From the late eighteenth century, Calcutta, first city of the British empire, has been a hub of intersecting ideas and movements of change. Nowhere did the restless currents of history play themselves out more graphically than in the composite art of theatre and performance. This pioneering study of the history of the Bengali theatre looks at the plays mounted in the city in the 18th and 19th centuries and their reception. It goes on to study the cultural efflorescence known as the "Bengal Renaissance" and the subsequent politicization of a theatre imbued with ideas of nationalism and social reform, with a particular focus on the complex and problematic issue of the place of women in theatre.