CAMDEN, Maine — Peter Brook’s groundbreaking three-part epic film “The Mahabharata” will be screened and discussed at 1:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct.30, Nov. 6 and Nov. 13, at the Camden Public Library.
Director Peter Brook and writer Jean Claude Carriere collaborated for eight years to translate “The Mahabharata” for western audiences on both the stage and screen. The stage version played on five continents before being adapted to the screen. In creating the screen version, they gathered 42 actors from 20 countries to tell the timeless story which Time magazine called “a spellbinding journey through myth and fable, blessed with an unfailing sense of wonder.” Each screening will have a post-screening discussion led by Bill Halpin and Saskia Huising of Meetingbrook. The series is co-sponsored by Resonance Arts and the Camden Public Library, and admission is free.
The Mahabharata is one of the great literary masterpieces of all time, dating back to the second and third century BCE, the same time period as the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey.” The world of the Mahabharata is one of profound storytelling, with epic loves and hatreds, with gods and demons, where characters command magical powers. Within the Mahabharata a civilization rises, falls and is reborn. Maha in Sanskrit means “great.” Bharata means “Hindu” and in a more general sense “man.” The Mahabharata can thus be understood as “the great history of humankind.” Peter Brook’s film offers a voyage into a fascinating civilization that reflects the concerns, emotions, contradictions and secret dreams of contemporary audiences.
Director Brook said, “The Mahabharata is the closest mythological reflection of our own times. It explores the roots of warfare with the same concrete reality as Shakespeare’s characters. The Mahabharata shows the conflict of people trying to live together. It is for today. What we are trying to do is to celebrate a work which only India could have created but which carries echoes of all mankind.”
For more information, call 236-3440.