The 1976 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts

CITATION for Sombhu Mitra

Ramon Magsaysay Award Presentation Ceremonies
Manila, Philippines

Theater at its best is a most difficult and demanding art form. As mimed fable, the play laughs at fools and praises heroes while probing their emotional and ethical dilemmas amid the adventures of life. Yet the serious dramatist goes far beyond telling tales. He mirrors and illuminates the realities of his society. None are spared in this remorseless scrutiny. Ideological persuasions are seen as incomplete and often shallow. Candor of inquiry and presentation distinguish the genuine artist from the propagandist. And his actors portray the timelessness and universality of the essential human character that with its flaws, fallacies and fortitude must shape our destinies.

SOMBHU MITRA qualifies with gifted versatility as a complete man of such theater. A Bengali, he is heir to the rich cultural tradition that also produced Rabindranath Tagore. Joining the professional stage in 1939 when 24 years old, he quickly earned repute as a fine actor with notably eloquent voice and gesture, but quit three companies out of dissatisfaction with stereotyped dramas. In association with wartime anti-fascist writers and artists in 1943, his staging of a protest play won theatrical acclaim. This relationship ended in 1948 with his refusal to sacrifice art to doctrine. That same year he organized a non-commercial dramatic troupe, Bohurupee, with 15 artists for whom the theater was not a livelihood but a dedication.

Bohurupee's initial years were marked by artistic integrity achieved through hard struggle. The troupe was shunned by commercial theaters, alarmed by the success of its startling departures from familiar sentimentality and melodrama, and accused of distortion by the political right and left. MITRA and his wife, Tripti—herself an accomplished actress, subsisted on tea and boiled vegetables until tided through each crisis by film roles. By preference, MITRA today receives income only as Head of the Drama Department of Rabindra Bharati University in Calcutta.

Overcoming meager costuming and sets with masterful acting and stagecraft, MITRA produced for Indian audiences some of the world's great classics. His adaptations of Henrik Ibsen's An Enemy of the People and A Doll's House, and his sensitive translation of Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, made dramatically meaningful in Bengali their moral concern with truth and self-realization. His production of Raktakarabi (Red Oleanders), Tagore's never-before staged poetic allegory of the spirit triumphing over materialism, was a cultural milestone. Portrayal of such philosophical implications with convincing reality in this and other powerful plays by Tagore has allowed Bengalis to discover themselves in drama. Bohurupee's repertoire, also received with critical enthusiasm in Delhi, Bombay and Madras, includes modern comedies and social satires by MITRA and hitherto unknown Indian playwrights.

An exacting disciplinarian with himself and colleagues, MlTRA trains his troupe in voice culture, body movement and all other aspects of acting, and in stage organization, lighting and decor. His insistence upon minute examination of plays encourages reflection and interpretation. In 28 years Bohurupee's artistic teamwork has fostered other lively drama groups throughout India, while MITRA has shaped the literary taste of an intellectual generation.

In electing SOMBHU MITRA to receive the 1976 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts, the Board of Trustees recognizes his creating a relevant theater movement in India by superb production, acting and writing.