https://doi.org/10.67147/literariness.v1i3.006
From Theatricality to Digital Spectacle: A Rasa-Theoretical Analysis of Jean Genet’s The Balcony in the Age of AI-Mediated Literary Studies
DR PRATHIBHA P
Assistant Professor
PG Department of English and Research Centre
Vimala College (Autonomous), Thrissur
Affiliated to the University of Calicut
prathibha@vimalacollege.edu.in
Abstract: This paper aims to analyze the famous absurd play The Balcony by Jean Genet employing the methodology of rasa theory. Although Absurdism is mostly associated with France than any other country, Genet is the only foremost practitioner of it who is French himself; the other two eminent contemporaries being Samuel Beckett and Eugene Ionesco. In The Balcony, Genet subverts the power structure and through role-play along with other absurd techniques represents the subaltern characters at war with the hegemonic structures. This study probes into those aspects in the play that credit it with the characteristics required to please the sahrdaya for he is never guided by any “meddling intellect,” similar to the philosophy behind the Absurd Theatre; and also, to highlight the significance of the Absurd from a subaltern point of view. This achieves contemporary significance as the concepts of hyperreality and surveillance capitalism raised in the play is elevated to a spectacle when viewed through the lens of Indian aesthetics and AI-mediated innovative approaches in English Studies. While this affords immense possibilities, it also necessitates the literary world to be critical of the reality/illusion dichotomy that reigns the digital world. In order to distance itself from self-sabotaging shifts, literature needs to adopt ways to maintain a neutral approach to champion subaltern cause.
Keywords: Rasa, Surveillance Capitalism, AI-Mediated Literary Studies, Theatre, Spectacle, Subaltern
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