Infinite Variety

by Madhavi Menon

  Draupadi turns out to be a recalcitrant subject and refuses to come into the court. Dushasana then drags her in by the hair. Duryodhana gestures to his thigh as the seat on which Draupadi should perch, and Dushasana starts to disrobe her in an attempt to dishonour her fully. The legend goes that Draupadi prays to Krishna to protect her honour, and lo and behold, it seems like Dushasana can never get to the bottom of her attire—the saree simply keeps coming. Exhausted, he gives up, and Draupadi’s clothes stay on her body. This episode is commonly referred to as Draupadi’s ‘cheer-haran’ or ‘vastra-haran’, which means the episode in which Draupadi’s clothes are stripped off her. But it should more properly be termed the ‘Hairy Tale’ since what happens to Draupadi’s hair is of more import in deciding the course of the Mahabharata and the ruinous war in which the cousins get embroiled.

  Draupadi gets dragged into the public court by her hair, which cascades as a sign of sexual availability. After narrowly escaping being disrobed, she vows never again to tie up her hair unless she is first able to bathe it in Dushasana’s blood. She prophesies that Bhima, one of her five husbands, will tear open Dushasana’s chest and she will bathe her hair in the gore. Until she is able to have that blood bath, however, she will not tie up her hair. Draupadi’s loose hair becomes the central concern in this entire episode. It is both the marker of her sexual humiliation, and the indicator of when that humiliation will end. Her hair becomes an actor in the theatre of the Great Indian War, the war of Kurukshetra that is central to the Mahabharata. Draupadi’s hair is a mighty weapon, and dance enactments of this episode, for instance, present it in all its gruesomeness. In a Kathakali version I once saw, Bhima rips apart Dushasana’s chest and, with his victim still twitching in the throes of agony, tears out his entrails from deep within the bowels. The entrails that emerge themselves look like long braids of hair, writhing in pain and dripping in blood. Draupadi is summoned, her hair washed in the blood so that there is little to distinguish her matted hair from the bloody entrails, and finally, her hair is tied up by a triumphant Bhima. This curtailed hair restores to Draupadi her chastity and modesty.

  ‘Draupadi’ by Raja Ravi Varma.

  Source: www.ravivarma.org

  Raja Ravi Varma’s early 20th-century paintings of Draupadi reinforce the difference that hair makes. In one, she sits on a throne with her oldest husband, Yudhishthira, and surrounded by her other four husbands. Here her hair is pulled back demurely, perhaps even tied up. This is in direct observance of the image of the good Hindu wife, even though this good wife has five husbands, and therefore has sex with five different men. In another painting, this time of Draupadi in exile with the Pandavas at the court of King Virata, Draupadi has been painted with her hair flowing over one shoulder. This is in obvious response to the plot of the Mahabharata, and Draupadi’s vow not to tie up her hair until it has been washed in Dushasana’s blood. But the loose hair is also a symbol of sexual licentiousness, which is perhaps the way in which King Virata’s commander, Kichaka, too reads the situation. Kichaka’s advances on Draupadi take place in the 13th year of the Pandavas’ exile (the Pandavas need to spend the 13th year of their exile incognito in order to avoid a 2nd 12-year term of exile) and they lead to the death of the commander. Draupadi’s hair becomes a matter of life and death in the Mahabharata, as well as in its reimagination by artists after the fact. Hair is a major pawn in the battlefield of desire—people live and die according to whether a woman’s hair is tied up or left loose. Entire epics change course and acquire shape depending on what is going on with a woman’s hair.

  This is the case again in The Story of Manu, when Varuthini is heartbroken after being rejected by Pravara. The force of her sexual ardour is made clear by the fact that her hair is not tied up, and is left to cascade down her entire body: ‘She rested her thick hair on her wrists, fragrant as lotus stems, and flowers were scattered everywhere as the hair came loose and, since it had grown so long, darkened her whole body as if the sky with its planets had fallen over her and made her still more beautiful.’ This thick hair makes desire beautiful, sexy, dangerous and sensual; it evokes the animal kingdom, the plant world, and the celestial stars. Her scattered hair leads to the plot developing in the way that it does, and Varuthini eventually has sex with the pseudo Pravara to produce a son who goes on to become the father of Manu, the hero of the epic. Hair is here all-encompassing and universal in its desirability.

  So much so that even the stones cannot do without it. Erotic sculptures in India, from the 11th-century Khajuraho temples to the 16th-century bronze and ivory statues in the Nayaka kingdom of South India, display abundant hair as a part of their sexual package. Men as much as women pile up hair on their heads, and there is inevitably an equivalence of scale between the bun on the head and the breast of the woman. Male kings and courtiers have hair piled on top of their heads—hair here seems to be a mark as much of sexuality as of power. This intertwining of power and desire is familiar to us from centuries ago: when the male city-dweller in the Kamasutra is taught the modes of acquiring power through sex, one of the first steps he has to take is to oil and comb and groom the hair on his head. The history of desire in India grows out of this long Indian obsession with hair and sexuality. Hair is the universal signifier of desire, power, exultation, loss and mourning. For both men and women.

  Amir Khusro brings out the poignancy of this desire beautifully when he narrates his shock at hearing of his beloved Nizamuddin’s death. With his master gone, Khusro is utterly bereft, his desire no longer has an anchor. Historically, Khusro followed Nizamuddin Auliya to the grave a few months after the pir’s death, and he is buried near him. In his immediate poetic outpouring of grief, Khusro feels his hair is disoriented and aimless: ‘The fair one sleeps on the couch, with dark tresses all over her face; / Come, Khusro, go home now, for night has fallen over the world.’

  So rich is this history of hairy desire in India, that it comes as no surprise to find out that India is the most desirable supplier of hair to the rest of the world. Indian hair is valued so highly on the international market that it makes up wigs and hair extensions at the best beauty salons globally. For his 2009 documentary Good Hair, American star Chris Rock travelled to India to get at the root of what makes good hair. Much of the hair for sale in high-end hair salons in the US comes from Indian temples that have turned into tonsure factories. Rock follows the journey of this hair from India to tens of thousands of happy customers abroad. Most suppliers specialize in a product called ‘Remy hair’, which is the generic name for a bunch of hair in which all the strands grow in the same direction. ‘Virgin Indian Remy Hair’ is considered the gold standard of Remy hair; it is the most highly priced product on the hair market internationally. The name itself—its virginal quality—suggests the impossibility of thinking of hair separate from desire. As though aware of this sumptuous cultural history, one of the top suppliers of Indian hair is called Desire Inc.

  _______________________________

  3. According to Saleem Kidwai, ‘[t]his famous couplet is generally considered an epitaph Khusro wrote for himself on hearing of his master’s death. It is exceptional in that the beloved here is gendered female.’

  13

  MAKE-UP

  Tere naina tere naina tere naina main chhupke rehna

  Kajra re kajra re tere kaare kaare naina

  Kaare kaare kaare kaare kaare kaare kaare kaare naina

  (Your eyes, your eyes, I want to hide myself in your eyes

  Your kohl-lined eyes, your intensely black eyes...

  Black, black, black, black, black, black, black, black eyes.)

  —Gulzar; lyrics from Bunty aur Babli (2005)

  In the Kamasutra, Vatsyayana recommends that the following set of daily practices be observed by the man who is the protagonist of his book:

  He gets up in the morning, relieves himself, cleans his teeth, applies fragrant oils in small quantities, as well as incense, garlands, beeswax and red lac, looks at hi
s face in a mirror, takes some mouthwash and betel, and attends to the things that need to be done. He bathes every day, has his limbs rubbed with oil every second day, a foam bath every third day, his face shaved every fourth day, and his body hair removed every fifth or tenth day. All this is done without fail.

  These instructions set the scene for the text’s protagonist as he goes through his daily life. Vatsyayana insists that the man use a ball of red lac with which to put on his lipstick, and then a ball of beeswax to fix the lipstick in place. The beauty of the outside is meant to complement the betel-inspired fresh breath of the inside of the mouth. In the book at large, both men and women are instructed to use sandalwood paste on their skin, and both use lipstick and eye-shadow to enhance their lips and eyes—the two facial features most associated with erotic desire. The use of lipstick and eye-shadow extended across social classes—it was the idealized aesthetic mode for both men and women, rich and poor. While poor men and women might not have been able to afford the sandalwood paste required to soften their skin and impart to it a golden glow, the red lac required for lipstick and the soot required for kaajal and eyeshadow was freely and plentifully available.

  The remarkably ‘modern’ devices in this passage for fixing one’s make-up and appearance include the use of a ‘foam bath’ and razors for removing body hair. Other texts on bodily aesthetics point to the use of wooden picks to clean the teeth and ears, and brush- and paddle-like instruments to apply make-up on the face. In addition to the lipstick for men advocated by Vatsyayana, wealthy men were also encouraged to paint designs on their arms—sometimes with henna. They also wore a thousand years ago what many Hindu men continue to wear in India today—a tikka or red/yellow mark on the forehead that mirrors the bindi worn by women. This is the mark that reflects Shiva’s third eye—the one that flutters tantalizingly and dangerously in the centre of the God’s forehead. Both men and women, then, used to walk around with red lips, eyes darkened with kohl, hennaed hands and feet, and a red mark on their foreheads. Rather than being the supreme example of the distinction between genders, make-up in ancient India was a mark of their similarity. One can imagine men and women comparing notes with one another about make-up. This is why the Kamasutra recommends that if a woman gets wet in the rain while en route to visiting her paramour, then the man should be the one to change her clothes and touch-up the streaked make-up on her face. Presumably, this is because he already knows how to do her make-up—exactly as his own.

  In a far remove from Vatsyayana, make-up in the Western world has historically been used to differentiate rather than unite the sexes. Even though male actors have been using make-up on stage since at least the 12th century in Europe, off the stage, make-up is what separates men from women. So it is that a Hamlet who is sick of women in general, and his mother in particular, can think of no better way to insult them than to say that women wear too much make-up. While examining a skull in the graveyard—this is the iconic figure of Hamlet with the skull that we see on almost all posters of productions of the play—Hamlet meditates on the fact that no matter who we are, we will all be reduced to this skeletal state. In the case of women, ‘let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come’. Despite the heavy use of make-up to ward off the reality of age and death, women too will not be able to protect their faces from this tragic end. Even more than cosmetic enhancement, this ‘paint’ is meant to imply a degree of unreliability—women are ‘painted over’, not real, not genuine, even as plays themselves are often dismissed for being ‘artificial’. Women are ‘fake’ because make-up is not real. From literature to religion to art, make-up in the West has been used to denounce women for being insincere. Concomitantly, men are praised for being ‘real’ and ‘true’ because they do not wear make-up. This distinction between the sexes—women wear make-up and men do not—has only persisted and deepened over the centuries. So much so that a recent line of make-up tries to expand its base and sell its products by announcing that men too can wear make-up. Unfortunately, such an announcement has not gained much traction because in the history of the Western world, only women and male homosexuals are understood to wear the taint of paint.

  And this taint is spreading rapidly in India too. The gender equality advocated by the Kamasutra in matters of hair and make-up is thus rather astonishing. In ancient India, this equality is maintained, not only in the face of cosmetics, but also with the use of jewellery. Using ornaments in the hair was a feature common to both men and women; both wore elaborate earrings, bracelets and anklets. In sculptures and temple carvings—for example, in Khajuraho—it is almost impossible to tell a man apart from a woman on the basis of ornamentation alone. In terms of facial and bodily make-up, men and women were equally beautified in both official and unofficial representations. One has to look to the voluptuous breasts to be able to separate a man from a woman. Otherwise, they share alike in all matters of aesthetic embodiment.

  As Vidya Dehejia notes in The Body Adorned, ‘[T]he term “beautiful” may be applied to the portrayal in art of the Indian male physique, with its gentle oval face, elongated eyes, and full lips, set off by long hair pulled back into an elegant knot. It bears repetition here that the literature of India employed equally for men and women many of the words that connote beauty, such as sundara, charu, and kanta... Men frequently shared with women a set of established poetic tropes, such as faces that put the moon to shame, eyes that outdo the lotus, arched eyebrows, feet and hands like lotuses, full red lips, and gleaming toenails. Like women, men adorned themselves with appropriate ornament (alankara).’ In an 11th-century Chola bronze sculpture of the androgynous Shiva as Ardhanarishvara—in which one half of the body represents the male Shiva and the other half the female Uma or Parvati—the sculptor leaves intact the jewellery worn by both sides of the gender divide. Subtle differences in the line of the jaw are unimportant compared to the sumptuous necklaces, armlets, and bracelets worn by male and female halves alike.

  Not only did classical Indian representational arts, then, make little to no distinction between men and women on the basis of make-up and jewellery, but erotic literature of the period too elevated male make-up to an art form. The 64 fine arts that the Kamasutra recommends should be mastered by all men about town (and also some women who study the text), include: the art of colouring the teeth, clothes, and limbs; making garlands and stringing necklaces, making diadems and headbands; making costumes; making various earrings; mixing perfumes; putting on jewellery; needlework; knowledge of the colour and form of jewels; skill at rubbing, massaging and hairdressing; and the art of using clothes for disguise. Many of these art-forms have been gendered beyond Vatsyayana’s recognition—no one would say today that knowledge of needlework is an essential part of being a complete man. But the strength of the Kamasutra lies in the fact that it allocates to men skills we usually think of as being the sole provenance of women.

  And these skills run through centuries of Indian fabric. Advice to a man on how best to adorn his face and body is the subject of Najmuddin Shah Mubarak Abru’s witty 18th-century poem on ‘Advice for the Adornment of a Beloved’. Eloquently rendered in English by Saleem Kidwai, the poem is an extended meditation on what and how much make-up looks best on a man:

  Remember what I say—a lad like you,

  So uninformed, must mould himself anew

  First let your hair grow out and fall in locks

  Around your face, but not run wild—that shocks

  The connoisseurs of beauty; snip your curls,

  But no shaving, no razors, no sideburns!

  Wash your hair with shampoo every morning,

  Never skip this—oil it, comb it, adorning

  It in braids, in buns, but please don’t keep

  Flaunting it to get stared at—that’s cheap.

  A bit of oil and turmeric on your skin—

  And when it’s sunny, please, please, stay in!

  Saffron and jasmine oil with lemon juice

  Gets
rid of blemishes and acne—use

  It each night, and wash it off each morning.

  Whiten your teeth, darken your gums, chewing

  Betel will keep your lips red—smile a lot

  But don’t say much, and, my dear, not a jot

  More collyrium than your eyes can take—

  Too much of it looks dreadfully fake.

  Put henna on your fingers, not your palms;

  If you like fingerbands, enhance your charms,

  My beauteous fairy, with an amber ring—

  A shining necklace too is quite the thing.

  In India, especially outside the bigger cities, and whether this is acknowledged or not, men still need to be made-up in order to be attractive. And the horizons of their make-up are vast, covering multiple arenas of jewellery, comportment and recommendations on both facial and head hair.

  These skills of make-up are recommended for men across texts, religions and centuries. They also come in handy for visual and literary depictions of the erotic shenanigans of Krishna and Radha since their entanglements inevitably involve Krishna dressing up as a woman—complete with make-up and flowers in the hair—in order to meet Radha. There are several variations on this theme. Kangra paintings—like the one on page 212 from the 18th century—routinely depict Radha dressed as Krishna, and Krishna made-up as Radha.

  ‘Krishna and Radha walking by the Jumna by moonlight

  after having exchanged clothes’ (PD.114-1948)

  © The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.

  As Vidya Dehejia notes, Krishna’s erotic potential has iconographically been presented as being coincident with his ability to be in disguise—‘the legendary ease with which Krishna, on many an occasion, disguised himself as a woman to get access to his beloved Radha. Seventeenth- and eighteenth-century painted manuscripts all emphasize this artistic ideal, whether they portray Krishna in the guise of a female bangle-seller, as a participant in the all-women’s Holi celebrations, or as a beautiful male figure bathing with the gopis in the waters of the Jamuna’. Such disguise was easy to achieve when men and women wore the same make-up and jewellery. The only thing needed to complete the ‘disguise’, then, would have been an upper cloth with which to create the illusion of voluptuous breasts and cover the head.