eNNangaL is a new play by Bharathi Nataka Mandram, a group based at San Francisco Bay Area. It is a translation of the popular play "Partition" by playwright Ira Hauptman, who is an assistant professor of Dramatics at Queens College, New York. The play is a semi-fictional narrative of the interactions between the mathematicians Srinivasa Ramanujan and Prof.G.H.Hardy. The play brings out the cultural divide between the two and their vastly different approaches to Mathematics. Hardy was an atheist who believed in rational thought and mathematical rigor. Ramanujan had an intuitive approach and believed that Goddess Namagiri wrote theorems in his tongue in his dreams. In this play about the mystical East meeting the rational West, we get a fascinating insight into the emotional struggles of the genius from Tamil Nadu who baffled the entire European mathematical community with his unorthodox ways of thinking and relating to number theory.

"Partition" is one of the plays in the newly developing genre of plays with themes related to science and scientific personalities. "Copenhagen" (based on the conversations between Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg) and "Proof" were the plays that Other notable plays that have received critical acclaim over the past couple of years include "Calculus: Newton's Whores" by Carl Djerassi about the feud between Issac Newton and Godfried Liebnitz, and "Fermat's Last Tango" by Joanne Lessner which is a hilarious play based on Andrew Wiles' proof of the Fermat's last theorem. Plays like these and films like "A Beautiful Mind" have moved scientific themes into the mainstream.

"Partition" was staged by Aurora Theatre company at Berkeley and at other places and received wide acclaim. It got good reviews from the media, including SanFrancisco Chronicle and SF Weekly. It was hailed for depicting the complex issues that Ramanujan faced when he went to Cambridge invited by Hardy. The partitions of culture were too much to fathom for these two people and Ramanujan died an enigma, as future generations still struggle to fathom his genius and thinking.

eNNangaL is our effort to herald a culture of serious theater in thamizh in USA. The play is easily accessible to the math-challenged. We hope to get people interested in diverse themes, ones that thamizh stage has not seen before here. There is a lot of area to be explored and eNNangaL is just a small step in that direction. We wish you would appreciate and give us your valuable feedback.