...For war is a drug.

"The rush of battle is a potent and often lethal addiction, for war is a drug."  - War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning

Last Sunday I finally managed to go to Rangashankara for a play titled ‘Robinson & Crusoe’. At first I didn’t read the name properly and mistook it as Robinson Crusoe and assumed that the play would be based on the well known story. But as I stepped inside the auditorium the stage and the posters hung on the walls increased the curiosity in my mind to know how a simple set like this could stage a huge play? It finally turned out to be a surprise and I must say that I didn’t knew the time that flew by while my eyes were glued on to the rendezvous of two shipwrecked soldiers Robinson and Crusoe.

 

The play was directed by a well known director Gracias Devraj, a Kannadiga settled in Germany for past 20 years. The set design was simple, it consisted of a blue ocean and in the middle of that a broken rooftop with a broken electric post stuck to it. The story is set in a deadly war that has engulfed the world, the destroyed houses and abandoned materials indicate the effect of war on the civilians. That is when the two soldiers shipwrecked, hungry managed to grab on to this floating roof. When they both meet on this destitute space the immediate instinct was to approach as though the other person is a hostile enemy and for that fight! And they fight to survive on the rooftop, later understanding that fact that both of them are in no position to wage a war turns their concentration on getting something to eat. Another point to be noted is that both of them don’t understand what the other one is speaking, while one soldier speaks English the other soldier speaks some illegible language which adds to much of the commotion. Together they starts exploring the house from the roof and unearths some interesting stuffs left over by the tenants of the house, something which amused both the soldiers who were trying to find some material to fix their raft/boat to escape which includes some casual clothes, a lantern, badminton racket, an umbrella, a camera and a bottle of liquor. Soon they forgot the war, the fights they had and starts trusting each other despite of the language barrier, they sing and dance under the night sky drinking and making fun at the flying aircrafts and booming bombs. The next day they wake up and try to reconcile everything, after many funny sequences they change themselves into 2 tourists who lost their way and ended up in a paradise beach. Their remembrance of the life they left long back at their villages while they left for war and the tears that swelled in the eyes as it reminded of their beloveds brought back the drama feel. Soon they both got back into fixing the rafts. As they got themselves to row away back in opposite directions to the place where they came from, the emotions swept in. They bid the final farewell and rowed their way to home.

 

This play tried to explain the triviality of hatred and hostility, irony of war and destruction and victory of brotherhood and hope. It showed us the future we are inviting, the extent to which man could go to satisfy his hunger for power, comfort, convenience, wealth and redemption for his hurt ego. And worst of all common man believes in wars! They believe wars can solve problems, subjugate the rebels, and enforce order even though the human history has proven how futile the wars have been. Wars have always taken a special position in the society, numerous fables, legends and epics have gone to all extends to glorify war. Most of the gods, heroes, villains are legends of a war epic. The reason why people doesn't even bother giving and taking a life is all because they draw inspiration from the heroes in the war epics like Sri Rama, Achilles, Hercules, and many other.The wars in epics have been interpreted as holy and sacred, like Achilles tells in Troy - "If you die in the great war, your name will be remembered by the mankind". We are humans and all the humaneness are all built in by us as we developed, but deep inside we are all animals and when in times of war there is no human or humaneness and we ride back to the animal instincts. At the end it leaves nothing but destruction and destruction only.