Dance Like A Man by Mahesh Dattani

✨“A woman in a man’s world may be considered as being progressive. But a man in a woman’s world is pathetic...sick”✨

Staged first on 22nd Sept 1989, Mahesh Dattani’s Dance Like a Man is a two-act play which focuses on clashes and conflicts between three generations, their compromises and their individual struggles. Jairaj is stifled by his ageing father’s principles and must find a way to escape in order to create an alternative world that will enable him to practice the one thing he loves to do most- dancing. But he is prevented from it due to his father’s plays. His wife, Ratna, is overly ambitious and is ready to sacrifice her husband’s dancing career for her own to take off which results in the man becoming a drunkard.

The play, primarily, deal with the theme of gender which are significantly influenced by social forces. Gender roles are dictated by society, culture, geographic location and politics.

The play centres on a man who breaks the stereotypical image of gender constructed role in our society by choosing dance as a profession. Dance is usually associated with grace, beauty and womanliness and therefore, a man in the world of dance is seen as an anomaly and is often suspected to be a homosexual being.

Jairaj’s father, Amritlal, cannot imagine his son pursuing dance as a career as he believes it a degraded form of art- he entertained it as a boyhood hobby, but now when he is grown up, the former try every measure to make him a man. The failure as a dance is accepted but the failure as a man goes to haunt his existential status throughout the play. The father’s underlying fear is that dancing would make Jairaj effeminate just like the guruji who has “long hair” and a feminine gait. Dattani presents the general idea that if a man does not being in the way he is expected, he is considered as a social misfit. Jairaj has a sexist fear of homoeroticism.

After failing to persuade Jairaj, Amritlal asks Ratna to help him and she happily obliges. Even Ratna is bound by the gender roles dictated by society.

Dattani never shows conflicts in stark contrasts of black and white. Instead of showing Jairaj as the victim of the society and Ratna as a conniving, scheming woman, he presents them in the shades of both good and bad.

The play is set in the present, but the story is chiefly based on Ratna and Jairaj’s past and is visited through flashbacks. The writing is pellucid. And the plot is engrossing and renders sympathy from the readers for the characters- the entire play is poignant.

I remember reading it the night before the book was to be discussed in the class, it’s a short play and I was moved to tears. After closing the book, I sat and a few minutes later, read the play all over again. If I had to recommend one book from my bachelor’s degree, I would have to be this one.

If you want to read a well-written fascinating Indian play, Dance Like a Man should definitely be on your list.