13: Vijay Tendulkar Biography by Ramu Ramanathan (Part 1)

Vijay Dhondopant Tendulkar

Born on 6 January 1928 and passed away on 19 May 2008. Tendulkar Sahab was or should I call is an unarguably a leading Indian playwright, movie and television writer, literary essayist, political journalist, and social commentator. He is best known for his plays Shantata! Court Chalu Aahe (1967), Ghāshirām Kotwāl (1972), and Sakhārām Binder (1972).

Welcome to Audiogyan Biographies. Today we will be documenting Vijay Tendulkar with a bit of help from Ramu Ramanathan.

Ramu is an Indian playwright-director with acclaimed plays to his credit. Ramu has previously been a guest on Episode Number 29 of Season 1. He spoke about Stagelife Characters. Ramu is my go to person to understand tidbits about Indian Theatre.

I am very curious to know, who were Tendulakar Sahab’s influencers? I am asking this because I was reading, Manus Navache Bait (Man is An Island), one of his first plays, was remarkable. People had never heard such dialogues before. Theatre at that time used very stylised acting and long sentences with very flowery language; it was distanced from reality. Something similar to which you spoke in the Episode 29 about Samuel Beckett and other playwrights trying to bring court room dramas to dining rooms. So do you have any insights what made him start this way?

What was happening in from 1960 to 1990s that Tendulkar wanted to express his thoughts through violence; because according to my limited knowledge, he said, that he lived in a simple middle class family which was doing fine.

What do you think; what made Vijay Tendulkar show violence to create awareness about violence, rather than showing something morally good or ethically sound? What is this style of showing real? Where does this form stem from?

What was his trajectory of him expressing violence throughout his plays? Did it increase due to ongoing unrest or it decreased? From Gidhade to Kamala?

Some of his plays were censored. What made him write so boldly in his new plays, despite being censored?

What is the one thing which young generation playwrights should learn from Tendulkar and what is that one should avoid considering the current times?

https://www.dnaindia.com/analysis/report-vijay-tendulkar-is-a-scathing-interpreter-of-maladies-4810

https://web.archive.org/web/20081201033510/http://www.indianexpress.com/res/web/pIe/ie/daily/19991020/ile20071.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTqj3GVs6bM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bF3GLjn1iI (Part 1 to 6)

https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/society-the-arts/story/19801231-vijay-tendulkar-indian-theatre-only-complete-philosopher-773665-2013-12-02