Fire and Rain is a play written by Indian playwright, actor, and film director Girish Karnad. The play was originally published in 1998. It explores themes of caste, revenge, and jealousy.
The Fire and the Rain By Girish Karnad
The Fire and the Rain Summary By Girish Karnad
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Summary of The Fire and the Rain By Girish Karnad
The story revolves around two Brahmin families: Raibhya’s family and the sage Bharadwaj’s family. Raibhya and the sage are brothers. Raibhya’s family has two sons and a daughter-in-law. The sage has a son named Yavakri.
Raibhya and sage Bharadwaj’s families belong to the Brahmin caste and are priests. The sage’s son, Yavakri, fights with Raibhya’s family because people chose Raibhya’s family for the fire sacrifice instead of him and his father. Yavakri believed that his father, sage Bharadwaj, was more worthy of the fire sacrifice.
Yavakri, jealous of Raibhya’s family, performs penance for 10 years to win the heart of Lord Indra. He gains spiritual powers and universal knowledge from Lord Indra and begins to take revenge on Raibhya’s family.
The play begins with a description of a village that hasn’t received sufficient rainfall for the past ten years. During these ten years, the villagers performed a yajna for seven years, but it was unsuccessful. This yajna, which lasted seven years, proved fruitless for the villagers. The village king has chosen Raibhya’s eldest son, Paravasu, as the chief priest. Now, Paravasu is going to make the fire sacrifice successful with his prayers and devotion.
Paravasu is going to impress Lord Indra with his prayers and devotion. Since Indra is the god of rain, the villagers are praying to him to bless their village with rain. Paravasu is a 28-year-old chief priest who is about to sacrifice himself in the yajna. The story now introduces a new character: Aravasu, Raibhya’s son and Paravasu’s youngest brother. Aravasu is in love with Nittilai, a girl from a lower caste. They both love each other, but Nittilai’s parents don’t want her to marry into a Brahmin family because they want her to marry someone from their own caste.
Although Aravasu and Nittilai belong to different castes, they love each other and want to be together. However, Nittilai’s family rejects Aravasu’s marriage proposal, and their wedding is cancelled.
Next, Aravasu and Nittilai go to Yavakri’s ashram because he wants to talk to her. On the way, they meet Andhaka, Yavakri’s blind protector who can recognize people by their footsteps. When they approach the ashram, he recognizes Andhaka by his footsteps. Aravasu and Nittilai wait for Yavakri and talk to her. When Yavakri doesn’t arrive, they head into the forest.
A new character enters the story: Vishakha, a 26-year-old woman and Paravakri’s wife. She is in the forest to fetch drinking water from a well. While Vishakha is in the forest, Yavakri grabs her and refuses to let her go. Before Yavakri’s ten-year asceticism, Yavakri and Vishakha were in a relationship. They converse, and Yavakri brings back memories, moving Vishakha emotionally.
Yavakri seduces Vishakha with her passionate words and takes her behind a tree to make love. Aravasu and Nittalai are also in the forest. Nittalai sees footprints and immediately realizes Vishakha is not alone, but is with someone. He knows Vishakha is with Yavakri. But she tries to get away from them and tells Aravasu to go somewhere else. Aravasu doesn’t listen. He goes behind the tree and sees Yavakri and Vishakha making love.
Vishakha returns home, embarrassed. There, she meets Raibhya, who, seeing Vishakha’s condition, immediately understands what has happened. In a fit of rage and jealousy, Raibhya begins to brutally beat Vishakha. Later, she reveals to him that she was with Yavakri. Raibhya becomes enraged and performs penance to awaken the Brahmarakshasa. Raibhya orders the Brahmarakshasa to kill Yavakri. Upon Raibhya’s orders, the Brahmarakshasa kills Yavakri.
The story now shifts to Paravasu, who returns home from his unfinished yajna. He sees Vishakha and learns of what has happened to her, as news of her death has spread throughout the village. Vishakha tells her husband, Paravasu, how angry Raibhya is and how he is acting out his lust for her. Raibhya expressed his anger and jealousy through lust for his own daughter-in-law, Vishakha.
Raibhya is angry with his son, Paravasu, because he has been chosen as the chief priest in his place. He is jealous of his own son. Later, Paravasu raises his bow and strikes Vishakha. The arrow’s direction shifts from Vishakha to Raibhya, killing him. He kills Raibhya with his bow. Later, he calls out to Aravasu, who is sitting under a tamarind tree.
When Aravasu arrives, he sees Vishakha and Paravasu weeping near Raibhya’s body. Paravasu asks Aravasu to perform Raibhya’s last rites, and then he resumes his penance. Aravasu, an obedient brother, obeys his brother’s command and performs his father’s last rites.
After the funeral, when Aravasu returned to Paravasu, he accused him of Raibhya’s murder. Paravasu publicly accused his younger brother Aravasu of murdering Raibhya. All the priests brutally beat Aravasu and threw him into the crematorium, even though he wasn’t dead yet.
Nittilai then took Aravasu from the crematorium and cared for him until he recovered. At the end of the story, the villagers sought permission from the king to stage a play. Indra and Vridhra would be cast in the play. Aravasu was given the role of Vridhra.
The story explores revenge and jealousy. It begins with Yavakri, who becomes jealous when his father isn’t chosen as the chief priest and performs austerities for 10 years to avenge Raibhya’s family. He had no love for Vishakha; he simply used her to avenge Raibhya.
In revenge, Yavakri is killed by the Brahmarakshasa. We see Raibhya become jealous of his own son and is killed by him. Paravasu was the smartest of them all; he killed his father and later blamed his younger brother for his death. Pravasu has no regard for his wife and does not care for her. He has no remorse for what he did to his younger brother.
Amazon :- Girish Karnad Books and Poems List