Hayavadana (meaning: Horse face) is a 1971 Indian Kannada language two-act play written by Girish Karnad. The plot is based on Br̥hatkathā and Thomas Mann's retelling of Transposed Heads. Its twin play is Nagamandala (1988). Hayavadana presents the story of two friends Devdutta and Kapila; and their love interest Padmini.
Characters
Bhagwata - the main narrator of the play
Devdutta - One of the two friends, A man of knowledge
Kapila - Devdutta's Friend, A man with great physical strength
Padmini - A beautiful woman, love interest of the two friends
Hayavadana - A strange creature with the Head of a Horse and body of a man
Actor-1 - An assistant to Bhagwata
Goddess Kali - the Goddess who brings Devdutta and Kapila back to life. The Boy - Son of Devdutta and Padmini Vidyasagar (only referenced) - Devdutta's father
Plot
Act - I
The play opens with worship to Lord Ganesha. Bhagwata comes to the stage. He is a character in the Play and also is the narrator of the play. He seeks blessings from Lord Ganesha for the successful performance of the play. Through his narration, he takes the audience to a place, called as Dharampur and introduces the audience to the king Dharmsheel. Then he puts up some rhetorical questions on incompleteness of man and God; and also on the perfection of a man. During his narration, he introduces two characters who are mutual friends. The first one is Devdutta. He is a sharp minded and highly intellectual person. He has defeated poets and Pandits with his knowledge. He is a son of Brahmin. The second one is Kapila. He is a muscular man. He has a great physical strength and he is a son of Lohar (Black Smith). Both Devdutta and Kapila are in contrast as the former lacks power and strength, the latter lacks knowledge and intellectual. According to the playwright, the head of Devdutta (knowledge) and the body of Kapila (physical strength) accomplish a complete man. The narrator compares their pair to the pair of Ram-Laxman, Luv-Kush and Krishna-Balram. All these are the pairs of great brothers in Hindu mythology.
A character, Actor-1 appears on the stage shouting and running towards Bhagwata. He tells Bhagwata that he has just seen a strange creature that looks like a horse (by face) but speaks like a man. That creature has the head of a horse and the rest of the body of a man. Without paying any heed to his talks, Bhagwata asks him to prepare for the play. But he runs away from the stage and soon after he returns shouting again. Now a strange creature appears on the stage. As earlier described by the Actor-1, the creature has the head of a horse and the body of a man. For a moment, Bhagwata thinks that someone is wearing the mask of horse. He tries to remove the mask but realizes that it is truly half a man and a half horse. Now the creature starts to introduce itself before Bhagwata, Actor-1 and the audience.
The creature introduces himself as Hayavadana and starts to narrate his story. He tells that once upon a time, a princess had to choose a groom for her marriage. So many Princes approached from far and wide. But the princess fell in love with a horse of an Arabian Prince. She became desperate to marry that horse. Eventually her parents allowed her to do so. She was married to the horse. After 15 years of their marriage, the horse transformed into a celestial being. Now the princess rejected him as her husband. That celestial being cursed her to be a Mare (female horse) and she became so. The princess give birth to Hayavadana. Now Hayavadana wants to get rid of this cursed life. Bhagwata asks him to go to goddess Kali temple in Chitrkut. He also asks the Actor-1 to accompany him on the way. They leave.