Shakespeare began travelling with the Raj towards the Orient, and by the early 20th century he was an oft-quoted name in Indian theatrical circles. That was the time when touring commercial companies, founded and owned mostly by the rich Anglophile Parsis in Mumbai, had created vast audiences all over the north.
The plays they staged were musicals in a Mili Juli Zuban (read Urdu-Hindustani), and translations of and pilfering from well known English plays were totally acceptable among the playwrights. Among the most well-known – and perhaps also the most colourful playwrights of the day – was Mohammad Jalal Agha, better known as Agha “Hashra” Kashmiri (1879-1925), the son of a Kashmiri migrant who took to writing plays in 1897.
In the preface to a handbook (of songs from his early hit Aseer e Hirs), Hashra writes that during the golden period in Britain under Malka Elizabeth, what raised the English theatre to its highest point (Meraz e kamal), was the Great Poet (Malkush Shoara) Shakespeare’s pen.
He goes on shrewdly to compliment his employer, Cowasji Palanji Khatau, for being the first man in Hind who thought of dressing up Hindustani plays in Western attire, and allowed the splendors of European culture to be revealed on stage. And it was under his orders, confesses “Hashra”, that he, as a young playwright, translated his first Shakespearean play, The Winter’s Tale, as Mureed e Shaq. The play was later restaged as Maar E Asteen after the script was worked upon some more. This, as a fellow playwright Narayan Prasad Betaab tells us, went on to be Hashra’s first hit and collected lots of “once mores” from the audiences (badi once morein le gaya).
Character by himself
Interestingly, Hashra knew little English when he entered theatre at a salary of Rs 35 per month. In his hometown, at the behest of well wishers, he writes, his father had enrolled him reluctantly in a local mission school so he could pick up English, the language of the up-and-coming elite in India. But Agha Hashra failed to make the grade and eventually quit.
Like the Bard, Agha Hashra was educated thereafter in the school of life – and a really swinging one at that. Those that have known him talk affectionately of his love for all the good things in life, including wine, women and sparkling and witty conversation. Earlier in Banaras or later in Mumbai, he remained a good-time Charlie, fair of face, with a booming laugh and an astonishing treasure of expletives, many of which he said he had picked up from quarrelling Doms and Domins (low-born singing tribes). He was always ready for drinking sessions with his myriad male and female buddies from theatre where he laughed, swore and fast-talked his way to the centre of each gathering.
Among his many female friends in the theatre circles of Mumbai was a Eurasian actor in the company, who is said to have introduced him first to the English language and thereafter to Shakespeare. She also continued to advise him about the translatability of various plays and warn him about portions that could court controversy with the Indian audiences and/or the British government.
Tweaking the plot
Encouraged by the success of his play Mureed E Shaq, in 1906 Hashra translated another Shakespearean play under the title of Shaheed E Naaz. It was based on Measure for Measure, but got a lukewarm response. However, with the translation of King Lear as Sufaid Khoon (blood gone white) in 1907, Agha Saheb hit pay dirt. Here was a real jerker about a once mighty royal patriarch being left in the cold by his greedy offspring. It was a theme cut out to appeal to the sentimental audiences in India and its operatic sweep could feed on a hundred songs and ghazals.
As a shrewd observer of his audiences, however, Hashra could see that it would not work as a bleak tragedy here. He declared that Shakespeare had been dead wrong in killing off Cordelia (named Zara), a loyal daughter who nurses her father (named Khakaan) despite his having foolishly rejected her earlier. So Hashra’s Lear gets a happy ending with a grand reunion between father and daughter, who has miraculously escaped death. This fully pleased the sentimental family-centric audiences and they went home happily repeating Zara’s wisdom, that powerful fathers must be careful listen more to their progeny and talk less. Had not God in his wisdom, given humankind only one tongue but two ears?
Hashra made some other changes to the original play keeping in mind the local sentiments. For example, Edmund (as Behram) is not the illegitimate son of Gloucester, but a legitimate albeit totally wayward kin. Hashra felt that Indian audiences would not accept princess (Goneril) marrying a bastard. To paint the disloyal daughters of Lear in a deeper shade of black, Hashra has shown both of them in love with the same man (Edmund) and cheating on their husbands.
A subtle twist
The grand success of Lear was followed with Said e Havas (A Captive of Lust), a play based partially on King John. Hashra used only two scenes from the original we are told, so as to avoid courting controversy with the British rulers about the debatable circumstances under which the coronation of King Henry was held.
Controversy was also similarly stepped over cleverly when Hashra based his famous Yahudi ki Ladki (the Daughter of The Jew) again only partially on The Merchant of Venice. One of his admirers, BN Mehta, then the District Magistrate of Benaras, once asked him why he had to pick up the theme when Shakespeare had already portrayed the Jew’s daughter so well. Hashra said that because Shakespeare was basically not too fond of the race and has made fun of many of their traits. “Not me,” said Hashra. “I see and have revealed a lot more goodness in this race with such a long history of self-reliance, pride and civility.”
Hashra’s many admirers still find him subtly attacking the colonial masters through songs in Yahudi ki Beti, such as this one sung by Portia:
“Tum Sitam karte rahey aur hum sitam dekha kiye/Zulm ka hum par magar ulta asar hota gaya/Chhantney se Nakhl E Kaumi babarey hota gaya." You kept torturing our race and we looked on, but your excesses have resulted in greater greening of the tree of love within the community.