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breakinglight11A bit from the flashbacks of Gilded Cages. This scene builds upon a connection that is established in Day #15 - A Small Alliance.
A theme that was suggested to incorporate by Mara Elissa Palma and Naomi Ibatsitas, two lovely theater artists who consulted on the development of this plot line, was the concept of power differentials making it so that mothers of color often have to take jobs caring for white women's children to provide an income for their families, but at the expense of being present for their own kids. I thought that was very powerful and here is the greatest presence that idea manifests in Gilded Cages. I want to display the effects, even if it's not directly named here.
It's important that this series of events is what wakes up Priyanka (I know I will have to rename because that's a Hindu name rather than a Muslim one— I looked up "Bengali names" in my research, not "Muslim Bengali names" like I should have.) to the reality of the injustice of British occupation. Up to this point, she has been too young and too preoccupied with the struggles of daily living to fully recognize how unfair and impossible colonial presence is. But the events of this story is what really opens her eyes, and she is a different person, now bent not only on relief of suffering but on justice, thenceforth.
Day #19 - "Rebellious Young Girls"
From Gilded Cages
By Phoebe Roberts
VICTORIA STANTON, daughter of the lieutenant territorial governor
PRIYANKA MALIK, a young rebel who works in the governor's house
~~~
(1859 in Bengal. PRIYANKA and VICTORIA plan in the manor courtyard.)
PRIYANKA:
We used to grow rice and lentils. But when the mandate came down for the indigo, the government confiscated all the grain. Since then we’ve had to buy from British sources, and no one in my village can afford it.
VICTORIA:
Could you grow in secret, then?
PRIYANKA:
Things are desperate enough to try. But we’d need to get the seed grain in large enough amounts, and there’s nowhere we can buy it.
VICTORIA:
Why, there’s the silo on the manor with loads of the stuff.
PRIYANKA:
You aren’t suggesting we could… rob it?
VICTORIA:
And why not? They’ve no right to starve you.
PRIYANKA:
How would we manage? To get enough of it away without anyone noticing?
VICTORIA:
There has to be something! A trick! Something to put them off our track.
PRIYANKA:
Like what?
VICTORIA:
Oh, there’s always a trick. When I was small, Mrs. Malik told me a story once about a woman who tricked some hungry beasts into waiting to eat her until she had grown fat from her dinner. Then afterward she rolled past them in a pumpkin shell and they never even knew she’d gone. See, there’s always a way if you’re clever enough.
PRIYANKA:
Did my mother often tell you stories?
VICTORIA:
Fairly often. I always wanted to hear about the tricksters. They always thumb it at the blokes who think they’re in charge. But she liked the love stories best, and the beasts who quarreled over this or that. She said it made you think about things you never had before.
PRIYANKA:
I never knew that. That those were her favorite stories. I should have.
VICTORIA:
Ah… it’s all right, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind.
PRIYANKA:
I’ve never done anything like this. Something so… defiant. I wonder what she would have thought of it all.
VICTORIA:
I expect she would have scolded you. That’s what they do, isn’t it?
PRIYANKA:
She always did what she had to for us. She worked so hard... this is no different, isn’t it? She would want me to help if I could. I suppose I’ll never know.
VICTORIA:
You mustn’t feel badly. Why, I never even had a mother, and I still got on.
A theme that was suggested to incorporate by Mara Elissa Palma and Naomi Ibatsitas, two lovely theater artists who consulted on the development of this plot line, was the concept of power differentials making it so that mothers of color often have to take jobs caring for white women's children to provide an income for their families, but at the expense of being present for their own kids. I thought that was very powerful and here is the greatest presence that idea manifests in Gilded Cages. I want to display the effects, even if it's not directly named here.
It's important that this series of events is what wakes up Priyanka (I know I will have to rename because that's a Hindu name rather than a Muslim one— I looked up "Bengali names" in my research, not "Muslim Bengali names" like I should have.) to the reality of the injustice of British occupation. Up to this point, she has been too young and too preoccupied with the struggles of daily living to fully recognize how unfair and impossible colonial presence is. But the events of this story is what really opens her eyes, and she is a different person, now bent not only on relief of suffering but on justice, thenceforth.
Day #19 - "Rebellious Young Girls"
From Gilded Cages
By Phoebe Roberts
VICTORIA STANTON, daughter of the lieutenant territorial governor
PRIYANKA MALIK, a young rebel who works in the governor's house
~~~
(1859 in Bengal. PRIYANKA and VICTORIA plan in the manor courtyard.)
PRIYANKA:
We used to grow rice and lentils. But when the mandate came down for the indigo, the government confiscated all the grain. Since then we’ve had to buy from British sources, and no one in my village can afford it.
VICTORIA:
Could you grow in secret, then?
PRIYANKA:
Things are desperate enough to try. But we’d need to get the seed grain in large enough amounts, and there’s nowhere we can buy it.
VICTORIA:
Why, there’s the silo on the manor with loads of the stuff.
PRIYANKA:
You aren’t suggesting we could… rob it?
VICTORIA:
And why not? They’ve no right to starve you.
PRIYANKA:
How would we manage? To get enough of it away without anyone noticing?
VICTORIA:
There has to be something! A trick! Something to put them off our track.
PRIYANKA:
Like what?
VICTORIA:
Oh, there’s always a trick. When I was small, Mrs. Malik told me a story once about a woman who tricked some hungry beasts into waiting to eat her until she had grown fat from her dinner. Then afterward she rolled past them in a pumpkin shell and they never even knew she’d gone. See, there’s always a way if you’re clever enough.
PRIYANKA:
Did my mother often tell you stories?
VICTORIA:
Fairly often. I always wanted to hear about the tricksters. They always thumb it at the blokes who think they’re in charge. But she liked the love stories best, and the beasts who quarreled over this or that. She said it made you think about things you never had before.
PRIYANKA:
I never knew that. That those were her favorite stories. I should have.
VICTORIA:
Ah… it’s all right, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind.
PRIYANKA:
I’ve never done anything like this. Something so… defiant. I wonder what she would have thought of it all.
VICTORIA:
I expect she would have scolded you. That’s what they do, isn’t it?
PRIYANKA:
She always did what she had to for us. She worked so hard... this is no different, isn’t it? She would want me to help if I could. I suppose I’ll never know.
VICTORIA:
You mustn’t feel badly. Why, I never even had a mother, and I still got on.
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