Abstract
Brecht’s canonical literary work’s indigenization in Pakistan can offer a valuable transcultural adaptation study because it was performed through a radical theatre with a distinct dramaturgy and political philosophy in two different cultural contexts and historical frame of references. As the foremost representative of Brecht’s radical dramaturgy, philosophy and literary works in Pakistan since 1983, Ajoka theatre utilized these adaptations as a platform for airing a critique on capitalism in Pakistan. Prior researches focused on the formal criticism: visual and aural elements. No contextual reading is conducted to explore its political and cultural dimensions of these transcultural adaptations in providing descriptive critique on capitalist society of Pakistan. Realizing the paucity of indigenous academic work in this area this article takes this initiative and addresses this ‘research gap’ by first conducting a new historicist study of Brecht selected work and its transcultural adaptations in Pakistan. This article also investigates the theatrical and cultural factors which contributed to the enormous success of these transcultural adaptations of Brecht’s selected work in Pakistan in light of Hutcheon’s theory of adaptation.
Highlights
Since 1980s Pakistani society was sharply transformed by the pro-capitalist policies of Zia-ul-Haq and later on his protégé’ Nawaz Sharif extended his economic policies under the banner of Islamic capitalism
The Threepenny Opera depicted the societal conditions ripped for Nazism in Germany while, in case of Takay da Tamasha and Burqa Vaganza if read together, presented the ‘nexus’ between capitalism and religiosity which gradually transformed the Pakistani liberal and secular society
Their social and political value seemed multi-folded: they were highly subversive to the status quo and boldly experimental in both form and content in their representation of the Capitalist society
Summary
Since 1980s Pakistani society was sharply transformed by the pro-capitalist policies of Zia-ul-Haq and later on his protégé’ Nawaz Sharif extended his economic policies under the banner of Islamic capitalism. Ajoka adapted Brecht’s work, The The Threepenny Opera, in two bold political productions at two critical historic junctions in a highly significant way Both adaptations are a satirical representations of emerging powerful and violent Pakistani pro-Islamic capitalist society in early 1990s during Sharif first period and post 9/11 period of Musharraf respectively. Transcultural adaptations of Brecht’s selected work in Pakistan can provide the research ‘opportunity’ to evaluate the productive effect of adaptations in forwarding a particular social and political philosophy in different cultural and historical framework. Spirit of Iqbal, Siddiqui, Bashir studies are seems reflected in critique of capitalism in Ajoka’s transcultural adaptations
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