The Old Playhouse

Introduction

‘The Old Playhouse’, selected from the book with the same title deals with Kamala Das’ recurrent theme of failure and frustration in love and marriage. It vividly reveals the plight of a housewife who bewails that her egocentric and male chauvinist husband has virtually reduced her full-blooded and aspiring self to a mere entertaining toy. Consequently, the caged wife, with her stifled and crippled spirit, is helplessly destined to witness the pathetic transformation of her mind into ‘an old playhouse with all its lights put out’. The network of evocative and concrete imagery and imaginative symbols transcends an individual’s suffering and makes it a generic experience.

Summary of ‘The Old Playhouse’

This poem is a title piece of Kamala Das’ third volume of verse, The Old Playhouse and other poems (1973). It is addressed to ‘you’, to the husband, who wanted to curtail her freedom of movement and action through his subtle manoeuvrings. The poetess does not like this, just as she does not like him or his ways. His ‘monstrous ego’ comes under fire herein, since it has totally reduced her and disappointed her. As a result, her mind becomes ‘an old playhouse with all lights put out.”

The poetess needed love and tenderness, security and permanence, from her strong man but he could not satisfy her on these scores. Hence her unredeemed damnation and suffering in his company.

The possessive instinct of the man is stressed in the opening of the poem. The man (or better, the poetess’ husband) tried to tame a free bird that she was and subject her to sexual torture so that she should forget her happy seasons, old homes and her intrinsic value as a woman. But she had come to him not to learn of him but of herself and thereby ‘grow’ in a carefree atmosphere. He was pleased with her body’s response and its fragile convulsions. He made hectic love to her and overwhelmed her by his forceful physical contact. He rather over flooded the organs of her body by an energetic mating and dribbled his spittle into her mouth. He called her ‘wife’, who was taught to attend to her domestic duties ungrudgingly and look after him properly by supplying him tea, food and vitamins at the needed moments. She tried to adjust herself in accordance with his wishes but she lost her individuality in the process and became a mere dwarf under his disastrous male ego. She was totally reduced and annihilated in due course:

“Cowering

Beneath your monstrous ego, I ate the magic loaf and

Became a dwarf. I lost my will and reason, to all your

Questions I mumbled incoherent replies.”

The days of happiness came to a grinding halt in her case. She began to feel the arrival of the autumn for her and the suffocating atmosphere of the burning leaves and the rising smoke. The man she loved adopts artificial measures to satisfy himself – ‘artificial lights’ and grows indifferent and insolent towards her by keeping his windows shut. But the artificial measures have not helped him in any way to override his dominating male impulse. Even his ‘breath’ is strongly masculine. The overall impact of all this on her is dejection and cheerlessness, with no hope of regeneration. Her singing is gone, her dance is forsaken, and her mind becomes ‘an old playhouse with all its lights put out.’ In contrast to this, the man adopts a hard line towards her and serves his love in deadly doses, whereas for her love is self-obsessed and unenjoyable and yet it seeks its fulfilment in freedom rather than in bondage. Love for its healthy growth wants to be pure and emotional, and not lustful and muddy. The expressions like ‘the water’s edge’ and ‘to erase the water’ signify sexual consummation between the man and the woman, which the woman does not like.

In this poem, the poetess’ personal predicament is expressed. She who was as free as a swallow has now been domesticated with all her wings severed.

She desired to discover a meaning, a perfect fulfilment through love, but her man broke her completely by thrusting household responsibilities on her shoulders and by creating barricades for her in life. He asserted his marital prerogatives, curtailed her freedom totally, and showed his masculine power to her. Consequently, she became a dwarf under the heavyweight of his lustful masculinity and monstrous ego. All her hopes were dashed into pieces; all her cheerful spirits disappeared for good. She began to feel a great emotional vacuum and couldn’t enjoy sexual encounters with him. She got possessed with abnormal psychology and sought love at strangers’ doors. The lustful advance of her man grew distasteful to her and she took revenge upon him by craving for freedom from his snares and by seeking shelter in others’ arms (to use her own expression).

Ans. The poetess’ husband

2. Why does the poetess call herself ‘an old playhouse with all its lights put out’?

Ans. Her husband wanted to curtail her freedom of movement and action through his subtle maneuverings. The poetess does not like this. His ‘monstrous ego’ comes under fire herein, since it has totally reduced her and disappointed her.

3. Why is the poetess suffering in her husband’s company?

Ans. The poetess needed love and tenderness, security and permanence, from her strong man but he could not satisfy her on these scores.

4. Which duties are assigned to the poetess as a wife?

Ans. The poetess was taught to attend her domestic duties ungrudgingly and look after him properly by supplying him tea, food and vitamins at the needed moments.

5. How is the language of the poem?

Ans. Fiery and charged.