Volume 2, Daksha Yaga and Nala Charita, contains librettos for five plays:  Daksha Yaga and Nala Charita, First Day, Second Day, Third Day and Fourth Day.  For Daksha Yaga (The Sacrifice of Daksha), a long play of many moods and characters written in the early Nineteenth Century, my collaborator/translator was again Kalamandalam John (1988-93).

The four plays, Nala Charita (The Story of Nala), First Day, Second Day, Third Day and Fourth Day, were written very early in the Eighteenth Century by the great poet Unnayi Warrier (whose dates were 1675-1716, according to K.P.S. Menon in his Kathakali Rangam); they are still studied today by university students for their literary merit.  From the ancient tale of the love and trials of King Nala and Princess Damayanti recounted in the epic Mahabharata, Warrier spins four full-night’s plays.   For these four plays my collaborator/translator was Sadanam Narayana Namboodiri, Kathakali artist (trained at the Sadanam school, stage name “Narippatta), scholar and teacher at the Calicut University at the time we worked together (1990-1998).

Some aspects of the art and science of Kathakali, its conventions, its costuming, its staging, its music and rhythm, and the theory and practice of its rasabhinaya  (the projection and arousal of emotion and aesthetic bliss in the viewer) are discussed in a Preface which takes the place of a Foreword in this Volume.  The Foreword to Volume 1 outlining my goals and procedure is also included.

Colour photos show the costumes and make-up of three character types and one “Special” (Hamsa, the golden swan).  Inside black-and-white photos show some of the characters in action.

I would recommend reading “Preliminaries to the Main Play(s)” in Volume 4 to anyone going to a Kathakali performance.