THE SHADOW-PLAY
MYSTICISM AND SLAPSTICK

His rival, the wild-eyed, stiff-mustachioed red monster Warn, with his little legs and enormous mouth, assisted by his Sangut, is a well-matched foe for Twalen. They fight constantly by magic means, by words, or by action in bawdy slapstick clowning; the puppets are banged together as the dalang improvises riotous dialogues, keeping the audience in hysterics. But in the end Twalen always wins, the triumph of the magic of the " right " over the " left."

The fascinating parekan are the favourites of the people and it can be said that the whole show is a pretext for their mad funmaking. Twalen and Delam, and their Javanese equivalents, are unknown in the original Hindu epics; they are undoubtedly native characters, perhaps ancient deities degraded to the rank of retainers of the Hindu hero-gods, reshaped by the adapters of the stories into ridiculous, clumsy monsters of ill manners to establish their relation to the Hindu gods. Certain legends mention Twalen as having a divine origin.

The Balinese say that he was a son of Tintiya, the Original God, and consequently a brother of Siva; but being given to worldly pleasures and liking Forbidden foods too well, he did not care to become one of the high gods and preferred to remain a servant, so that he could eat and drink all he wanted. In exchange for his renunciation. He was given the power always to come out victorious over his enemies.

Because of his exorcizing powers, Twalen can purify the country of evil. He probably resents the old Indonesian. Magician who vanquishes evil monsters, and his role was adapted , assist the prince against the forces that stood in the way of is spiritual improvement. With its elaborate magic, religious significance, its undiminished popularity, and as the probable ancestor of the Balinese theatre, the wayang remains the most important form of Balinese entertainment. ous styles of classic plays, each with its own technique, and with special stories and costumes.

For instance, episodes from the Ramayana are played only in wayang wong style (perhaps a development from the shadow-plays) in which masked actors in elaborate costumes enact the struggle between Rama and Rawana, while the rowdy monkeys play tricks on each other and the clowns Twalen and Warn provide hilarious comedy. The music of the wayang wong is, like that for the shadow-plays, mellow and delicate, played by the same genders augmented by drums and gongs to provide dramatic accents. The human wavang is not, however, as popular today as the shadow wayang and is rarely played.

The romantic and heroic adventures of Pandji, the native Ardjuna, the dashing young prince of the Malat stories, are played in the gambuh, the ancestor of the Balinese opera. The gambuh is played by middle-aged actors who represent kings and prime ministers, singing and chanting long Kawi recitatives to the accompaniment of great bamboo flutes or a twostringed violin, and drums and cymbals. The style of singing gambuh is curiously dissonant and archaic, with great contrasts of deep voices mingled with high falsettos, whines, and loud cries that grow into a jumbled chorus at the exciting moments of the play. There are other classic plays, more or less in the style of the gambuh, but with their own stories, such as the tantri, tjupak, and so forth.

A great favourite is the famous Ardjuna Wiwaha, one of the Kawi classics, a masterpiece of romantic poetry, but when played in the baris pendet, it becomes a mixture of love story and roughhouse. The favourite episode of the Balinese is the one in which Ardjuna, in deep meditation on a mountain top, seeks to obtain a divine weapon with which to vanquish the demon Deyta Wata Kewatja, who has insulted the gods by demanding that the most beautiful dedari, the nymph Supraba, be given to him in marriage.

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