No more silence, please

Yoneechya Maneechya Gujgoshti or secret conversations of the vagina –the title of Vandana Khare’s Marathi adaptation of Eve Ensler's celebrated play The Vagina Monologues is perhaps more shocking than its controversial English counterpart. “It’s okay if we use bad words in English, but it hits hard when you use them in Marathi,” Khare says, pointing out just one among the many dualities, contradictions and ironies that surround the issue of gender and female sexuality in our society. In the same vein, the beginning of her play seeks to expose the hypocrisy of a culture that venerates its mother goddesses,while evoking female genitals in the choicest of swear words with impunity. The audiences are asked to join in as the actors spell out the word ‘vagina’ loudly, in an effort to reclaim the word from its corrupted connotation.
But is this tokenism really liberating? Doesn’t it shock and stun an audience that’s expected to watch the sensitively-written play with empathy and compassion? “Of course, there was no compulsion.But I thought it was important in order to disarm the caution with which the audiences approach this play - so that they can view it,participate in it with their guards down,” reasons Khare.
The way this episode is brought about, much like the rest of the play,is what makes the difference. Khare’s attitude towards the socially-under-wraps subjects the play deals with – female fantasies, orgasm, lesbianism, extra-marital relationships, sexual abuse, rape, menstruation, female subjugation, reproduction, et all –is not sensationalist, but that of a concerned activist, who has worked in the area of gender and sexuality for around 20 years. It was the feminist and the writer in her that felt compelled to make Ensler’s seminal work available to a wider audience. “I came to really ‘know’ the play when a Marathi magazine asked me to write about TheVagina Monologues. My research allowed me to see the significance of this work. The material originated from an extensive research covering a very diverse demographic of women and the play was Ansler’s way of giving it back to the society. Even purely as a play, I loved the form, the affirmative tone, and most of all, the humour in it,” says Khare.
Yet, it is precisely the humour in the play that the audiences are very reserved in reacting to. “A lot of women come to me saying they liked the play a lot, but we could have done without the boisterous laughter ringing through many of the episodes. This is again indicative of our attitude towards women’s sexuality. It’s only associated with exploitation, abuse and protest. It’s difficult for people to accept that desires and ecstasies are as much a part of a woman’s sexual experience,” ponders Khare.
With such potentially explosive material at hand, Khare’s biggest challenge was to walk the thin line between vulgarity and boldness.“My effort was to not sound over-cautious, nor be very insensitive towards people’s sensibilities. And I think the play has achieved itsrequired tone, going by the kind of positive reactions we have been getting from women of all ages and backgrounds, as well as men,” she says. Though a lot of the male audience queue up for the play expecting titillation, Khare says they come out unrewarded, but not disappointed. “They laugh, shed tears, feel for the play. That’s the strength of Ensler’s work. Men come and tell me it was better than their expectations. That’s what I go by, not the few critics who could not see what the play was really all about,” smiles Khare.