Hariraj and Haider: Popular Entertainment and the Nation in Two Indian Adaptations of Hamlet

Abstract

AbstractMy essay will examine how two Indian adaptations of Hamlet, separated by more than a century, engage with the canonical text and also rehearse codes of indigenous identity. The adaptations in question are (i) Hariraj, a Bengali play first staged in 1897 and (ii) Haider, a Hindi film released in 2014. These two adaptations operate within popular media: Hariraj was commercially the most successful stage adaptation of Shakespeare in 19th‐century Bengal, while Haider has been the highest grosser among all of director Vishal Bhardwaj's films. Coincidentally, both of these base the action in Kashmir. For Hariraj, the locale implies a pseudo‐medieval past suggestive of Hindu political autonomy, which would therefore appeal to the contemporary taste for Hindu revivalism in Bengal. As against this, Haider brings the elements of Shakespearean appropriation to a dialogue with the setting for its action – the militancy‐stricken and militarized (Indian) Kashmir of 1995, characterized by gross violation of human rights. If Haider explores the ideological and aesthetic limits of representing the Indian nation as a political construct, Hariraj may be seen as an exercise in imagining an exclusionary Hindu past imbued with the glamour of Shakespearean tragedy. More importantly, both of the adaptations show the Gertrude‐equivalent to be strong‐willed and transgressive, and in both the texts, the Gertrude‐figure's climactic revelation of maternal love coincides with a self‐punitive/redemptive suicide. These two adaptations are thus invested in re‐formulating the sub‐plot of Hamlet's mother in an attempt at testing the representational limits of femininity. In both the cases, the Shakespearean original acts as a catalyst for dramatizing cultural expectations and assessing the imbrications between the personal and the political.