The Oxford Companion to Indian Theatre

The Oxford Companion to Indian Theatre is the first reference work embracing both rural and urban modes of Indian theatre spanning its entire history of over 2000 years. Now accessible online for the first time as part of Oxford's Digital Reference Shelf, this comprehensive title consists of 750 entries encompassing forms and personalities across India geographically and historically, in twenty-two languages, according to their contribution to the tradition. In keeping with the highest standards of international reference publishing, the editor has compiled and edited this material from 63 contributors. The theatre defined here spans not just conventional proscenium drama, and devotional and secular rural performing genres, but also musical forms such as Kirtan, dance theatre such as Kathakali, and oral narrative such as Katha Kalakshepam, all of which contain theatres' most fundamental element