All Arts In India Owe Their Roots To The Theoretical Structure Developed By Bharatamuni In His Celebrated Work Natyasastra. His Theory Of Beauty Is Known As The Theory Of Rasa. The Present Volume Has Shown How The Insight Of Bharata Was Developed By The Classical Scholars From Abhinavagupta To Jagannatha Who Propounded The Theories With Names Like Rasa, Alamkara, Riti, Vakrokti, Dhvani Etc. To Employ The Theory Of Beauty From Natya (Drama) To Kavya (Poetry).

Richly illustrated study drawing on art, literature and science to explore Victorian attitudes towards sight.

Rasa, Dhvani and Rasa-Dhvani are the major critical terms in Sanskrit poetics that developed during the post-Vedic classical period. Rasa is used by a sage named Bharata to denote the aesthetic experience of a theatrical audience. But Anandavardhana and Abhinavagupta intermedialize this experience by extending it to a reader of poetry. They argue that rasa is also generated by a linguistic potency called dhvani. Some critics like Bhoja also proposed generation of rasa by pictorial art, and further, some (...) class='Hi'>modern critics propose to trace dhvani property in non-verbal arts such as dance and music pleading thereby that these non-verbal arts also generate rasa. The present essay examines these arguments and concludes that generation of rasa is confined to only the audio-visual and verbal arts such as the theatre and poetry, and, dhvani as a specific linguistic potency, is strictly confined to the verbal arts. Its intermedialization is a contradiction in terms. (shrink)

Throughout its history of almost a millennium and a half, Sanskrit kāvyaśāstra was resolutely obsessed with the task of unravelling the ontology kāvya. Literary theoreticians in Sanskrit, irrespective of their spatio-temporal locations, unanimously agreed upon the fact that kāvya was a special mode of expression characterized by the presence of certain unique linguistic elements. Nonetheless, this did not imply that kāvyaśāstra was an intellectual tradition unmarked by disagreements. The real point of contention among the practitioners of Sanskrit (...) literary theory was the prioritization of certain formal elements as the ‘soul’ of literature. This strong sense of intellectual disagreement on the question of what constituted the soul of kāvya eventually paved the way for the emergence of new frameworks of criticism and extensive scrutiny of the existing categories, thus playing a vital role in keeping this tradition alive and new.But towards the turn of the 20th century, Sanskrit kāvyaśāstra tradition underwent an epistemic rupture primarily because of a change in the way the idea of literariness was understood. During this phase, the traditional Formalistic notions about literature underwent a radical transformation, and the style and language of literature eventually became similar to everyday speech. This trend played an important role in severing Sanskrit kāvyaśāstra’s natural tie with literature. Eventually, the vigour in which new treatises in Sanskrit literary poetics were produced also dwindled. This did not mean that the scholarship in Sanskrit poetics vanished. Scholars in Sanskrit poetics continued to flourish in India, but in a different form and shape. In other words, the focus of scholars in Sanskrit poetics slowly got shifted from the production of new treatises in Sanskrit poetics to the creation of the intellectual history of this field and the application of these theories to evaluate the literary merit of modern literary texts. Though these two approaches played a vital role in disseminating the knowledge about Sanskrit poetics in modern times, they were caught up in an ontological certitude. In other words, neither of these two directions attempted to study these theoretical positions from a standpoint other than that of literary theory. To borrow a Barthian terminology, these two approaches treated Sanskrit poetics as a ‘work,’ instead of a ‘Text.’ This paper aims to intervene in this lacuna of scholarship by proposing the Derridian idea of ‘play’ as a methodological framework to unearth the potentialities lying dormant in these theories and to move beyond the ontological certitude traditionally imposed on these theoretical positions. The new methodological praxis that I put forward in this paper is further exemplified through a non-canonical reading of Ānandavardhana’s avivakṣita-vācya-dhvani. (shrink)

The article presents a preliminary survey of textual reuse in Nepalese collections of j?takas and avad?nas, focusing in particular on three works: the Avad?na?ataka, the Divy?vad?na, and the Dv?vi??atyavad?nakath?. The reassessment of the manuscript tradition of these three Sanskrit collections, based on Nepalese manuscripts and Tibetan translations, sheds more light on the role of scribes in the creation of these collections and of the Nepalese avad?nam?l? literature. In particular, the great role played in the 17th century by the (...) Nepalese scribe and scholar Jayamuni in shaping the text of the Avad?na?ataka, the Divy?vad?na, and many other Buddhist narrative works is brought to light. The result of this preliminary survey shows that a study of this type of collections based on the available critical editions should be rethought in the light of the specific character of their manuscript and textual transmission in medieval and early modern Nepal. (shrink)

This paper will examine the sanskrit short-poem Āta ṅkavādaśataka written in 1988 by the famous indian pandit Vagish Shastri. Although composed in a language that is 2500 year old, the Century deals with one of the most dramatic events in contemporary indian history: sikh nationalist terrorism. The poet provides both a socio-political interpretation as well as a mythological-theological one, managing to combine a traditional approach with a pronounced ideological awareness. We will both supply information on the social and historical (...) background of the phenomenon, and discuss the poetic qualities of the work. Special attention will be given to linguistic, metrical and rhetorical features, which link this contemporary composition to classical kāvya poetry. (shrink)

This essay is an attempt to analyze, classify and illustrate different scholarly approaches to the Sanskrit philosophical commentaries as reflected in some influential and especially thoughtful studies of Indian philosophy; at the same time it highlights some specific features involving commentary and annotation in general, drawing from results of studies on commentaries conducted in other disciplines and fields, such as Classical and Medieval Studies, Theology, and Early English Literature. In the field of South Asian Studies, philosophical commentaries may (...) be assessed from various overlapping and not always exclusive points of view, such as preservation of otherwise lost historical information, historical authenticity and reliability, interpretational innovation, spiritual or experiential insight, philosophical creativity, intellectual liveliness, doxographic intent, degree of incidentality, expository breadth and explanatory depth. The essay provides numerous examples taken from classical to early modern philosophical literature, especially of the Brahminical and Buddhist traditions, and also discusses their diverging perception by modern scholars and interpretators. (shrink)

A guide to personal discipline and social ethics from a classical Sanskrit scholar, designed for the modern yoga practitioner. Students of yoga are introduced to the ancient teachings of classical Indian literature in abundant workshops and teacher trainings. But amidst this abundance there is a hunger for more insight into how practitioners can integrate this wisdom into their modern lives. In today's complex world, how is it possible to truly live as a yogi? Drawing from his (...) deep insight into ancient Sanskrit texts, Dr. Shankaranarayana Jois connects yogic philosophy to how we approach food, work, education, relationships, and much more to support our deepest longings for true peace and happiness. The Yoga Journey focuses on the yamas and the niyamas, the personal disciplines (or restraints) and social ethics that represent the first two limbs of Ashtanga Yoga. Rather than offering a set of esoteric practices and disciplines, Dr. Jois offers clear and practical guidance to help us both understand and experience for ourselves why yogic practices are meaningful. Dr. Jois's central message underscores the benefits we can gain from adopting a yogic way of life in the modern world. His unique teachings show us the ultimate goal of yoga, and he clearly directs us toward the tools available to us for reaching that goal. Rather than suggesting that we blindly follow some prescription from the past, Jois challenges us to use our analytical mind to assess their usefulness and benefit in our daily lives. His teachings honor ancient traditions, going beyond the information and teachings being offered (and recycled) by many Western teachers. (shrink)

Philosophical poetry has had a long and distinguished history in different cultural traditions. These traditions have always interacted to some extent, but today the barriers between them have largely broken down. Savitri, an epic in English by the early twentieth-century Indian philosopher and poet Sri Aurobindo, is a notable outcome of the confluence of Eastern and Western civilisations. Based on a creative reworking of a legend from the Sanskrit epic, the Mahābhārata, it incorporates in its neo-Vedantic vision aspects of (...) the worldviews represented by the great philosophical poems of ancient, medieval and modern Europe. As vast in scope as any of these works, Savitri took shape over much of the poet’s life in a way comparable to Goethe’s Faust. A study of the stages of its composition reveals much about the author’s artistic, intellectual and spiritual development and gives insight into the poem’s autobiographical dimension. (shrink)

Festschrift in honor of 60th birtha anniversary of Ganesh Umakant Thite, Sanskritist; comprises contributed articles on various aspects of Vedic literature, Hinduism and Indic philosophy.

This paper finds its origin in a debate between Georges Bataille (1897-1962) and Octavio Paz (1914-1998) on what is central to the idea of eroticism. Bataille posits that violence and transgression are fundamental to eroticism, and without prohibition, eroticism would cease to exist. Paz, however, views violence and transgression as merely intersecting with, rather than being intrinsic to, eroticism. Paz places focus on imagination, and transforms eroticism from a transgressive, to a ritualistic act. Eroticism thus functions as an intermediary, turning (...) animal sexuality into ceremony and rite. In this paper, I argue that Paz and Bataille are not fundamentally at odds in their conceptualisation of eroticism. Instead, Paz redefines the locus of eroticism by subverting its unsettling aspects. His conception of eroticism gives precedence to the imagination, which in itself is an act of violation. Imagination transgresses normal life, but this transgression – the violation of the habitual world – also introduces a glimpse of the numinous that Paz associates with belongingness. The paper further explores eroticism, as this is perceived today, and argues that it ultimately eliminates the threshold marked by transgression. The rise of the contemporary pornographic society is marked by a loss of imagination and transcendence, which ultimately reduces the subject into a mere automaton that demands instant gratification. (shrink)

Accounts of creation in Sanskrit literature include a number of hymns in the R̥gveda principal among which are R̥V 10.72, 10.81–82, 10.90, 10.121, and 10.129. Later accounts appear in the Mānavadhārmaśāstra, the Mahābhārata, and purāṇas. Scholars generally describe these accounts as various, mutually inconsistent myths, or as superseded stages of philosophical thought. Even recent treatments of Indian cosmogony that praise the poetic subtlety and prowess of their composers consider their work as products of individual poetic imagination. Yet, despite (...) the variety of expression in the various accounts, they appear to convey a consistent model of the origin of the world. Moreover, the model of the absolute and the first stages of creation mirror the descriptions of the development of enlightenment in foundational texts of Vedānta and systematic analyses of Yoga. The descriptions of creation may therefore rather be the result of the special insight of enlightened sages than the results of individual imagination. (shrink)

Laura Marcus is one of the leading literary critics of modernist literature and culture. Dreams of Modernity: Psychoanalysis, Literature, Cinema covers the period from around 1880 to 1930, when modernity as a form of social and cultural life fed into the beginnings of modernism as a cultural form. Railways, cinema, psychoanalysis and the literature of detection - and their impact on modern sensibility - are four of the chief subjects explored. Marcus also stresses the creativity of (...) modernist women writers, including H. D., Dorothy Richardson and Virginia Woolf. The overriding themes of this work bear on the understanding of the early twentieth century as a transitional age, thus raising the question of how 'the moderns' understood the conditions of their own modernity. (shrink)

Can subjective taste regulate social norms or political practices? This book argues that from the late seventeenth century to the present national cultures have sought to regulate the democratic subject through the academic form of arguments about the proper relations of aesthetics to ethics and politics. In so doing it offers a radical reconsideration of the history of modernity, tracing the emergence of criticism as a socio-cultural practice across all the major European nations, and drawing on an extensive range of (...) European literature and philosophy. (shrink)

Works in Sanskrit that deal with governance and ethics are an important repository for moral precepts of kingship. Classic examples of this form of political advice literature, recounted through the fables of animals, are the Pañcatantra and the Hitopadeśa. In various recensions and myriad translations, these works spread throughout Asia. Authors writing in Arabic and Persian displayed a fascination for these texts, beginning significantly with the work of Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ and his famous translation, Kalīla wa-Dimna. This article treats (...) the transmission of Sanskrit advice literature in the early modern period into Persian and Rekhta. It considers how this literature was translated in the contexts of Muslim imperial and British colonial rule, and asks what it reveals about the relationship between language, knowledge, and politics in South Asia. (shrink)

In the literature we have found correspondence of several significant traits of Jewish mysticism with traits of Buddhism and other systems of Indian religion-philosophy. Among the corresponding traits is the fundamental idea of emptiness or nothingness, shuunyataa in Sanskrit, ayin in Hebrew. Also corresponding are attempts to harmonize the idea and experience of emptiness with fullness, and with the experience of the secular world with its many things and concepts. We list eight significant traits of Jewish mysticism, which (...) we find correspond with traits of Indian religion-philosophies. We also discuss some important relations of these Indian and Jewish belief systems with modern science. We contend, that natural science is built on spontaneous sensory experiences; on this basis concepts and theories are constructed. Likewise we think, that spiritual experiences occur spontaneously and contribute to the basis of religious, mystic and some philosophical belief systems. We thus think, there are important parallels between scientific and spiritual cognition. Key words: Comparative religion; Emptiness/fullness; nothingness; God; compassion; reincarnation; cognition, scientific spiritual; spiritual experiences; Buddhism. (shrink)

First Words, Last Words charts an intense "pamphlet war" that took place in sixteenth-century South India. The book explores this controversy as a case study in the dynamics of innovation in early modern India, a time of great intellectual innovation. This debate took place within the traditional discourses of Vedic Hermeneutics, or Mīmāṃsā, and its increasingly influential sibling discipline of Vedānta, and its proponents among the leading intellectuals and public figures of the period. At the heart of this dispute (...) lies the role of sequence in the cognitive processing of textual information, especially of a scriptural nature. Vyāsatīrtha and his grand-pupil Vijayīndratīrtha, writers belonging to the camp of Dualist Vedānta, purported to uphold the radical view of their founding father, Madhva, who believed, against a long tradition of Mīmāṃsā interpreters, that the closing portion of a scriptural passage should govern the interpretation of its opening. By contrast, the Nondualist Appayya Dikshita ostensibly defended this tradition's preference for the opening. But, as the book shows, the debaters gradually converged on a profoundly novel hermeneutic-cognitive theory in which sequence played little role, if any. In fact, they knowingly broke new ground, and only postured as traditionalists. First Words, Last Words explores the nature of theoretical innovation in this debate and sets it against the background of comparative examples from other major scriptural interpretive traditions. The book briefly surveys the use of sequence in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic hermeneutics and also seeks out parallel cases of covert innovation in these traditions. (shrink)

Volume 25, Issue 4, June 2020, Page 486-488.

The word 'philosophy' as well as the conjuring expression 'Indian philosophy' has meant different things to different people-endeavours and activities, old and new, grave and frivolous, edifying and banal, esoteric and exoteric. In this book, the author has chosen deliberately a very dominant trend of the classical (Sanskrit) philosophical literature as his subject of study. The age of the material used here demands both philological scholarship and philosophical amplification. Classical pramanasastras usually deal with the theory of knowledge, the (...) nature of inference and language, and the related questions of ontology and semantics. Several important concepts and theories have been singled out for critical analysis and clarification in modern terms so that the results may be intelligible to modern students of both Sanskrit and philosophy. It is hoped that such an attempt will kindle the enthusiasm of young scholars in the field and inspire them to proceed in this comparatively new area of research and explore further and more interesting possibilities. (shrink)

Compilation of works chiefly on Hindu philosophy, Hindu prayers and commentaries on Vedic texts.

Examines how the modern city is portrayed in art and literature, discusses modernism, futurism, and expressionism, and looks at the work of Rilke, Eliot, Pound, Joyce, and Brecht.

A Brilliant Introduction To The Essence Of Living Hinduism The Thirteen Principal Upanisads, Sanskrit Texts In The Religious Traditions Of The Vedas, Lie At The Heart Of Hinduism. Devoted To Understanding The Inner Meaning Of The Religion, They Explicate Its Crucial Doctrines Rebirth, The Law Of Karma, The Means Of Conquering Death And Of Achieving Detachment, Equilibrium And Spiritual Bliss. They Emphasize The Perennial Search For True Knowledge Especially That Of The Connection Between The Self And The Transcendental Absolute. (...) In This Translation, Marked By Empathy And Erudition, Valerie Roebuck Approaches The Upanisads As Belonging To The Tradition Of 'Sruti', Literature Which Is Heard, As Distinct From 'Smriti', Which Is Remembered. Seeking To Reveal The Intent Of The Authors, She Attempts To Represent What, In Fact, Constitutes The Original Text. Care Is Taken To Exclude Later Accretions Of Commentaries. The Invocations Included Underline The Traditional Recitation Of These Texts, And The Literary Devices Repetitions, Dialogue And Word Combat, Riddles, Paradoxes And Word Play Used By The Sages To Express Their Teachings. This Accurate And Exceptional Rendering, While Making Accessible To The Modern Reader Something Of The Beauty And Variety Of The Original Language, Reaffirms The Place Of The Upanishads As One Of The Most Profound Works Of World Literature. This Authentic And Nuanced Rendering Makes Accessible To The Modern Reader Something Of The Beauty And Variety Of These Ancient And Rich Texts Of Hinduism. The Upanisads Belong To The Tradition Of Literature That Is Heard Rather Than Remembered , And In Her Translation Roebuck Seeks To Reveal The Intent Of The Authors And Arrive At 'The Original' Text. (shrink)