The story of Mohanangi and the Kuravanji
By Aruna. S / Chennai

Four Chennai based Bharatanatyam dancers - Roja Kannan, Priya Murle, Lavanya Ananth and N. Srikanth, got together to present a dance-drama, 'Ardhanareesar Kuravanji' on March 15, at the Tagore auditorium, Govt. Music College, Chennai.

And this is not the first time that this foursome got together for a dance production. For the past four years, they have been staging a thematic dance presentation featuring Bharatiyar compositions.

This time, it was an impressive narration of the story of the lovelorn Mohanangi and the Kurathi who predicts her future. The production also called 'Thiruchengottu Kuravanji' is a 17th century work by Poongothai. The music has been composed by S. Rajeswari, former principal of the Govt. Music College, who had received a grant from Iyal Isai Nataka Mandram to present this show. It was hosted by The Dept. of Art and Culture, Kanchipuram zone, Govt. of Tamil Nadu.

The Kuravanji format of a dance-drama is said to have evolved during 17th-18th century. So far, more than 120 Kuravanji dance-dramas are said to have been written, but very few have been published. The Kuravanji dance-dramas follow a certain pattern: Description of the kurathi's life in the mountains, the scene where the lord comes in a procession and the heroine falling in love with him, description of the lovelorn heroine, Kurathi's entry and narration of her talents, Kurathi's prediction of the heroine's future after reading her palm, kurathi receiving gifts from the heroine, coming together of the kuravan and kurathi.

The story has four main characters - the heroine, her friend, kurathi and kuravan. Usually in a kuravanji, the heroine falls in love with a deity (like lord Subrahmanya or lord Shiva) and the kurathi predicts that the hereoine will unite with her lord.

Some of the popular kuravanjis include Kumbesar Kuravanji, Thyagesar Kuravanji, Viralimalai Kuravanji, Kuttrala Kuravanji, Mohini Vilasa Kuravanji, Azhagar Kuravanji and Sarabendra Bhoopala Kuravanji among many others. About two decades ago, the well acclaimed trio Sudharani Raghupathy, Padma Subrahmanyam and Chitra Visweswaran came together for the first time, to present the Viralaimalai Kuravanji on Doordarshan. And still afresh in the memories of many rasikas would be the images of the heroine Rajamohini played by Sudharani Raghupathy, the perky Suratavalli played by Chitra Visweswaran and Padma Subrahmanyam as the humorous Kuravanji!

Ardhanaareesar Kuravanji

The Ardhanaareesar Kuravanji was published in 2002, after it was culled out from the palm-leaf collections of U.Ve. Swaminatha Iyer. It is believed that the author of this kuravanji is a 17th century poetess named Poongothai. This work is said to have a beautiful description of lord Ardhanaareeswara, who represents Shiva and Parvathi together. Thiruchengodu, a mountainous region situated in the Salem district in Tamil Nadu houses a unique temple dedicated to lord Ardhanaareeswara. And this kuravanji is set in this place.

In this story the heroine Mohanangi falls in love with lord Ardhanaareeswara and the Kuravanji foretells the union of Mohanangi with her lord.

Coming alive as Mohanangi was Priya Murle, as Kurathi was Roja Kannan, as the sakhi was Lavanya Ananth and in the role of Kuravan was N. Srikanth. While the chemistry between the four dancers seemed to work well and drew a huge round of applause after every scene, the group sequences featuring students of Roja Kannan reminded one of a school annual day.

Supporting the dancers was a well co-ordinated music team with Nandini Anand on vocal, Aswathi Srikanth on nattuvangam, Vijayaraghavan on mridangam, Sasidharan on flute and M.S. Kannan on violin. Said an excited Roja Kannan at the end of the show, "It was a wonderful opportunity given to us by S. Rajeswari. It has been a great experience working with my good friends, Priya, Lavanya and Srikanth. We could say that the four of us have clicked well and we've presented several shows. And we hope to continue performing together."