Dialogue (sometimes spelled dialog in American English^[1]) is a literary and theatrical form consisting of a written or spoken conversational exchange between two or more ("dia" means through or across) people. Its chief historical origins as narrative, philosophical or didactic device are to be found in classical Greek and Indian literature, in particular in the ancient art of rhetoric.

While the dialogue was less important in the ninetenth cnetury than it had been in the eighteenth, it was not extinct. The British author W.H. Mallock employed it successfully in his work "The New Republic," which was explicitly based on Plato's "Republic" and on the writings of Thomas Love Peacock. But the notion of dialogue reemerged in the cultural mainstream in the work of cultural critics such as Mikhail Bakhtin and Paulo Freire, theologians such as Martin Buber, as an existential palliative to counter atomization and social alienation in mass industrial society.

As literary and philosophical device[link]

Antiquity and the middle ages[link]

Dialogue as a genre in the Middle East and Asia dates back to the year 1433 in Japan, Sumerian disputations preserved in copies from the late third millennium BC^[2] and to Rigvedic dialogue hymns and to the Mahabharata.

Literary historians commonly suppose that in the West Plato (c. 437 BC – c. 347 BC) introduced the systematic use of dialogue as an independent literary form: they point to his earliest experiment with the genre in the Laches. The Platonic dialogue, however, had its foundations in the mime, which the Sicilian poets Sophron and Epicharmus had cultivated half a century earlier. These works, admired and imitated by Plato, have not survived but scholars imagine them as little plays, usually presented with only two performers. The Mimes of Herodas give us some idea of their scope.

Plato further simplified the form and reduced it to pure argumentative conversation, while leaving intact the amusing element of character-drawing. He must have begun this about the year 405 BC, and by 400 he had perfected the dialogue, especially in the cycle directly inspired by the death of Socrates, and is considered a master of the genre. All his philosophical writings, except the Apology, use this form.

Following Plato, the dialogue became a major literary genre in antiquity, and several important works both in Latin and in Greek were written. Soon after Plato, Xenophon wrote his own Symposium; also, Aristotle is said to have written several philosophical dialogues in Plato's style (none of which have survived).

Dialogue is formed by the two words 'dia' and 'logos', which can be literally interpreted as 'dual meaning' or more appropriately the 'two way flow/exchange' of meaning, which is the tone suggested by Boehm, and many modern philosophical (and management) writers.

Modern period to the present[link]

Two French writers of eminence borrowed the title of Lucian’s most famous collection; both Fontenelle (1683) and Fénelon (1712) prepared Dialogues des morts ("Dialogues of the Dead"). Contemporaneously, in 1688, the French philosopher Nicolas Malebranche published his Dialogues on Metaphysics and Religion, thus contributing to the genre's revival in philosophic circles. In English non-dramatic literature the dialogue did not see extensive use until Berkeley employed it, in 1713, for his treatise, Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous. Landor’s Imaginary Conversations (1821–1828) formed the most famous English example of dialogue in the 19th century, although the dialogues of Sir Arthur Helps also claim attention and make himself more popular.

In Germany, Wieland adopted this form for several important satirical works published between 1780 and 1799. In Spanish literature, the Dialogues of Valdés (1528) and those on Painting (1633) by Vincenzo Carducci are celebrated. Italian writers of collections of dialogues, following Plato's model, include Torquato Tasso (1586), Galileo (1632), Galiani (1770), Leopardi (1825), and a host of others.

More recently, the French returned to the original application of dialogue. The inventions of "Gyp", of Henri Lavedan, and of others, which tell a mundane anecdote wittily and maliciously in conversation, would probably present a close analogy to the lost mimes of the early Sicilian poets. This kind of dialogue also appeared in English, exemplified by Anstey Guthrie, but these dialogues seem to have found less of a popular following among the English than their counterparts written by French authors.

The Platonic dialogue, as a distinct genre which features Socrates as a speaker and one or more interlocutors discussing some philosophical question, experienced something of a rebirth in the 20th century. Authors who have recently employed it include George Santayana, in his eminent Dialogues in Limbo (1926, 2nd ed. 1948; this work also includes such historical figures as Alcibiades, Aristippus, Avicenna, Democritus, and Dionysius the Younger as speakers), and Iris Murdoch, who included not only Socrates and Alcibiades as interlocutors in her work Acastos: Two Platonic Dialogues (1986), but featured a young Plato himself as well.

The philosophic dialogue, with or without Socrates as a character, continues to be used on occasion by philosophers when attempting to write engaging, literary works of philosophy which attempt to capture the subtle nuance and lively give-and-take of discourse as it actually takes place in intellectual conversation.

Compare: Closet drama

As theological and social device[link]

Martin Buber assigns dialogue a pivotal position in his theology. His most influential work is titled I and Thou. Buber cherishes and promotes throughout his work dialogue not as some purposive attempt to reach conclusions or express mere points of view, but as the very prerequisite of authentic relationship between man and man, and between man and God. His concern with the profound nature of true dialogue has resulted in what is known as the philosophy of dialogue.

The Second Vatican Council placed a major emphasis on dialogue with the World. Most of the Council's documents involve some kind of dialogue : dialogue with other religions (Nostra Aetate), dialogue with other Christians (Unitatis Redintegratio), dialogue with modern society (Gaudium et Spes) and dialogue with political authorities (Dignitatis Humanae).

The physicist David Bohm originated a related form of dialogue where a group of people talk together in order to explore their assumptions of thinking, meaning, communication, and social effects. This group consists of ten to thirty people who meet for a few hours regularly or a few continuous days. Dialoguers agree to leave behind debate tactics that attempt to convince and, instead, talk from their own experience on subjects that are improvised on the spot. People form their own dialogue groups that usually are offered for free of charge. There exists an international online dialogue list server group, facilitated by Don Factor, co-author of a paper called "Dialogue - A Proposal," with David Bohm and Peter Garrett.^[3]

The Russian philosopher and semiotician^[4] Mikhail Bakhtin’s theory of dialogue emphasized the power of discourse to increase understanding of multiple perspectives and create myriad possibilities. Bakhtin held that relationships and connections exist among all living beings, and that dialogue creates a new understanding of a situation that demands change.^{[citation needed]} In his influential works, Bakhtin provided a linguistic methodology to define the dialogue, its nature and meaning:^[5]

Dialogic relations have a specific nature: they can be reduced neither to the purely logical (even if dialectical) nor to the purely linguistic (compositional-syntactic) They are possible only between complete utterances of various speaking subjects... Where there is no word and no language, there can be no dialogic relations; they cannot exist among objects or logical quantities (concepts, judgments, and so forth). Dialogic relations presuppose a language, but they do not reside within the system of language. They are impossible among elements of a language.^[6]

The Brazilian educationalist Paulo Freire, known for developing popular education, advanced dialogue as a type of pedagogy. Freire held that dialogued communication allowed students and teachers to learn from one another in an environment characterized by respect and equality. A great advocate for oppressed peoples, Freire was concerned with praxis—action that is informed and linked to people’s values. Dialogued pedagogy was not only about deepening understanding; it was also about making positive changes in the world: to make it better.

Today, dialogue is used in classrooms, community centers, corporations, federal agencies, and other settings to enable people, usually in small groups, to share their perspectives and experiences about difficult issues. It is used to help people resolve long-standing conflicts and to build deeper understanding of contentious issues. Dialogue is not about judging, weighing, or making decisions, but about understanding and learning. Dialogue dispels stereotypes, builds trust, and enables people to be open to perspectives that are very different from their own.

In the past two decades, a rapidly-growing movement for dialogue has been developing. The website of the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation,^[7] serves as a hub for dialogue (and deliberation) facilitators, conveners, and trainers and houses thousands of resources on these communication methodologies.

Groups such as Worldwide Marriage Encounter and Retrouvaille use dialogue as a communication tool for married couples. Both groups teach a dialogue method that helps couples learn more about each other in non-threatening postures, which helps to foster growth in the married relationship.

Dialogue is a delicate process. Many obstacles inhibit dialogue and favor more confrontational communication forms such as discussion and debate. Common obstacles including fear, the display or exercise of power, mistrust, external influences, distractions, and poor communication conditions can all prevent dialogue from emerging.^[8]

Egalitarian dialogue[link]

Egalitarian dialogue is a form of discussion that takes place when different contributions are considered in terms of the validity of the arguments, rather than assessing them according to the power positions of those who advocate them. they stand out well written and they include many details in the story and they show honorship.

Structured dialogue[link]

Structured dialogue represents a class of dialogue practices developed as a means of orienting the dialogic discourse toward problem understanding and consensual action. Whereas most traditional dialogue practices are unstructured or semi-structured, such conversational modes have been observed as insufficient for the coordination of multiple perspectives in a problem area. A disciplined form of dialogue, where participants agree to follow a framework or facilitation, enables groups to address complex problems shared in common.

Aleco Christakis (Structured Dialogic Design) and John N. Warfield (Science of Generic Design) were two of the leading developers of this school of dialogue, which was practiced for over 20 years as Interactive Management. The rationale for engaging structured dialogue follows the observation that a rigorous bottom-up democratic form of dialogue must be structured to ensure that a sufficient variety of stakeholders represents the problem system of concern, and that their voices and contributions are equally balanced in the dialogic process.

Today, structured dialogue is being employed by facilitated teams for peacemaking (e.g., Civil Society Dialogue project in Cyprus, Act Beyond Borders project in the Middle East,^[9]), global indigenous community development^{[citation needed]}, government and social policy formulation^{[citation needed]}, strategic management^{[citation needed]}, health care^{[citation needed]}, and other complex domains^{[citation needed]}.

In one deployment, structured dialogue is (according to a European Union definition) "a means of mutual communication between governments and administrations including EU institutions and young people. The aim is to get young people’s contribution towards the formulation of policies relevant to young peoples lives."^[10] The application of structured dialogue requires one to differentiate the meanings of discussion and deliberation.

See also[link]

• Bohm Dialogue
• Chat
• Conversation
• Deliberation
• Dialogue Among Civilizations
• Dialogue in writing
• Facilitation
• Intercultural Dialogue
• Interfaith dialogue
• Intersubjectivity
• Philosophy of dialogue
• Small talk
• Speech communication

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Bakhtin, M. M. (1986) Speech Genres and Other Late Essays. Trans. by Vern W. McGee. Austin, Tx: University of Texas Press.
• Maranhão, Tullio (1990) The Interpretation of Dialogue University of Chicago Press ISBN 0-226-50433-6
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 
• E. Di Nuoscio, "Epistemologia del dialogo. Una difesa filosofica del confronto pacifico tra culture", Carocci, Roma, 2011

External links[link]

Look up dialogue in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation
• Smith, M. K. (2001) Dialogue and conversation, the encyclopaedia of informal education
• The Journal of Inter-Religious Dialogue

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (May 2010)

Nana Patekar
Born	Vishwanath Patekar (1951-01-01) 1 January 1951 (age 61) Murud-Janjira, Maharashtra, India
Occupation	Actor, Filmmaker
Years active	1978 – present
Spouse	Neelakanti Patekar
Parents	Dinkar Patekar Sanjana Patekar

Vishwanath "Nana" Patekar (born 1 January 1951) is an Indian actor and filmmaker.

Biography[link]

Born Vishwanath Patekar in Murud-Janjira, Maharashtra, to Dinkar Patekar (a painter) and his wife Sanjanabai Patekar. He is an alumnus of the Sir J.J. Institute of Applied Art, Mumbai.^[1]

Career[link]

He acted in movies such as Gaman (1978), Mohre (1987) and Salaam Bombay! (1988) and was noticed by the mainstream Bollywood industry for his portrayal of the villain in the 1989 film, Parinda, for which he won his first National Film Award for Best Supporting Actor. He was also awarded the Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award for the role. He won the Filmfare Best Villain Award in 1992 for Angaar.

In 1994, he won the National Film Award for Best Actor for his performance in Krantiveer (1994). He also won the Filmfare Award and the Star Screen Awards in the best actor category.

Patekar has played many types of roles. He has played the occasional villain but been a hero in most of his films. He played a truant, gambling son in Krantiveer (1994), a wife beater in Agni Sakshi (1996), a deaf father to Manisha Koirala in Khamoshi: The Musical (1996) and a schizophrenic in Wajood (1998). In the movie Ab Tak Chappan (2005) he plays a police officer who is a sharpshooter. Patekar has also done comic roles in Welcome (2007) in which he plays a powerful crime lord who once desired to be an actor in films.

He turned director with his movie Prahaar: The Final Attack co-starring Madhuri Dixit. His other films as an actor include Hu Tu Tu and Bluff Master. For his performance in Apaharan, he received the Filmfare Best Villain Award as well as the Star Screen Award Best Villain. He is going to be in Sangeeth Sivan's next film, which is a remake of the Telugu film Athadu (2005) and as the character Anjaneya Prasad (CBI officer), which was originally played by Prakash Raj.

Patekar did some playback singing in the films Yeshwant (1997), Wajood (1998) and Aanch (2003).

He has an honorary Captain's rank from Indian Army. He underwent training for his role as a Army officer in Prahaar and was thus awarded the rank. He joined the Territorial Army in the early 1990s.^{[citation needed]} At the age of 54, he took up the sport of rifle shooting. He qualified for the G.V. Mavlankar Shooting Championship.^[2]

He has also acted in few Marathi movies and plays. He is known to donate generously to the poor.^[3][4]

Nana Patekar starred in the Marathi film Deool, released on 4 November 2011.

Awards[link]

Patekar is the only actor ever to win Filmfare Awards in the Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Villain categories.^[5]

Filmography[link]

Actor[link]

Director[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Nana Patekar at the Internet Movie Database

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Nana Patekar

• Nana's interview

Karen Armstrong FRSL (born 14 November 1944), is a British author and commentator who is the author of twelve books on comparative religion. A former Roman Catholic nun, she went from a conservative to a more liberal and mystical faith. Armstrong first rose to prominence in 1993 with her book, A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, an international best seller that is now required reading in many theology courses. Her work focuses on commonalities of the major religions, such as the importance, in many, of compassion or "The Golden Rule".

Armstrong received the $100,000 TED Prize in February 2008. She used that occasion to call for the creation of a Charter for Compassion, which was unveiled the following year.

Early life[link]

Armstrong was born at Wildmoor, Worcestershire,^[1] into a family of Irish extraction who, after her birth, moved to Bromsgrove and later to Birmingham. In 1962, while still in her teens, she became a nun in the Society of the Holy Child Jesus, a teaching order, in which she remained for seven years. Once she had advanced from postulant and novice to professed nun, she enrolled in St Anne's College, Oxford, to study English. Armstrong left her order in 1969 while still a student at Oxford. After graduating with a Congratulatory First, she embarked on a DPhil on the poet Tennyson. According to Armstrong, she wrote her dissertation on a topic that had been approved by the university committee. Nevertheless it was failed by her external examiner on the grounds that the topic had been unsuitable.^[2] Armstrong did not formally protest this verdict, nor did she embark upon a new topic but instead abandoned hope of an academic career. She reports that this period in her life was marked by ill-health stemming from her life-long but, at that time, still undiagnosed temporal epilepsy.^[3][4]

Career[link]

In 1976, Armstrong took a job as teaching English at a girls' school in Dulwich while working on a memoir of her convent experiences. This was published in 1982 as Through the Narrow Gate to excellent reviews. That year she embarked on a new career as an independent writer and broadcasting presenter. In 1984, the British Channel Four commissioned her to write and present a TV documentary on the life of St. Paul, a project that involved traveling to the Holy Land to retrace the steps of the saint. Armstrong described this visit as a "breakthrough experience" that defied her prior assumptions and was the inspiration for virtually all her subsequent work. In A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, she traces the evolution of the three major monotheistic traditions from their beginnings in the Middle East up to the present day and also discusses Hinduism and Buddhism. As guiding "luminaries" in her approach, Armstrong acknowledges (in The Spiral Staircase and elsewhere) the late Canadian theologian Wilfred Cantwell Smith, a Protestant minister,^[5] and the Jesuit father Bernard Lonergan.^[6] In 1996, she published Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths.

Armstrong's The Great Transformation: The Beginning of Our Religious Traditions (2006) continues the themes covered in A History of God and examines the emergence and codification of the world's great religions during the so-called Axial age, identified by Karl Jaspers. In the year of its publication Armstrong achieved the distinction of being invited to choose her eight favourite records for BBC Radio's Desert Island Discs programme.^[7] She has made considerable appearances on television, including appearances on Rageh Omaar's programme on The Life of Muhammad. She was also an advisor for the award-winning, PBS-broadcast documentary Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet (2002), produced by Unity Productions Foundation.

In 2007, Armstrong was invited by the Islamic Religious Council of Singapore to deliver the "2007 MUIS Lecture".^[8]

Armstrong is a fellow of the Jesus Seminar, a group of scholars and laypeople which attempts to investigate the historical foundations of Christianity. She has written numerous articles for The Guardian and other publications. She was a key advisor on Bill Moyers' popular PBS series on religion, has addressed members of the US Congress, and was one of three scholars to speak at the UN's first ever session on religion.^[9] She is a vice-president of the British Epilepsy Association, otherwise known as Epilepsy Action.

Armstrong, who has taught courses at Leo Baeck College, a rabbinical college and centre for Jewish education located in north London, says she has been particularly inspired by the Jewish tradition's emphasis on practice as well as faith: "I say that religion isn't about believing things. It's about what you do. It's ethical alchemy. It's about behaving in a way that changes you, that gives you intimations of holiness and sacredness." ^[10] She maintains that religious fundamentalism is not just a response to but, paradoxically, a product of contemporary culture^[11] and for this reason concludes that, "We urgently need to make compassion a clear, luminous and dynamic force in our polarized world. Rooted in a principled determination to transcend selfishness, compassion can break down political, dogmatic, ideological and religious boundaries. Born of our deep interdependence, compassion is essential to human relationships and to a fulfilled humanity. It is the path to enlightenment, and indispensable to the creation of a just economy and a peaceful global community."^[12]

Awarded the $100,000 TED Prize in February 2008, Armstrong called for drawing up a Charter for Compassion, in the spirit of the Golden Rule, to identify shared moral priorities across religious traditions, in order to foster global understanding and a peaceful world.^[13] It was presented in Washington, D.C. in November 2009. Signatories include Queen Noor of Jordan, the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Paul Simon.^[14]

Honours[link]

In 1999 Armstrong received the Muslim Public Affairs Council's Media Award^[15][16][17].

Armstrong was honoured by the New York Open Center in 2004 for her "profound understanding of religious traditions and their relation to the divine."^[18]

She received an honorary degree as Doctor of Letters by Aston University in 2006^[19].

In May 2008 she was awarded the Freedom of Worship Award by the Roosevelt Institute, one of four medals presented each year to men and women whose achievements have demonstrated a commitment to the Four Freedoms proclaimed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1941 as essential to democracy: freedom of speech and of worship, freedom from want and from fear. The institute stated that Armstrong had become "a significant voice, seeking mutual understanding in times of turbulence, confrontation and violence among religious groups." It cited "her personal dedication to the ideal that peace can be found in religious understanding, for her teachings on compassion, and her appreciation for the positive sources of spirituality." ^[20]

She has also received the TED Prize 2008^[21].

In 2009 she was awarded the Dr. Leopold Lucas Prize by the University of Tübingen.^[22]

Armstrong was honored Nationalencyklopedin's International Knowledge Award 2011^[23] "for her long standing work of bringing knowledge to others about the significance of religion to humankind and, in particular, for pointing out the similarities between religions. Through a series of books and award-winning lectures she reaches out as a peace-making voice at a time when world events are becoming increasingly linked to religion."

On November 30, 2011 (St. Andrew's Day) Armstrong was made honorary Doctor of Letters by the University of Saint Andrews.^[24]

Reception[link]

Armstrong has been called "a prominent and prolific religious historian"^[25] and described as "arguably the most lucid, wide-ranging and consistently interesting religion writer today".^[26] Juan Eduardo Campo, author of the Encyclopedia of Islam (Encyclopedia of World Religions) (2009), included Armstrong among a group of scholars whom he considered as currently conveying a "more or less objective" (as opposed to polemical) view of Islam and its origins to a wide public in Europe and North America.^[27] She is in demand as a speaker on the Abrahamic tradition; in the last decade increasing interest in and debate surrounding Islamic issues has brought her even wider visibility.^{[citation needed]}

Bibliography[link]

Journal articles:

• "Women, Tourism, Politics" (1977)
• "The Holiness of Jerusalem: Asset or Burden?" (1998)
• "Ambiguity and Remembrance: Individual and Collective Memory in Finland" (2000)

Books:

• Through the Narrow Gate (1982)
• The First Christian: Saint Paul's Impact on Christianity (1983)
• Beginning the World (1983)
• Tongues of Fire: An Anthology of Religious and Poetic Experience (1985)
• The Gospel According to Woman: Christianity's Creation of the Sex War in the West (1986)
• Holy War: The Crusades and their Impact on Today's World (1988)
• Muhammad: A Biography of the Prophet (1991)
• The English Mystics of the Fourteenth Century (1991)
• The End of Silence: Women and the Priesthood (1993)
• A History of God (1993)
• Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths (1996)
• In the Beginning: A New Interpretation of Genesis (1996)
• Islam: A Short History (2000)
• The Battle for God: Fundamentalism in Judaism, Christianity and Islam (2000)
• Buddha (2001)
• Faith After September 11 (2002)
• The Spiral Staircase (2004)
• A Short History of Myth (2005)
• Muhammad: A Prophet For Our Time (2006)
• The Great Transformation: The Beginning of Our Religious Traditions (2006) ISBN 978-0-375-41317-9
• The Bible: A Biography (2007)
• The Case for God (2009) ISBN 978-0-307-26918-8
• Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life (2010) ISBN 978-0-307-59559-1
• A Letter to Pakistan ISBN 978-0-19-906330-7

See also[link]

• Abrahamic religions
• Interfaith dialog
• Theology

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Karen Armstrong

• Author Spotlight at Random House
• Profile at islamfortoday.com
• Charter for Compassion, charterforcompassion.org
• Interview with Karen Armstrong on "The Bible", readthespirit.com
• The reason of faith Ode magazine, 2009.
• Articles by Karen Armstrong on the 5th Estate blog, fifthestate.co.uk

Audio and video

• Karen Armstrong's TED Talk "Let's revive the golden rule", ted.com
• Audio: Karen Armstrong in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion programme The Forum, BBC.co.uk
• Booknotes interview with Armstrong on Islam: A Short History, September 22, 2000.

Amitabh Bachchan
Amitabh Bachchan in 2009
Born	Amitabh Harivansh Bachchan (1942-10-11) 11 October 1942 (age 69) Allahabad, United Provinces, British India
Residence	Prateeksha, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Occupation	Actor, producer, singer, television presenter
Years active	1969–present
Spouse	Jaya Bhaduri (1973–present)
Children	Abhishek Bachchan Shweta Nanda
Website
bigb.bigadda.com

Amitabh Bachchan ([əmɪtaːbʱ bəttʃən] ( listen), born Amitabh Harivansh Bachchan on 11 October 1942) is an Indian film actor. He first gained popularity in the early 1970s as the "angry young man" of Hindi cinema, and has since appeared in over 180 Indian films in a career spanning more than four decades.^[1][2] Bachchan is regarded as one of the greatest and most influential actors in the history of Indian cinema.^[3][4][5]

Bachchan has won numerous major awards in his career, including three National Film Awards as Best Actor, and fourteen Filmfare Awards. He is the most-nominated performer in any major acting category at Filmfare, with 37 nominations overall. In addition to acting, Bachchan has worked as a playback singer, film producer and television presenter. He also had a stint in politics in the 1980s. He has received both the Padma Shri and the Padma Bhushan civilian awards from the Indian government.

Early life[link]

Bachban was born in Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh. His father, Harivansh Rai Bachchan, was a Hindi poet, and his mother, Teji Bachchan, was a Sikh from Faisalabad (now in Pakistan).^[6] Bachchan was initially named Inquilaab, inspired from the famous phrase Inquilab Zindabad, during the Indian independence struggle. However, at the suggestion of fellow poet Sumitranandan Pant, Harivansh Rai changed the name to Amitabh which means, "the light that would never go off." Though his surname was Shrivastava, his father had adopted the pen-name Bachchan (meaning child-like in colloquial Hindi), under which he published all his works. It is with this last name that Amitabh debuted in films, and, for all public purposes, it has become the surname of all members of his family. Bachchan's father died in 2003, and his mother in 2007.^[7]

Amitabh is the eldest of Harivansh Rai Bachchan's two sons, the second being Ajitabh. His mother had a keen interest in theatre and had been offered a role in a film, but preferred her domestic duties. She had some degree of influence in Bachchan's choice of career because she always insisted that he should take the centre stage.^[8] He attended Allahabad's Jnana Prabodhini and Boys' High School (BHS), followed by Nainital's Sherwood College, where he majored in the art stream.^{[citation needed]} He later went on to study at Kirori Mal College of the University of Delhi and completed a Bachelor of Science degree.^{[citation needed]} In his twenties, Bachchan gave up a job as freight broker for the shipping firm, Bird and Co., based in Calcutta now known as Kolkata, to pursue a career in acting.^{[citation needed]}

Career[link]

Early work: 1969–1972[link]

Bachchan made his film debut in 1969 as a voice narrator in Mrinal Sen's National Award winning film Bhuvan Shome. Thereafter he got his first acting role as one of the seven protagonists in Saat Hindustani, a film directed by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas and featuring Utpal Dutt, Madhu and Jalal Agha. Though the film was not a financial success, Bachchan won his first National Film Award for Best Newcomer.^[9]

Anand (1971) followed, where he starred alongside Rajesh Khanna. Bachchan's role as a doctor with a cynical view of life garned him his first Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award. He then played his first negative role as an infatuated lover-turned-murderer in Parwaana (1971). This was followed by several films including Reshma Aur Shera (1971). During this time, he made a guest appearance in the film Guddi which starred his future wife Jaya Bhaduri. He narrated part of the film Bawarchi. In 1972, he made an appearance in the road action comedy Bombay to Goa, directed by S. Ramanathan. Many of his films during this early period did not do well, but that was about to change.^[10]

Rise to stardom: 1973–1983[link]

Director Prakash Mehra cast him in the leading role for the film Zanjeer (1973) as Inspector Vijay Khanna. The film was a sharp contrast to the romantically themed films that had generally preceded it and established Amitabh in a new persona—the "angry young man" of Bollywood cinema.^[2] He earned a Filmfare nomination for Best Actor. Filmfare considers this one of the iconic performances of Bollywood history.^[10] The year 1973 was also when he married Jaya, and around this time they appeared in several films together; not only in Zanjeer but in films such as Abhimaan which followed and was released only a month after their marriage. Later, Bachchan played the role of Vikram in the film Namak Haraam, a social drama directed by Hrishikesh Mukherjee and scripted by Biresh Chatterjee addressing themes of friendship. His supporting role won him his second Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award.^{[citation needed]}

In 1974, Bachchan made several guest appearances in films such as Kunwara Baap and Dost, before playing a supporting role in Roti Kapda Aur Makaan. The film, directed and written by Manoj Kumar, addressed themes of honesty in the face of oppression and financial and emotional hardship. Bachchan then played the leading role in film Majboor, released on 6 December 1974, which was a remake of the Hollywood film Zigzag. The film was only a moderate success at the box office.^[11] In 1975, he starred in a variety of film genres from the comedy Chupke Chupke, the crime drama Faraar to the romantic drama Mili. 1975 was the year when he appeared in two films which are regarded as important in Hindi cinematic history. He starred in the Yash Chopra directed film Deewaar, opposite Shashi Kapoor, Nirupa Roy, and Neetu Singh, which earned him a Filmfare Nomination for Best Actor. The film became a major hit at the box office in 1975, ranking in at number 4.^[12] Indiatimes Movies ranks Deewaar amongst the Top 25 Must See Bollywood Films.^[13] Released on 15 August 1975 was Sholay (meaning flames), which became the highest grossing film of all time in India, earning INR 2,36,45,00,000 equivalent to US$ 60 million, after adjusting for inflation.^[14] Bachchan played the role of Jaidev. In 1999, BBC India declared it the "Film of the Millennium" and like Deewar, has been cited by Indiatimes movies as amongst the Top 25 Must See Bollywood Films.^[13] In that same year, the judges of the 50th annual Filmfare Awards awarded it with the special distinction award called Filmfare Best Film of 50 Years.

Bachchan starred in comedies such as Chupke Chupke (1975) and Amar Akbar Anthony (1977) and in films such as Kabhie Kabhie (1976). In 1976, he was once again cast by director Yash Chopra in his second film, Kabhi Kabhie, a romantic tale in which Bachchan starred as a young poet named Amit Malhotra who falls deeply in love with a beautiful young girl named Pooja played by actress Rakhee Gulzar. The film saw him again nominated for the Filmfare Best Actor Award. In 1977, he won his first Filmfare Best Actor Award for his performance in Amar Akbar Anthony where he played the third lead opposite Vinod Khanna and Rishi Kapoor as Anthony Gonsalves. In 1978 he starred in all four of the highest grossing films of India in that year.^[15] He once again resumed double roles in films such as Kasme Vaade as Amit and Shankar and Don playing the characters of Don, a leader of an underworld gang and his look alike Vijay. His performance won him his second Filmfare Best Actor Award. He also performed in Trishul and Muqaddar Ka Sikandar which both earned him further Filmfare Best Actor nominations. He was billed a "one-man industry" by the French director François Truffaut.^[16]

In 1979, for the first time, Amitabh was required to use his singing voice for the film Mr. Natwarlal in which he starred alongside Rekha. His performance in the film saw him nominated for both the Filmfare Best Actor Award and the Filmfare Best Male Playback Awards. In 1979, he also received Best Actor nomination for Kaala Patthar (1979) and then went on to be nominated again in 1980 for the Raj Khosla directed film Dostana, in which he starred opposite Shatrughan Sinha and Zeenat Aman. Dostana proved to be the top grossing film of 1980.^[17] In 1981, he starred in Yash Chopra's melodrama film Silsila, where he starred alongside his wife Jaya and rumoured lover Rekha. Other films of this period include Ram Balram (1980), Shaan (1980), Lawaaris (1981), and Shakti (1982) which pitted him against legendary actor Dilip Kumar.^[18]

[edit] 1982 injury while filming Coolie

On 26 July 1982, while filming Coolie in the University Campus in Bangalore, Bachchan suffered a near fatal intestinal injury during the filming of a fight scene with co-actor Puneet Issar.^[19] Bachchan was performing his own stunts in the film and one scene required him to fall onto a table and then on the ground. However as he jumped towards the table, the corner of the table struck his abdomen, resulting in a splenic rupture from which he lost a significant amount of blood. He required an emergency splenectomy and remained critically ill in hospital for many months, at times close to death. The public response included prayers in temples and offers to sacrifice limbs to save him, while later, there were long queues of well-wishing fans outside the hospital where he was recuperating.^[20] Nevertheless, he spent many months recovering and resumed filming later that year after a long period of recuperation. The film was released in 1983, and partly due to the huge publicity of Bachchan's accident, the film was a box office success.^[21]

The director, Manmohan Desai, altered the ending of Coolie after Bachchan's accident. Bachchan's character was originally intended to have been killed off but after the change of script, the character lived in the end. It would have been inappropriate, said Desai, for the man who had just fended off death in real life to be killed on screen. Also, in the released film the footage of the fight scene is frozen at the critical moment, and a caption appears onscreen marking this as the instant of the actor's injury and the ensuing publicity of the accident.^[20]

Later, he was diagnosed with Myasthenia gravis. His illness made him feel weak both mentally and physically and he decided to quit films and venture into politics. At this time he became pessimistic, expressing concern with how a new film would be received and stated before every release, "Yeh film to flop hogi!" ("This film will flop").^[22]

Politics: 1984–87[link]

In 1984, Bachchan took a break from acting and briefly entered politics in support of long-time family friend, Rajiv Gandhi. He contested Allahabad's seat of 8th Lok Sabha against H. N. Bahuguna, former Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh and won by one of the highest victory margins in general election history (68.2% of the vote).^[23] His political career, however, was short-lived: he resigned after three years, calling politics a cesspool. The resignation followed the implication of Bachchan and his brother in the "Bofors scandal" by a newspaper, which he vowed to take to court. Bachchan was eventually found not guilty of involvement in the ordeal.^[24]

His old friend, Amar Singh, helped him during a financial crisis due to the failure of his company ABCL. Therefore Bachchan started to support Amar Singh's political party, the Samajwadi party. Jaya Bachchan joined the Samajwadi Party and became a Rajya Sabha member.^[25] Bachchan has continued to do favors for the Samajwadi party, including advertisements and political campaigns. These activities have recently gotten him into trouble again in the Indian courts for false claims after a previous incident of submission of legal papers by him, stating that he is a farmer.^[26]

A 15 year press ban against Bachchan was imposed during his peak acting years by Stardust and some of the other film magazines. In his own defense, Bachchan claimed to have banned the press from entering his sets until late 1989.^[27]

Slump and retirement: 1988–1992[link]

In 1988, Bachchan returned to films, playing the title role in Shahenshah, which was a box office success due to the hype of Bachchan's comeback.^[28] After the success of his comeback film however, his star power began to wane as all of his subsequent films failed at the box office. The 1991 hit film, Hum, for which he won his third Filmfare Best Actor Award, looked like it might reverse this trend, but the momentum was short-lived as his string of box office failures continued. Notably, despite the lack of hits, it was during this period that Bachchan won his first National Film Award for Best Actor, for his performance as a Mafia don in the 1990 film Agneepath. These years would be the last he would be seen on screen for some time. After the release of Khuda Gawah in 1992, Bachchan went into semi-retirement for five years. In 1994, one of his delayed films Insaniyat was released but was also a box office failure.^[29]

Producer and acting comeback 1996–99[link]

Bachchan turned producer during his temporary retirement period, setting up Amitabh Bachchan Corporation, Ltd. (A.B.C.L.) in 1996, with the vision of becoming a 10 billion rupees (approx 250 million $US) premier entertainment company by the year 2000. ABCL's strategy was to introduce products and services covering the entire section of the India's entertainment industry. Its operations were mainstream commercial film production and distribution, audio cassettes and video discs, production and marketing of television software, celebrity and event management. Soon after the company was launched in 1996, the first film was produced by the company. Tere Mere Sapne failed to do well at the box office but launched the careers of actors such as Arshad Warsi and South films star Simran. ABCL produced a few other films, none of which did well.

In 1997, Bachchan attempted to make his acting comeback with the film Mrityudata, produced by ABCL. Though Mrityudaata attempted to reprise Bachchan's earlier success as an action hero, the film was a failure both financially and critically. ABCL was the main sponsor of the 1996 Miss World beauty pageant, Bangalore but lost millions. The fiasco and the consequent legal battles surrounding ABCL and various entities after the event, coupled with the fact that ABCL was reported to have overpaid most of its top level managers, eventually led to its financial and operational collapse in 1997. The company went into administration and was later declared a failed company by Indian Industries board. The Bombay high court, in April 1999, restrained Bachchan from selling off his Bombay bungalow 'Prateeksha' and two flats till the pending loan recovery cases of Canara Bank were disposed of. Bachchan had, however, pleaded that he had mortgaged his bungalow to Sahara India Finance for raising funds for his company.^[30]

Bachchan attempted to revive his acting career and had average success with Bade Miyan Chote Miyan (1998),^[29] and received positive reviews for Sooryavansham (1999)^[31] but other films such as Lal Baadshah (1999) and Hindustan Ki Kasam (1999) were box office failures.

Return to prominence: 2000–present[link]

Bachchan at the IIFA Awards in 2006

In 2000, Amitabh Bachchan appeared in Yash Chopra's box-office hit, Mohabbatein, directed by Aditya Chopra. He played a stern, older figure that rivalled the character of Shahrukh Khan. His role won him his third Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award. Other hits followed, with Bachchan appearing as an older family patriarch in Ek Rishtaa: The Bond of Love (2001), Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham... (2001) and Baghban (2003). As an actor, he continued to perform in a range of characters, receiving critical praise for his performances in Aks (2001), Aankhen (2002), Khakee (2004) and Dev (2004). One project that did particularly well for Bachchan was Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Black (2005). The film starred Bachchan as an aging teacher of a deaf-blind girl and followed their relationship. His performance was unanimously praised by critics and audiences and won him his second National Film Award for Best Actor and fourth Filmfare Best Actor Award. Taking advantage of this resurgence, Amitabh began endorsing a variety of products and services, appearing in many television and billboard advertisements. In 2005 and 2006, he starred with his son Abhishek in the hit films Bunty Aur Babli (2005), the Godfather tribute Sarkar (2005), and Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna (2006). All of them were successful at the box office.^[32][33] His later releases in 2006 and early 2007 were Baabul (2006),^[34] Ekalavya and Nishabd (2007), which failed to do well at the box office but his performances in each of them were praised by critics.^[35]

In May 2007, two of his films Cheeni Kum and the multi-starrer Shootout at Lokhandwala were released. Shootout at Lokhandwala did very well at the box office and was declared a hit in India, while Cheeni Kum picked up after a slow start and only had average success.^[36] A remake of his biggest hit, Sholay (1975), entitled Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag, released in August of that same year and proved to be a major commercial failure in addition to its poor critical reception.^[36] The year also marked Bachchan's first appearance in an English-language film, Rituparno Ghosh's The Last Lear. The film premiered at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival on 9 September 2007. He received positive reviews from critics who hailed his performance as his best ever since Black.^[37] Bachchan was slated to play a supporting role in his first international film, Shantaram, directed by Mira Nair and starring Hollywood actor Johnny Depp in the lead. The film was due to begin filming in February 2008 but due to the writer's strike, was pushed to September 2008.^[38] The film is currently "shelved" indefinitely.^[39] Vivek Sharma's Bhoothnath, in which he plays the title role as a ghost, was released on 9 May 2008. Sarkar Raj, the sequel of the 2005 film Sarkar, released in June 2008 and received a positive response at the box-office. Paa, which released at the end of 2009 was a highly anticipated project as it saw him playing his own son Abhishek's Progeria-affected 13-year-old son, and it opened to favourable reviews, particularly towards Bachchan's performance. It won him his third National Film Award for Best Actor and fifth Filmfare Best Actor Award. In 2010, he debuted in Malayalam film through Kandahar, directed by Major Ravi and co-starring Mohanlal.^[40] The film was based on the hijacking incident of the Indian Airlines Flight 814.^[41] Bachchan did not receive any remuneration for this film.^[42]

Television career[link]

In the year 2000, Bachchan stepped up to host India's adaptation of the British television game show, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? entitled, Kaun Banega Crorepati. As it did in most other countries where it was adopted, the program found immediate success. He has hosted all but one of the seasons of the show. Canara Bank withdrew its law suit against Bachchan in November 2000. Bachchan hosted KBC till November 2005, when he fell ill. At that time he was admitted to Lilavati Hospital's ICU once more, to undergo surgery for diverticulitis of the small intestine.^[43] During the period and that following his recovery, most of his projects were put on hold, including KBC.^[44] He has hosted all but one season of the show. Its success set the stage for his return to film popularity. In 2009 Oscar winning movie Slumdog Millionaire in the first question of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? contest "Amitabh Bachchan" was the correct answer to the question "Who was the star of Zanjeer? Feroz Abbas Khan performed as Amitabh Bachchan in a scene in the movie while Anil Kapoor performed as the host of the contest. Bachchan hosted the third season of the reality show Bigg Boss in 2009.^[45]