Page 247 - DENG503_INDIAN_WRITINGS_IN_LITERATURE

Digvijay Pandya, Lovely Professional University Unit 30: Mahesh Dattani: Final Solution—Plot Construction

Unit 30: Mahesh Dattani: Final Solution—Plot Construction Notes

CONTENTS
Objectives
Introduction
30.1 Final Solution
30.2 Plot Construction

30.3 Summary
30.4 Key-Words
30.5 Review Questions
30.6 Further Readings

Objectives

After reading this Unit students will be able to:
• Introduce Mahesh Dattani as the best known Indian playwright.
• Discuss the Plot Construction.
Introduction

One of the best known Indian playwrights writing in English, Mahesh Dattani is also a stage
director, screen writer and film maker. His published works include Final Solutions and Other
Plays, Tara and Collected Works published by Penguin India in two volumes.
In 1998 Mahesh Dattani won the prestigious central Sahitya Akademi Award for his book Final
Solutions and Other Plays, the highest award for a literary work in the country. Mahesh is the first
playwright writing in English to receive this award.
Today his plays are produced in all the major cities of India. His works have been produced in
cities outside the country as well including London, Leicester, New York, Washington DC, Sydney,
Colombo and Dubai. Most of his plays have been translated and performed in Hindi, Gujarati and
Kannada.

30.1 Final Solution

Ramnik, the father carries with him the burden of the guilt of his father's black deeds, transferring
some of the resentment to his mother. Hardika, Aruna, his Wife and Smita, his daughter both hit
on at each other for no apparent reason. The entire family is of course, putted again the back deep
of a root. Tom City Zarine and the other guests from the post make an entry in the dramatic device
that Dattani uses to show his time-shifts-Daksha, the young Hardika whose voice will resonate
through the play inter weaving the post with present. The play now assumes a wholly different
perspective even as the familial tensions continue within the home and are set off by communal
tensions outside. The outside (Babban and Javed) is in a sense allowed entry, after severe resistance
from within (Aruna and Hardika) and then begins the extortion of the fragile familial ties. Several
scenes establish the bond between Aruna and Smita, with Ramnik, the father often being made to
feel isolated. But with the instruction of Babban and Javed, Smita reveals her true sensibility and
fees herself of the 'stifling' prejudices of her mother, at the same time trying to be fair to her.

LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY 241