BINGLISH

The cultural heritage connecting British-Indian theatre

Education Resource Pack

CONTENTS
Binglish and the National Curriculum

An Introduction to Binglish

Binglish and Connecting Worlds

Classroom activity

Theatres and Music Halls of Britain and India

Classroom activity

Parsi Theatre

Classroom activity

Shakespeare and Theatre Artists of Britain and India

Classroom activity

From Parsi Theatre to Bollywood film

Classroom activity

About Tara Arts

Further Resources and Research

Feedback

Produced using a Creative Commons (CC) copyright licence

to enable free distribution of this otherwise copyrighted work.
BINGLISH AND THE NATIONAL CURRICULUM

“Binglish” = Black English; Being English; Bombay English...

A word coined by Tara’s Artistic Director Jatinder Verma to describe
the fusion of Indian and English languages that has been underway
since at least the 18th century.

Tara Arts’ Binglish heritage project explores key themes and issues across the National Curriculum at
Key Stages 3, 4 and 5 and could be explored with young people in a workshop or classroom
environment.

Focused on the curriculum for History, English and Art and Design in upper Key Stage 3 and Key
Stages 4 and 5, Binglish opens up the opportunity to talk about broader issues, including culture,
heritage, archives, exhibitions; plus race, migration and identity.

This Education Resource Pack sets out to encourage students to explore the issues raised in the Binglish
project by stimulating classroom activity in a ‘safe space’, inspiring deeper understanding through
discussion and learning across the curriculum.

The project is aimed at a diverse range of young people aged 12+.

History – understanding the value and use of archival research, how to interpret the findings and use
them to produce and curate heritage in a tangible and meaningful way.

PSHE (SMSC – Social, Moral Spiritual and Cultural measures) – rights and responsibilities living in
diverse communities; making informed choices.

English – analysing original sources, engaging with themes and ideas; creating written responses to the
research, e.g. speeches, discussions, debates.

Art & Design – three-dimensional design, textile design.

This Education Resource Pack has been designed to give teachers, students and workshop participants
information about a key heritage aspect of contemporary lives as well as practical classroom games
and exercises to support student visits to see the archives, museums, heritage sites and of course thea-
tre.

We have assembled a range of activities to help you reflect and work creatively, through presentation,
discussion, role play, improvisation and writing.

This Education Resource Pack is designed to engage participants from all backgrounds.

IDEAS FOR CLASSROOM EXERCISES & ACTIVITIES are indicated throughout this Resource Pack
AN INTRODUCTION TO BINGLISH
The connections between East and West date back to at least the first contact between
India and Britain in 1603, when Sir Thomas Roe took gifts from Queen Elizabeth to the
court of the Mughals in Delhi.

This contact was soon reflected by artists - Shakespeare incorporated the fabulous East
as a dispute between Oberon and Titania over “the lovely boy, stolen from an Indian
king” in Midsummer Night’s Dream, while Dryden wrote an entire verse-drama -
Aurang-zebe - on one of these fabulous kings.

With the introduction of proscenium-arch theatre to Calcutta in the late-18th century,

Shakespeare, Sheridan and Goldsmith were amongst a host of other English writers
stepping into the heat and dust of India.

For Indians, these new forms of plays and architecture opened the floodgates of a love
affair that continued through the ages. From the poet Tagore, through innumerable
theatre companies presenting adaptations of great European drama around India, to
Sybil Thorndike performing the title role in a classic Indian play in Drury Lane and
Geoffrey Kendall taking his touring troupe of Shakespeare wallahs around India, this
affair has continued down the centuries.

The most joyous legacy of these connections is evident today in the glittering Bollywood
cinema, whose pioneers were all theatrical legends.

Theatre is not alone in displaying these centuries-old connections between East and
West: “shampoo”, “juggernaut”, “pyjama”, “loot” are just some of the many words that
have travelled from East to West... a journey that continues into modern-day Britain.
Binglish is a state of mind, as much as it is a reality shaping us all today.

Our Binglish project is designed to offer some understanding of these connections.

Jatinder Verma
Artistic Director, Tara Arts

In Autumn 2018 Tara Arts’ Binglish Project culminates with an

exhibition at Tara Theatre in south London.

Supported by the V&A Theatre & Performance and

funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.
BINGLISH and CONNECTING WORLDS

The heritage connections between Britain and India encompass: i) the forms of performance and their
appreciation; ii) architecture of performance; iii) and artists.

The earliest forms of the theatre of India are as old as Greek theatre, taking formal recorded shape
during the classical Sanskrit period around the 4th C BC. Where Aristotle’s Poetics set the framework for
development of Western (including British) theatre, Bhasa’s Natya-Shatra set an equivalent framework
for Indian theatre.

Binglish focuses on the critical period of Britain’s relationship with India – from the East India company
in the 1700’s to the post-imperial aftermath of the 20th century.

This period in our shared history directly influences our contemporary multicultural society.

This 17th C painting of an Indian Prince provides a suitable starting point for Binglish, as is evident by the
Western-style dress worn by perhaps the Prince’s lover who’s standing before him, while one of her friends
plays the sitar behind him and another dances in front.

From the early encounters and connections in the 17th century, a remarkable change was evident, as
Englishmen and Indians eagerly explored each others’ cultures. Men like William Jones, who served as
a High Court judge in Bengal, became one of the founders of the Asiatic Society and went on to
translate into English one of the great legal texts of ancient India, The Laws of Manu.

Charles Wilkins, another member of the Asiatic Society, was the first to translate into English the great
philosophical poem, The Bhagavad Gita, in 1785; followed by the Hitopadesa – an ancient Indian
collection of fables.

This increasing fascination with all things Indian led to many remarkable exchanges – in forms of dress,
taste, language and cultural expression. As is illustrated by the example of James Ochterlony on the
following page.
 James Ochterlony was an English official in Delhi in the early-1800s. In this painting, commissioned by him, he is shown sitting
in the main room of his house, dressed in Indian clothes, smoking a hookah (like a modern-day sheesha) while watching a dance
performance - something he appears to have done with great pleasure and regularly.

By no means was traffic such as illustrated above only one way: there are a number of accounts of
Indians coming to Britain. Perhaps the most famous of these was Sake Dean Mahomet, who first went to
Ireland in 1787 before settling in Britain in 1807. In 1794 he published a 2-volume book, The Travels
of Dean Mahomet – the first book in English written and published by an Indian. For a time after
arriving in London, he set himself up as a “shampooer” – introducing Indian head massage and
shampooing of hair to Londoners. (The word “shampoo” comes from the Indian word champa,
meaning “cleaning the hair with oil”). Then in 1809 he opened the first Indian restaurant in London,
called the Hindustani Coffee House. There is now a plaque commemorating the site on George Street
near Marble Arch.

In 1814, Mahomet moved to Brighton with his family, where he opened his famous Bath House,
offering aromatherapy cures for many ailments… leading to his being noticed by King George IV and
King William IV and becoming their official “shampooing surgeon”.

Dean Mahomet (right)

and his Baths in Brighton (left)
 Mirza Abu Talib travelled to England, Ireland, Scotland and
France between 1799-1802, recording extensively his
impressions of life in the West – including watching an opera
in one of the London theatres, which he found fascinating.
On his return, he published his Travels of Talib in the Lands of the
Franks/Europe, being the first to incorporate English and French words and
phrases in his writing. Translated soon after his death, Mirza Talib’s account
was widely read in England, especially by those serving in the East India
company.

Such exchanges were echoed by English playwrights – the most famous

being Samuel Foote, whose hugely successful comedy, The Nabob opened
at the Haymarket Theatre in London in 1772. In his play, Foote explored the
antics of Englishmen making their fortune in India and returning to buy their
way into high society. This was in fact quite a biting political satire as a
number of contemporary British politicians owed their success to India - the
best example being Britain’s youngest Prime Minister, William Pitt the
Younger: his grandfather, called “Diamond Pitt”, made his fortune as an East
India Company man in India, buying a seat in Parliament on his return to
England and sending his son to Eton and Cambridge.

During the same period, English theatre A contemporary caricature of British

entrepreneurs began introducing “English” plays to “Nabobs” (1811)

Indians – complete with English-style architecture.

Such theatre architecture was first unveiled in Calcutta in 1756; replaced in
1775 by The New Playhouse Theatre, also in Calcutta.

The famous English actor-manager, David Garrick (left) of Drury Lane Theatre
in London, sent his brother to take charge of this theatre, who also took with
him curtains and props from the Drury Lane Theatre.

The introduction of this style of theatre buildings was revolutionary – proscenium-arch theatre, with
curtains and painted scenery, was completely unknown in India. Soon after its introduction, Indian
theatre makers enthusiastically took on this new form of presenting plays… leading to the enormously
successful “Parsi Theatre” movement throughout India. This movement – with its myriad writers, actors
and producers - is the direct ancestor of modern Bollywood cinema.

Classroom activities
The British Museum, V&A, National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery all have archives and
exhibitions which conserve and preserve our historic connections between India and Britain.

ONLINE AND ARCHIVAL RESEARCH: either through online research or by visiting one of the UK’s
museums and archives, find: Historic and cultural connections between Britain and India. These may be
in the a painting, manuscript or an object on display. What does the research tell you about our shared
history?
THEATRES AND MUSIC HALLS OF BRITAIN AND INDIA
The relative ease of exchange between British and Indian theatres was in part due to
the Music Hall traditions exported into proscenium-arch theatres in India.

The use in these of music and dance as integral supportive elements of the spoken word found a ready
echo in every Indian region, where theatre had for centuries been practiced and appreciated as a
“total” form.

On the left is a photograph of a

Bhavai troupe in performance.
Bhavai is a form of popular
theatre in western India (Gujarat),
dating back to at least the 14th C.
There are similar popular forms of
theatre in every region of India.

Pictured below on the right is the Victorian Wilton’s Music Hall which is still running as a theatre in East
London. The interior design that can be seen today was created by Tara’s Associate Designer, Claudia
Mayer. Next to the photo of Wiltons, on the left, is the entrance of the Edward Theatre in modern
Mumbai (Bombay) - now used as a cinema house!

Music Hall was one on the most popular forms of affordable entertainment in the Victorian period.
Members of the public flocked to theatres around the country to watch high melodrama, light opera,
sing along to favourite popular songs, or watch entertainment as diverse as acrobats, trapeze artists,
minstrels, female and male impersonators and dancers.

Classroom activities
VISUAL ANALYSES: looking at the images above, what do they suggest to you about the types of
performances they may present and the kinds of audiences who would attend?
PARSI THEATRE

“Parsi” describes both a particular community of Indians - the “Parsis” who originally came from Persia
and settled in western India - and the form of theatre art that developed as a result of encounters with
Britain.

The first known “English” style theatre house was The Playhouse, built in Calcutta in 1756. It was
shut-down the year after, during Robert Clive’s battles with the local Bengali ruler, Siraj-ud-Daula. 19
years later, another theatre was built on the same site, renamed as The New Playhouse Theatre. These
theatres first introduced Shakespeare, Sheridan, Congreve and other English playwrights to India.

Around the same time, in 1776, the Bombay Theatre was built in modern-day Mumbai - which also
happened to be where the majority of Parsis lived. By the early-19th century, Indians had begun to own
and run their own “English”-style theatres in both cities.

The opening of the Indian-owned Grant Road Theatre in Bombay in 1846 spurred the rapid spread
throughout India of the new style of theatre making. In addition to plush theatre houses like the Grant
Road Theatre (picture below), a large number of touring theatre companies emerged, using the same
techniques as had begun to be seen in these new theatres - a ‘picture-box’ opening with a front
curtain, painted scenic curtains against which actors performed ‘front-on’ facing the audience, standing
and seated audiences and ‘special effects’ in the form of lighting and sound - complete with ‘flashing’
swords!
SHAKESPEARE AND THEATRE ARTISTS OF BRITAIN AND INDIA

Artistic exchanges between Britain and India inevitably centred around Shakespeare - perhaps Britain’s
greatest export during the imperial period. It is perhaps not surprising that Shakespeare today is more
widely known in India than in any other part of the world, including Britain.

One of the reasons for this popularity was his quick adoption into Indian languages: writers and
theatre artists avidly adapted Shakespeare’s plays to their own language - and India has at least 17
main languages!

Perhaps the greatest of these writers was Agha Hashr Kashmiri. Starting in 1885 when he adapted
Winters Tale, Agha Hashr went on to translate and adapt Merchant of Venice, King Lear, Macbeth and
Measure for Measure.

Agha Hashr Kashmiri (left) and (right) a

modern version of his translation of
Merchant of Venice (Yahudi ki Ladki)

Writers such as Agha Hashr worked of course for theatre companies, many of whom both managed
their own theatre buildings and toured extensively around the country, and abroad. Indeed the first of
these ‘Parsi’ theatre companies to tour Britain was the Victoria Dramatic Company from Bombay, which
appeared at the Gaiety Theatre London in 1855.

The Indian appetite for Shakespeare and touring theatricals spurred many British
companies to undertake similar tours. Company’s like Shakespeareana, led by
actor-manager Geoffrey Kendal, which toured India in the 1940s and 50s.
Kendal’s troupe was made famous in 1965 by the film Shakespeare Wallah,
starring Shashi Kapoor and Felicity Kendal.

Felicity, Geoffrey Kendal’s younger daughter and a renowned actress in Britain,

went back to India in 2012 for a BBC documentary - a short clip of her watching
a Shakespeare production in prison can be seen here.

Forms and texts were not the only areas of

exchange - just as important were roles in the
theatre. Including those of women.

Where actresses like Ellen Terry (left) lit up the

English stage, Munni Bai (right), who began
her career on the Parsi stage in Bombay in
1911, was no less a superstar whose acting
and singing drew huge audiences.
Classroom activities

Arranged below are photos from various Indian productions of Shakespeare’s plays, both on stage and
film. Caption each photo with the name of the Shakespeare play you think it is based on.
PARSI THEATRE TO BOLLYWOOD CINEMA

English artists and especially the architectural forms of English theatre, exerted an enduring influence
on the development of modern theatre in India.

By the 1920s, in India as in Britain, theatre artists were beginning to look excitedly at the new form of
storytelling - film.

The popularity of Parsi Theatre across India - with its writers, actors & actresses, managers and
musicians and its style of performance that incorporated music and dance with enacted stories -
transferred quickly to the new cinema that began to rise. Popular plays started to be filmed and actors
and actresses emerged as stars of the silver screen.

Since the Parsi Theatre companies were often led by strong personalities and came out of traditions of
Indian theatre where artistic skills tended to be passed down from generation to generation in families,
it was not surprising that film dynasties quickly began to emerge. And the most influential of these was
the Kapoor family.

Prithviraj Kapoor (right) was an immensely popular Parsi Theatre

actor/manager, who also acted with Geoffrey Kendal in his
Shakespeareana theatre company.

His eldest son, Raj Kapoor, formed the

famous RK Studios of Bombay (logo left),
producing and starring in some of the most
famous Bollywood films (below, still from
Barsaat, 1949).

Prithviraj’s youngest son, Shashi Kapoor (above right) , followed the success of his starring role in
Shakespeare Wallah to become in his turn a successful Bollywood star. And the children of both sons
went on to become cinema stars in their own right...

Classroom activities
ADAPTATION: Think of a short play or story - perhaps even a Shakespeare play. Make a storyboard
for a film, incorporating song and dance. Design a logo for your film company.
ABOUT TARA ARTS

Over the years Tara Arts has proved itself a uniquely seductive British theatre company.
Its blend of East and West continues to inspire an alluring vision of modern Britain.
Hanif Kureishi, CBE

Tara Arts is a multicultural company with its own theatre in Earlsfield, south west London. It is the only
diverse company in Britain to run its own theatre building, presenting both its own productions and
those of a wide range of other visiting artists and companies.

The word Tara has a number of meanings:

• In most North Indian languages it means 'star'
• In Buddhism it is the name of the Goddess of Love and Art
• In Ireland, it is an ancient seat of power

Tara Arts connects worlds....

Tara’s cross-cultural theatre shows range from the classics to new plays. Productions are always creat-
ed with a strong visual sensibility and often include live music. Tara has taken shows to Japan, France,
Belgium, Holland, Spain, Turkey, India, Australia and New Zealand.

When was the theatre founded?

On 4th June 1976, Gurdip Singh Chaggar, a 17-year old
Sikh boy living in Southall, west London, fell victim to a racist
murder. Out of the outcry surrounding his death, an Asian
public presence emerged in Britain, with a variety of Asian
civil liberties movements springing up in all the major
British cities. Tara Arts was founded during this time by
young Wandsworth residents - current Artistic Director
Jatinder Verma, along with Sunil Saggar, Ovais Kadri,
Praveen Bahl and Vijay Shaunak.

The company’s building was redesigned and opened in September 2016 by Mayor of London Sadiq
Khan. Tara Theatre is the only theatre building in the country with antique Indian doors throughout and
an earth stage floor.

Tara Theatre is Connecting Worlds - bringing East and West together.

FURTHER RESOURCES AND RESEARCH

We hope the Binglish Theatre heritage project has inspired you and the students to learn
more about the shared heritage between Britain and India. You may wish to encourage
students to undertake their own research online by visiting relevant websites and
exploring their archives. Here are some useful pointers:

TARA ARTS DIGITAL THEATRE ARCHIVE

BBC Bitesize
BBC BITE SIZE SCHOOLS ENGLISH LITERATURE

Digital Theatre
DIGITAL THEATRE

British Library theatre sound archive recordings

SOUNDS AT THE BRITISH LIBRARY ARTS LITERATURE AND PERFORMANCE

V&A Theatre & Performance collections

V&A THEATRE AND PERFORMANCE

Warwick University BBA Shakespeare, BRITISH BLACK & ASIAN SHAKESPEARE

South Asian Diaspora Arts Archive, SADAA

FEEDBACK

If you have found this pack useful, please take a moment to give us your feedback.

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could have made it better)

Is there any other information you would have liked to enhance your students’ under-
standing?

Any other comments?

Please return to Tara Arts at the address below or email tara@tara-arts.com

TARA THEATRE
356 Garratt Lane
London, SW18 4ES