On 30 October 2013, the British Council, Culture+Conflict and the Royal Court Theatre hosted a panel discussion called Making a better world? around Abhishek Majumdar's The Djinns of Eidgah running at the Royal Court until 9 November.
The panel comprised Elyse Dodgson, International Director, Royal Court Theatre; Abhishek Majumdar, playwright; Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, Author and Journalist, The Independent; Sumantra Bose, Professor of International and Comparative Politics, London School of Economics and Political Science; Pauline Ross, Founder and Artistic Director, The Playhouse, Derry/Londonderry; James Thompson, Professor of Applied and Social Theatre, University of Manchester, Director, In Place of War and Executive Director, Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute. The panel was chaired by Professor Sunil Khilnani, Director of King's India Institute, King’s College London.
Stephan Roman, Regional Director South Asia at the British Council, introduced the panel, explaining to invited delegates that “South Asia is a region that's changing rapidly, both in terms of positive benefits like economic growth and in terms of its conflicts”. In this light, the panel discussed ways in which culture can be used in conflict zones, using themes from Abhishek's play – which is set in Kashmir – as a starting point.
Elyse Dodgson told the invited audience that “in recent years, [the Royal Court] has made a concerted effort to go out into the world” and meet new writers. She continued: “It's all about finding ways to work with playwrights, to find those voices, even if a zone is paticularly dangerous. We have to find ways to work with writers and to stand up to the authorities who say that their voices can't be heard.” The Royal Court opens every conversation with new writers by asking: What do you as a young writer feel that it is urgent to address in your country?
Abhishek Majumdar was one of the writers that the Royal Court worked with in India several years ago. He explained the motivation for writing The Djinns of Eidgah: “I was interested in writing this play because I wanted to know more about Kashmir, not because I knew lots already.” Others on the panel were quick to praise the play; Professor Bose said that “it captured a profoundly impressive degree of authenticity”, and Professor Thompson said that it “resonated hugely” with him. Pauline Ross called it “beautiful brave and authentic", saying that she was so moved she gave a standing ovation. As Bose pointed out, “the themes are universal – brutality, despair, grief, bereavement – but it's also very culturally specific with an understanding of its society.”
Thompson commented on the way that those working in the arts sometimes see telling stories as an automatically cathartic or healing experience, and cautions against seeing the arts as a panacea: “Stories make wars as much as they unmake wars. Wars are fought with guns, stones and stories. An astounding amount of work is made in spite of conflict situations, not because of conflict, not dealing with war or brutality at all – people choose to tell different stories. Part of our rhetoric suggests that telling stories is healing. This is a very Westernised view of mental health and getting 'better'. We need to recognise that silence can have its own power.”
Pauline Ross talked about the Playhouse's Theatre of Witness programme, which brings people together to share experiences and cross boundaries. "Art is to humans what yeast is to bread – it lifts us up,” said Ross, explaining why she founded the Playhouse in the first place, as a community space during the Troubles. She compared the difficulties of working through “bombs and bullets” with the joy of Derry/Londonderry now being Capital of Culture.
Continuing the idea of how to create cultural work during conflict, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown remarked: "Where life and death are so close to each other, everything matters... what you do with the arts has a completely different dimension". She cautioned against overestimating the power of the arts to heal or to “fix” things, saying: "We have to feel for people with whom we have nothing in common, who we might detest. That's what drama can do, that's where drama can help.”
