Violence, Nonviolence and Peace in Satyajit Ray’s Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne and Hirak Rajar Deshe: A Brief Study

Abstract

In the garb of children’s fantasy, in Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne and its sequel Hirak Rajar Deshe Satyajit Ray experimented with the manifestations of violence predominant in the contemporary world and sought to provide a utopian, fantastic solution to counter such violence. Although these films have been reviewed often as political films, there is ample scope for exploring objectively the nature of the violence and peace and their negotiation, which this paper intends to do. This paper will attempt to categorise the violence which form the primary tension in the films and the basic premise of argument in the narrative in order to assess the nature of the peace that brings an equilibrium to the troubled society. The paper would examine whether the representation of the means to peace by Ray encapsulates violence itself. The argument would be foregrounded predominantly on the model of peace research provided by Johan Galtung.