At the outset, however, the playwright distinguishes his ‘myth’ (of epic inspiration) from a ‘mythological’. The latter “aims to plunge us into the sentiment of devotion,” declares the Sutradhara, addressing the audience in the manner of a Greek Chorus. “Our play has no gods.”
Yayati deals with troubled mortals, who— despite belonging to an era, long past, of pride and prejudice— are familiar figures in that their search for identity is as timeless as it is traditional. “We turn to ancient lore,” explains the Sutradhara, “ ...because it provides fleeting glimpses of the fears and desires deep within us. It is a good way to get introduced to ourselves.”

An early episode in the Mahabharatha forms the background to the play. Devayani, daughter of the “revered Shukracharya”, is pushed into a well by her highborn companion, Sharmishtha. Devyani marries her rescuer, King Yayati. Devyani then seeks revenge on Sharmishtha, whose assumption of her royal father’s superiority to the former’s learned parent, is unacceptable not only to the sage, but also to the ruler of the Asuras.
In fact, King Vrishaparva actually consents to his daughter’s punishment as decreed by Devyani. Thus, when the play opens, Sharmishtha is in attendance on Devyani, as the court awaits the arrival of the King’s son, Pooru, and his bride.

While the events that have brought the “princess of the rakshasas” to a state of subservience are revealed through conversation, the play focuses largely on her relationship with the Queen, her employer. Although Devyani deplores Sharmishtha’s “foul tongue”, she ignores the pleas of Swarnalatha (another maid) to “send (the ‘rakshasi’) back to her tribe,” and allows Sharmishtha considerable liberty.

Central to the plot is Yayati’s fatal fascination for Sharmishtha. Even that paragon of patience, Devyani, cannot tolerate her husband’s decision to accord spousal status to Sharmishtha. Devyani’s father, resenting the slight to his daughter, dooms his son-in-law to grow old prematurely; ironic, considering that Shukracharya has mastered the ‘sanjeevani’ spell.

The curse on Yayati can be lifted if someone is willing to trade youth for age. In the Mahabharatha, four out of Yayati’s five sons refuse their father’s desperate request to give him back his vigour. In the play, we only meet Prince Pooru, who makes the required sacrifice. His wife, Chitralekha, expresses her opinion of the deed with the fiery force of a feminist.

As Aparna Bhargava Dharwadker observes in her Introduction to Girish Karnad’s Collected Plays (2005), “the most memorable feature of Yayati— and a striking accomplishment for a twenty-two-year-old author (the original Kannada version dates back to 1960)— is its quartet of sentient, articulate, embittered women.” These victims of male domination “assert their rights.” The strange story of Swarnalatha is a case in point.

Finely drawn too are the male characters. Pooru undercuts popular notions of princely prowess with his disarmingly realistic understanding of himself. Yayati, while undoubtedly arrogant, displays a surprisingly humble readiness to grasp various points of view. We are invited to do the same.