance, nor is there the slightest doubt that the early dramatists were anything but composers of plays meant only to be read. They were connoisseurs, we may be certain, in the merits which would accrue to their works from the accessories of the dance, music, song, and the attractions of acting; the Vikramorvaçī must, for instance, have had much of the attraction of an opera, and as a mere literary work loses seriously in attraction.
On the other hand, the existence of regular theatres for the exhibition of drama is not assumed in the theorists. A drama was, it is clear, normally performed on an occasion of special rejoicing and solemnity, such as a festival of a god, or a royal marriage, or the celebration of a victory, and the place of performance thus naturally came to be the temple of the god or the palace of the king. We learn often in the drama and tales of the existence of dancing halls and music rooms in the royal palace where the ladies of the harem were taught these pleasing arts, and one of these could easily be adapted for a dramatic performance. But we have from the second century B.C. the remains of a cave which seems to have been used, if not for the performance of plays, at any rate for purposes of recitation of poems or some similar end; it is found in the Rāmgarh hill[1] in Chota Nagpur, and, although it is quite impossible to prove that it had anything to do with plays, it is interesting to note that the Nāṭyaçāstra states that the play-house should have the form of a mountain cave and two stories. [[359]]
According to the Çāstra,[2] the play-house as made ready for performance may be of three types, the first for the gods, 108 hands (18 inches) long; the second rectangular, 64 hands long and 32 broad; the third triangular, 32 hands long, the second being praised on acoustic grounds. The house falls into two parts, the places for the audience and the stage. The auditorium is marked off by pillars, in front a white pillar for the seats for the Brahmins, then a red pillar for the Kṣatriyas, in the north-west a yellow pillar marks the seats for the Vaiçyas, while the Çūdras have a blue-black pillar in the north-east. The seats are of wood and bricks, and arranged in rows. In front beside the stage is a veranda with four pillars, apparently also for the use of spectators. In front of the spectators is the stage (ran̄ga), adorned with pictures and reliefs; it is eight hands square in the second form of play-house; its end is the head of the stage (ran̄gaçīrṣa), decorated by figures, and there offerings are made.[3]
Behind[4] the stage is the painted curtain (paṭī, apaṭī, tiraskaraṇī, pratisīrā), to which the name Yavanikā (Prākrit, Javanikā) is given, denoting merely that the material is foreign, and forbidding any conclusion as to the Greek origin of the curtain itself or the theatre. When one enters hastily, the curtain is violently thrown aside (apaṭīkṣepa). Behind the curtain are the actors’ quarters (nepathyagṛha) or tiring rooms. Here are performed the sounds necessary to represent uproar and confusion which cannot be represented on the stage; here also are uttered the voices of gods and other persons whose presence on the stage is impossible or undesirable.
The colour of the curtain is given in some authorities as necessarily in harmony with the dominant sentiment of the play, in accordance with the classification of sentiments already given, but others permit the use of red in every instance. Normally the entry of any character is effected by the drawing aside of the curtain by two maidens, whose beauty marks them out for this [[360]]employment (dhṛtir yavanikāyāḥ). The term Nepathya has suggested an erroneous deduction as to the relative elevation of the stage and the foyer, for it is conceivable that it denotes a descending (ni-patha) way, and it has been concluded[5] that it was, therefore, below the level of the stage. But the regular phrase of the entry of an actor on the stage (ran̄gāvataraṇa) would suggest exactly the opposite, a descent from the foyer to the stage. In the case of stages hastily put together, often for merely very temporary aims, it would clearly be absurd to expect any fixed practice, nor can we say what was the normal height of the stage platform. In the case of a play within a play, in the Bālarāmāyaṇa of Rājaçekhara, we find that both a stage and a tiring room are erected on the original stage, though we may assume that these were of a very simple structure.
The number of doors leading to the tiring room from the stage is regularly given as two,[6] and apparently the place of the orchestra was between them.