Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from February, 2010

Medea and Criminal Liability

Euripides' Medea has defined the modern perception of her. Some time ago, the Teatro Instabile Di Aosta presented, in Delhi, a contemporary revisiting of Euripides' Medea in a play based on the texts of Euripides and Pasolini revolving around “discriminations and forbearance, power and revenge, and the meeting of two extremely different worlds; the one that is logical and rational, and the other one that grapples with the possible reality of mythology and ritual,” as the brochure said. The performance was meant to portray the universality and power floating in the story culminating in the “terrible decision that Medea comes to as a result of her painful suffering.” Her “painful suffering” was the suffering which her husband Jason inflicted on her by being unfaithful to her and marrying Glauce, a princess, to further his political ambitions. He justified himself by saying that he could not pass up the opportunity to wed a princess, and Medea was, after all, a barbarian woman, ne

The Tomb at Tughlaqabad

The glories of our blood and state Are shadows, not substantial things; There is no armour against fate; Death lays his icy hand on kings. Sceptre and crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made With the poor crooked scythe and spade. — James Shirley I had visited Tughlaqabad fort which was built by Ghiyas-ud-din Tuglaq in the 14th century. An elevated causeway on the southern side of the fort connects the fort to the mausoleum of Ghiyas-ud-din Tughluq which was built by the ruler himself. The fort itself comprises what were undoubtedly once imposing stone fortifications, now in ruins. The causeway has been cut across to make space for a highway. And the lake over which it apparently once ran has long since dried out, giving way to a rather dusty ground which children play on.The mausoleum is relatively simple; it’s architecture Indo-Islamic. Inside, there are two graves which unnerved me a little bit: one is in the centre and the other to its side. While I know little abou