The author, Mr. H.V. Sharma, was born and educated in Hyderabad. Provident with strong propensity for fine arts, he obtained eight diplomas, including one in dramatic arts from the National School of Drama. Of the fine arts he learnt, painting, sculpture and music turned out to be his forte. Mr. Sharma studied subjects like psychology, art and religious philosophy. His articles on topis of Child Developmental Psychology as well as theatre have appeared in various concerned magazines. In spite of his varied interests, his principal occupation has been teaching. He served as Associate Professor at the National School of Drama where he taught Theatre Architecture. Mr. Sharma has been visiting the Departments of Drama of various Colleges and Universities of the country as Professor of subjects on art and crafts of the theatre. He still continues to paint, sculpt, sing, teach and work for the stage as designer of sets, costumes and masks.
Besides the present work, Mr. Sharma has translated Special Aspects of Natya Śāstra, and authored The Theatres o of the Buddhist, Notes on Architecture for the Theatre and Tantric Origin of natya. The last two books are yet to be published.
Bharata enunciates the rules of construction of three forms of natyamandapa (theatre) in the second chapter of Natya Śāstra. They are vikrstha (rectangular), caturaśra (square) and tryaśra (triangular). He mentions three sizes of theatre as Jyestha (large), madhyama (middle- half of the large) and avara (small quarter of the large). In one of the verses, Bharata indicates that the large size nățyamandapa is not suitable for mortals. Therefore, in a subsequent verse, he proposes the madhyama size as most conducive (irrespective of the form). He tells scantily the rules pertaining to the planning and building the vikrstha of the madhyama dimensions which are 64 x 32 hastas (96 x 48 feet).
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