STAGING THE LIFE OF CHRIST IN AHMEDABAD
Ahmedabad in 1958 was less a city than a large town. Cotton mills, famous mills – Calico, Arvind, Ambica among them – gave it importance and wealth. One of its leading families was that of the Sarabhais, which gave India the scientist Dr Vikram Sarabhai. One of his sisters was Leena, who married another mill-owner. Leena had been home-schooled along with her siblings, under the guidance of Maria Montessori, who sent a teacher out to them. From her parents and paternal aunt she imbibed certain values that blended with her own unusual ideas, making of her a pioneering, fearless, and dedicated educationist.
Leena Sarabhai began a school called SHREYAS, and among her many innovative ideas was this one, that the children who studied there should ‘experience’ the history, geography, and languages which they would be taught, as an integrated cultural experience. For this reason, the entire school would be involved each year in such an experience, revolving around a theatrical performance. Among these were shadow plays on the lives of Gandhi and of Abraham Lincoln, and plays on Don Quixote and Peter Pan. One of her earliest projects focused on a subject that had become important to her: the life and teachings of Jesus Christ.
Leena went to great trouble to understand her subject, going to the country where Christ lived and spending time in retreat in a monastery. The result was extraordinary and unforgettable. The Illustrated Weekly of India published an account of it, lavishly illustrated with photographs credited to K. R. Koty. These are reproduced here, along with quotations from the anonymous article.
“To represent the story of Christ’s life from his birth to his death, to bring out the great truths of his teachings through parables, and in the process to enthral, even to move to the point of tears, a sophisticated audience, all these would amount to a great achievement.
“But this was much more. Treading a stage that was in itself a technical miracle, dressed in costumes eloquent of the barbaric splendour of those times, the students of Shreyas recreated in Ahmedabad, with a realism worthy of Oberammergau, the profoundly moving story that began in Bethlehem of Judah two thousand years ago, and thereby fulfilled the underlying purpose of the project to a degree unattainable through conventional methods of instruction.”
Guided by their teachers, the children made many of the costumes and props themselves. The Junior School presented the Birth of Christ. The children were taught the geography of West Asia and a brief history of its ancient civilisations. To practise them in a language new to these Gujarati children, this part of the drama was performed in English. Susana Heredia, a trained teacher and musician, the wife of Ahmedabad’s Collector and District Magistrate, taught the teachers and children suitable Christmas Carols.
“Christ’s public life was played in Gujarati by the High School and College students, assisted by a few members of the staff. The dignity and sincerity of their acting were impressive, and especially that of Prabodh Pandya, as Jesus. As the play ended, some of those who had watched him wept and touched his feet.”
The Crucifixion was presented in a darkness entirely natural since the sun had set. (The performance had been timed very well to take advantage of this.) Only voices were heard until the moment when Christ gave up His Spirit. Then a light grew slowly in brightness, focused on the cross, at whose foot Mary was seen to be kneeling.
“With song and dance the profound truths underlying the Parables of the Prodigal Son and the Wise Virgins were related with a spontaneity most appropriate to the themes. Splendidly, majestically, yet innocently the drama moved to its sorrowful but consoling climax; and when at last it was ended, and darkness descended on the stage, the silence that intervened before the audience broke into applause was a spontaneous tribute to a moving and memorable performance.”
It was indeed, etched in the memory of this young person watching it.
Ahmedabad in 1958 was less a city than a large town. Cotton mills, famous mills – Calico, Arvind, Ambica among them – gave it importance and wealth. One of its leading families was that of the Sarabhais, which gave India the scientist Dr Vikram Sarabhai. One of his sisters was Leena, who married another mill-owner. Leena had been home-schooled along with her siblings, under the guidance of Maria Montessori, who sent a teacher out to them. From her parents and paternal aunt she imbibed certain values that blended with her own unusual ideas, making of her a pioneering, fearless, and dedicated educationist.
Leena Sarabhai began a school called SHREYAS, and among her many innovative ideas was this one, that the children who studied there should ‘experience’ the history, geography, and languages which they would be taught, as an integrated cultural experience. For this reason, the entire school would be involved each year in such an experience, revolving around a theatrical performance. Among these were shadow plays on the lives of Gandhi and of Abraham Lincoln, and plays on Don Quixote and Peter Pan. One of her earliest projects focused on a subject that had become important to her: the life and teachings of Jesus Christ.
Leena went to great trouble to understand her subject, going to the country where Christ lived and spending time in retreat in a monastery. The result was extraordinary and unforgettable. The Illustrated Weekly of India published an account of it, lavishly illustrated with photographs credited to K. R. Koty. These are reproduced here, along with quotations from the anonymous article.
“To represent the story of Christ’s life from his birth to his death, to bring out the great truths of his teachings through parables, and in the process to enthral, even to move to the point of tears, a sophisticated audience, all these would amount to a great achievement.
“But this was much more. Treading a stage that was in itself a technical miracle, dressed in costumes eloquent of the barbaric splendour of those times, the students of Shreyas recreated in Ahmedabad, with a realism worthy of Oberammergau, the profoundly moving story that began in Bethlehem of Judah two thousand years ago, and thereby fulfilled the underlying purpose of the project to a degree unattainable through conventional methods of instruction.”
Guided by their teachers, the children made many of the costumes and props themselves. The Junior School presented the Birth of Christ. The children were taught the geography of West Asia and a brief history of its ancient civilisations. To practise them in a language new to these Gujarati children, this part of the drama was performed in English. Susana Heredia, a trained teacher and musician, the wife of Ahmedabad’s Collector and District Magistrate, taught the teachers and children suitable Christmas Carols.
“Christ’s public life was played in Gujarati by the High School and College students, assisted by a few members of the staff. The dignity and sincerity of their acting were impressive, and especially that of Prabodh Pandya, as Jesus. As the play ended, some of those who had watched him wept and touched his feet.”
The Crucifixion was presented in a darkness entirely natural since the sun had set. (The performance had been timed very well to take advantage of this.) Only voices were heard until the moment when Christ gave up His Spirit. Then a light grew slowly in brightness, focused on the cross, at whose foot Mary was seen to be kneeling.
“With song and dance the profound truths underlying the Parables of the Prodigal Son and the Wise Virgins were related with a spontaneity most appropriate to the themes. Splendidly, majestically, yet innocently the drama moved to its sorrowful but consoling climax; and when at last it was ended, and darkness descended on the stage, the silence that intervened before the audience broke into applause was a spontaneous tribute to a moving and memorable performance.”
It was indeed, etched in the memory of this young person watching it.
The Adoration
The Temptation
"They were fishermen"
At the Well of Jacob
"Suffer the little children to come unto me"
The Last Supper
Carrying the Cross
Mary at the Crucifixion
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