CAT stages The Lesson in Delhi

Rokeya Rafiq Baby, Kamaluddin Nilu and Sabina Sultana in The Lesson.

The absurd play is about an insane professor and his student. The teacher wants to teach according to his will--by controlling her way of thinking. Is The Lesson a mere play on teacher-student relationship from that point of view? At the end of the play, however, when the teacher, having failed to control the thought process of the student, kills his pupil and wears a Swastika--the Republican National Committee armband, it indicates something different. The Lesson turns out as an anti-Nazi play. The way the playwright satires the misuse of religion and politics by the ruling force to control the weaker ones has got a universal appeal.

Mejrema Reuter's approach to the play is not much different from the contemporaries of Ionesco. In most productions of Ionesco's drama, the character of the student is portrayed by a cheerful young female. Her direction, with blocking is choreographed down to the slightest gesture and nuanced glance. Ionesco's characters demand robotic presentation. And Reuter has successfully handled it.

Sabina Sultana as the pupil was superb on stage. Sabina with her counterpart Kamaluddin Nilu (the teacher) performed well in presenting the stream of words, internal weariness, and childish farces, in the play, which are the main aspects of a Theatre of the Absurd. Rokeya Rafiq Baby and Azad Abul Kalam Setu were the other two performers.

Nasirul Haque Khokon's light-design was also praiseworthy.