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Thullal is the solo-dance which tells a story,
normally drawn from puranic legends, through verbal
acting and miming. Compared to koodiyattom and
kathakali the mode of dancing and miming are simple
and the language used in the performance can
communicate with the ordinary people directly. The
origins of thullal should be seen from the
background of seventeenth and eighteenth century
Kerala, when this art form took shape.
The Brahmanic temple centered cultural forms
including koothu and koodiyattom were showing signs
of stagnation, unable to break new grounds in their
own stipulated paths. New linguistic and visual
forms were emerging, as shown by the growth of
vernacular poetry initiated by Cherusseri,
Poonthanam and Ezhuthassan. Efforts were on to
combine folk traditions prevalent in various parts
of Kerala, with puranic themes and traditional forms
of performance, as shown by the growth of
krishnanattom and ramanattom and finally kathakali.
Moreover, patronage was accorded to a large number
of temple festivals and rituals like pooram, theyyam
and thira and patayani all of them having roots in
the popular traditions. This together with the
bhakti forms resulted in the temples having a
different identity as popular socio-religious
centres. Changes were taking place in the social
structure. The traditional ruling class consisting
of naduvazhi chiefs and Brahmanas, found themselves
confronted by powerful non-Brahmana madampis and
land-owners. New ruling families emerged and local
chiefs held absolute jurisdiction in their
respective areas.
These groups patronised the growth of new linguistic
and cultural forms. The crisis in the medieval
social system was manifested in the emergence of the
Tiruvitamkur state by uprooting the powers of the
madampis and attempting to build a new political and
administrative structure. Kunchan Nambiar, the major
exponent of the art of thullal lived in these times.
He was witness to the changing social structure and
cultural forms. He sought to develop a new style in
performing arts which could directly communicate
with the people, unlike koodiyattom and even
kathakali which could be appreciated only by the
elite who were conversant with the idiom. The result
was that he composed a number of poems, based on
puranic themes which could be enacted in the form of
thullal.
There are three forms of thullal, ottan thullal,
parayan thullal, and seethankan thullal. It is
possible that parayan and seethankan forms pre-dated
the ottan form, in which Nambiar wrote and enacted
most of his poems. All the forms had its origin in
the folk dances, particularly from patayani
performed in the temples in central Tiruvitamkur.
The major change made was the use of puranic themes
instead of folk themes. However, under the overall
framework of puranic themes, the popular element is
preserved in the form of local meters, singing and
enacting styles. Kunchan Nambiar made it rise to
another level by bringing in the element of
trenchant social criticism particularly against the
degenerate tendencies of the age. The element of
satirisation of social mores already existed in
koothu, in the background of the medieval social
crisis. Nambiar also apparently infused considerable
knowledge of music, style of dancing and linguistic
variations into his art, thus developing it into a
perfect blend of a popular solo-dance-drama.
However, thullal tradition apparently did not
survive Kunchan Nambiar. There were other thullals
by Ambayatt Panickar and a few others, but they lack
the quality of Kunchan Nambiar. Writing and
performing thullal was not taken up as a serious
profession, unlike other traditional art forms. It
is at present difficult to locate a definite reason
as why this happened, but there is a definite
possibility that thullal fell out of favour with
royal courts as being a 'vulgar' form compared to
the sophisticated kathakali, classical music and
dances including mohiniyattom. In the background of
the traditional social order, even the composition
of thullal required considerable familiarity both
with the folk medium and the aristocratic art forms
and music, which was something unimaginable for the
popular artists who worked within their limited
means, with little patronage from aristocratic
circles. The aristocratic circles used thullal in a
lighter vein as humorous and satirical poetry, and
thus undermine the tremendous potential that this
form had as an artistic expression of social satire
and protest.
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