The Strategy of Power and the Tragedy of Yomdoy

Abstract

This paper aims to study the roles of male and female characters in the Thai dance play "Chaolai” of Prince Narathippraphanphong. The results of the study show that the character roles have been presented from a patriachal point of view, which includes the strategy of power : the father's power to the daughter and the master's power to the commoner, reflecting the mythologies of female gender. This leads to the decrease of female roles and the tragedy of female character, and the increase of the female values in human rights. Inspite of increasing the female values in human rights, male characters still have predominant roles over female ones. The reason is that female characters still live under the shadow of families which are run by males.