Sanskrit Drama

Moser, Heike. 2012. »Many ›Kūṭiyāṭṭams‹: Emotions and Rituals in Kerala’s Sanskrit Theatre between Tradition and Modernity«. In: Emotions in Rituals and Performances. South Asian and European Perspectives on Rituals and Performativity. Ed. by Axel Michaels and Christoph Wulf. New Delhi: Routledge, p. 378-396.

The piece begins with a quick review of the encomia showered on Kālidāsa by great Indian poets over nearly two millennia and also by many western poets and scholars ever since Sir William Jones’s translation of ‘Sakontala’. The review of Abhijñāna-Śakuntalā traces the gradual unfolding of Duṣyanta as a tender lover; an accomplished poet (with some of the best of Kālidāsa’s subhāṣitas emerging from his lips); a lover of music; a gifted painter; an affectionate father; and a dutiful king. It was to Kālidāsa’s credit that he converted a secondary one-dimensional character of the original epic into the towering multi-faceted protagonist of his incomparable play. But unlike Bhavabhūti’s Rāma, Kālidāsa’s Duṣyanta is not a root-and-branch alteration of the original.  Kālidāsa respects the epic’s tradition and portrays his hero as a credible aggregate of humanly strengths and flaws.
The review analyses how with three brilliant innovations – Durvāsā’s curse; non-ritualistic (gāndhrava) marriage between Duṣyanta and Śakuntalā and the lost-and-found signet ring – Kālidāsa effectively redeemed the libertine Duṣyanta of the epic, thus conforming to the Alaṅkāra-Śāstra of classical Sanskrit drama, while also upholding poetic justice. Kālidāsa’s Śakuntalā too is as human in her attributes and failings. She has passion in her blood and passion makes her enter into a hasty marriage without even informing her foster father, the kind and wise sage Kaṇva; she also allows her romantic languor to ignore her duty as hostess, thus bringing on herself the curse of Durvāsā. But she is a composite of some truly fine qualities: of heart-warming affection for plants and animals; of joyously pure friendship for her inseparable companions; of fiery protest against Duṣyanta’s injustice; of tender and dignified love for her offspring; and of gentle fortitude to withstand adversities – first of estrangement and then of rejection. The other notable characters are also etched out with life-like clarity. Kaṇva the holy recluse is the epitome of worldly wisdom and affection. Then there are the character-pairs created by Kālidāsa who have become intrinsic to the Śakuntalā lore: Anasūyā-Priyaṃvadā representing the living embodiments of selfless friendship, and Śarṅgarava-Śāradvata representing two distinct faces of righteousness – one intense, the other placid in strikingly dramatic contrasts.
As a model drama, Abhijñāna also mirrors the image of contemporary society – the society of Kālidāsa’s time. The episode of police treatment of a poor fisherman who found the ring shows power was as much a corruptor then as it is now. The same fisherman’s comparison of his own profession with the deemed non-cruelty of the Vedic act of sacrifice can be interpreted as a reaction to Buddhist attack on the Veda. The reference to Yavanīs (Greek women) as attendant-bodyguards to the king indicates a possible practice of employing those bow-wielding foreign women around the king on security grounds. The difference in spoken language (pure Sanskrit by higher male characters and Prākrit by the women and lowly persons) implies difference in educational levels across genders and across social classes.

This is my PhD thesis, defended in 2015. Don't be put off by the Hungarian on the first two pages - that's the official stuff. The rest is in English. My primary purpose is to examine a Sanskrit drama—the Mudrārākṣasa of Viśākhadatta—as a text that was created and has survived as part of an organic web of other texts. See the separate file Dissertation Abstract for a longer summary, or read the big thing.

A fresh and original translation from Sanskrit of the dashrajnya hymn (hymn 7.18 of Rig Veda) describing this defining battle between Aryan king Sudas and his Aryan as well as non-Aryan foes. The decisive battle led to the uprooting of many tribes from the Sapta Sindhu area.

Many existing beliefs are shown to be merely due to misunderstandings. Further, it is shown that the existing translations fall well short of the true meaning.
For example, no Matsya tribe was involved in this battle.

This article concerns the performance of Kūṭiyāṭṭam enactments of Mahābhārata narratives and the written texts on which those performances are based. The Kūṭiyāṭṭam tradition of Sanskrit drama enactment in Kerala has been recognised by UNESCO as a 'masterpiece of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity' but is also profoundly concerned with written texts. I argue that the ways Kūṭiyāṭṭam performers have modified and elaborated upon the dramas' texts have resulted in enactments more devotionally oriented than are the texts themselves, and that this distinctively devotional performative practice has contributed to the tradition's longevity. I also argue that performances in secular settings in recent decades represent both an opportunity and a danger to the tradition. devānāmidamāmananti munayaḥ śāntaṃ kratuṃ cākṣuṣaṃ / … nāṭyaṃ 'Sages regard drama as the visible and pacifying sacrifice to the Gods….' Kālidāsa, Mālavikāgnimitra (1.4)

This article focuses on two of the best-known Sanskrit allegorical dramas: the Prabodhacandrodaya of Kṛṣṇamiśra (11th c.) and the Saṃkalpasūryodaya of Vedānta Deśika (1268-1369). I discuss how the plays offer competing interpretations not only of Vedānta, but of the relationship between Vedānta and non-Vedāntic traditions. The Prabodhacandrodaya is perhaps the earliest text to articulate an inclusivist vision of Vedānta as the culminating tradition within a pan-Vedic (and arguably pan-" Hindu ") alliance of philosophical schools and devotional sects. The Saṃkalpasūryodaya upholds an unapologetic exclusivism, rejecting the worship of gods other than Viṣṇu and portraying philosophical schools such as Sāṃkhya and Vaiśeṣika as fighting on the same side as Buddhism and Jainism. I explore the reasons for these doxographical differences, drawing attention to the Prabodhacandrodaya's status as the first work of Vedānta to be composed for a royal audience, and I suggest that the widespread influence of Advaita Vedānta in later centuries is traceable in part to its willingness to adopt the kind of inclusivism championed in Kṛṣṇamiśra's play.

This course introduces students to the history of world theatre and corresponding dramatic literature from the prehistoric rituals to the eighteenth century. The student will be introduced to the ways in which the theatre played a crucial social, political, and cultural role throughout its early history. The course will also examine the various lenses that effect the writing of history and problematize the idea of a singular and linear historical narrative.

The Saṅgīta‧samaya‧sāra (ca 1245 CE) by Pārśvadēva is an important source-text for the history of Indian music and dance. It is a particularly rich source of the regional (dēśya) vocabulary pertaining to vocal music, instrumental music and dance that was prevalent in the Deccan. Using this treatise as a key, this article attempts to interpret a verse describing a music performance from the twelfth century Kannada poem Hariścandra‧cāritra of Rāghavāṅka. The shared idiom of the scholarly worlds of poetry and musicology between two texts that were not too far separated in space and time is interesting, and may indicate the critical value of kāvya literature in editing and interpreting śāstra texts.

par Sylvain BROCQUET. — La Chrestomathie sanskrite est un ouvrage d’une absolue nouveauté, qui à ce jour n’a d’équivalent dans aucune langue. Elle rassemble un nombre considérable de textes parmi les plus représentatifs de la littérature sanskrite, en fournissant au lecteur tous les éléments qui lui permettront, à quelque niveau qu’il soit parvenu dans la connaissance de la langue, de les comprendre et d’en apprécier les qualités littéraires : chacun d’entre eux est brièvement présenté et situé dans son contexte, édité en écriture Nāgarī puis en caractères latins, expliqué dans les moindres détails (grammaire, vocabulaire, civilisation), enfin traduit dans un français qui se veut à la fois élégant et précis.

La Chrestomathie comporte cinq parties, qui offrent un panorama complet de la littérature sanskrite :
(1) L’épopée (Rāmāyaṇa, Mahābhārata).
(2) Les contes (Pañcatantra, Tantrākhyāyika).
(3) Le théâtre (Bhāsa, Kālidāsa).
(4) La poésie savante (d’Aśvaghoṣa à Jayadeva, en passant par Kālidāsa, Bhāravi, Amaru, etc.).
(5) Les traités (les Lois de Manu, le Traité de politique, le Kāmasūtra, le Traité d’art dramatique, le Miroir de la poésie).

Le choix a été fait d’alterner des extraits relativement brefs, mais se suffisant à eux-mêmes, avec des textes plus longs – un épisode entier du Mahābhārata, un chapitre de la Bhagavadgītā, une pièce en un acte de Bhāsa… Le lecteur pourra ainsi prendre le temps de se familiariser avec un style et goûter le plaisir de s’immerger dans une œuvre. Il pourra aussi parcourir les époques et les genres littéraires, comme il le ferait avec une anthologie. Car le but de la Chrestomathie, au-delà de sa fonction didactique, c’est précisément le plaisir du lecteur : lui offrant tous les éclaircissements linguistiques dont il peut avoir besoin et lui épargnant la fastidieuse consultation des dictionnaires, elle s’efforce de lui faire goûter les saveurs multiples d’une littérature d’accès réputé difficile.

Public cible :
Le lectorat auquel s’adresse cet ouvrage est divers : le sanskritiste débutant, dès lors qu’il a acquis les rudiments de la grammaire, y trouvera son compte, tout autant que l’indianiste déjà chevronné. Les textes de lecture aisée y côtoient en effet des œuvres plus complexes et les explications fournies, plus ou moins denses selon la difficulté, peuvent s’utiliser de plusieurs manières, en fonction des acquis de chacun et de ses habitudes en matière d’apprentissage. De plus, au-delà de ceux qui ont entrepris l’étude du sanskrit, la Chrestomathie s’adresse également aux curieux qui, sans prétendre lire les textes originaux, prendront plaisir à découvrir à travers leur traduction quelques-uns des chefs-d’œuvre d’une des littératures les plus remarquables que le génie humain ait produites.
Cette Chrestomathie sanskrite constitue le troisième volet de la série Sanskrit classique destinée à l’enseignement de la langue et de la littérature sanskrites. Comme la Grammaire élémentaire et pratique du sanskrit classique, d'une part, et le Cahier d'exercices, d'autre part, cet ouvrage s’adresse autant aux étudiants qui effectuent leur apprentissage dans le cadre d’un cours qu’à ceux qui l’ont entrepris en autodidactes. Il va sans dire que ces trois volets se complètent mutuellement et que le lecteur aura profit à les utiliser conjointement.

L'auteur :
Sylvain Brocquet est professeur de langue et civilisation comparées des mondes indo-européens à l’Université d’Aix-Marseille, où il enseigne essentiellement la langue et la littérature sanskrites. Après des études classiques (agrégation de grammaire), il s’est orienté vers l’indianisme : d’abord les études védiques, puis l’épigraphie sanskrite, domaine dans lequel il a soutenu sa thèse, qui porte sur les inscriptions d’une dynastie du sud de l’Inde, après avoir effectué un séjour de deux ans à l’Institut français de Pondichéry. Il s’est ensuite spécialisé en littérature et en poétique sanskrites. Ses recherches portent en particulier sur la poésie à double sens : il a publié une traduction et une étude de la Geste de Rāma, un poème épique relatant à la fois les aventures de Rāma et un épisode de l’histoire du Bengale, et achève actuellement la première traduction du Rāghavapāṇḍavīya, qui résume simultanément les deux grandes épopées de la tradition indienne. Il a publié plusieurs autres traductions d’œuvres littéraires sanskrites, notamment dans la collection de La Pléiade, chez Gallimard. Il œuvre également dans le domaine de la formation : fondateur d’une école d’été renommée, l’Académie des langues de l’Inde, il a publié chez Safran la Grammaire élémentaire et pratique du sanskrit classique, suivie du Cahier d’exercices corrigés, qui constituent le complément indispensable de la présente Chrestomathie.
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Table des matières et détails sur http://www.safran.be/proddetail.php?prod=LCA32

This hymn pertains to the river crossing event of the Rigveda.

A massive and continuous flood stopped the Bharatas in their tracks. Their guide Vishwamitra then organised a sacrifice and composed this hymn to mollify the rivers' fury. Amazingly, the rivers did subside for a while, just enough for the army to cross over.

This fresh translation of Rig Veda's hymn 3.33 brings out the meaning clearly. It shows there was no real or imaginary dialogue between the sage Vishwamitra and the rivers. Rather, this was Vishwamitra's prayer to the rivers in which the Bharata army joins in at the very end.

In Rig veda, Indra is treated much like a celebrity sportsperson of today.

This original translation from Sanskrit, of Hymn 3.45 of Rigveda, just as my other translations, demonstrates how lucid and lively the hymns of Rigveda are, in contrast to the almost abstract work of all previous translators.

Th is article presents issues encountered in ethnographic fi eldwork in Kerala, south India, on a tradition of Sanskrit theatre called Kūṭ iyāṭ ṭ am. Key issues include recent changes in both the audience and performing troupes as Kerala's society has become more egalitarian, and reduced ritual activity by priests. Kūṭ iyāṭ ṭ am has been transformed from a devotional off ering in temples to a cultural performance viewed as an art form. Ethnographic research on this tradition has contributed to international recognition and patronage. In this case, ethnographic fi eldwork aff ects both the researchers and the subjects of their research.

In this paper I discuss historical and contemporary approaches to the 10th century Sanskrit poet and playwright Rājaśekhara (most of which centre upon literary criticism) and propose an alternative approach to his work in which his plays might be examined in terms of their performance and courtly contexts. I then apply this analysis to his play Viddhaśālabhañjikā (The Hollow Statue). By analyzing the performance context focusing on the categories of body, space, and object, I argue that the text puts forward strong evidence for its own performativity, offers a diverse set of indications of how the play is to be staged, and contains a number of noteworthy and unique material characteristics. I then examine the courtly and historical context surrounding the play’s creation to offer suggestions about how its content may have been intended and received, as well as the significance of certain historical characters or events which seem to be embedded in the text. The result is that—rather than being a poorly-constructed, incomprehensible play full of inappropriate moments, depicting a Sanskrit dramatic form in decline—Viddhaśālabhañjikā is in fact quite a novel and complex work of Sanskrit drama that shows a conscious sensitivity to performance concerns and an acute awareness of its place in society.

This paper is dedicated to the genesis of Hindu Iconography and brings together the results of the research project conducted in 2015-2016. The circumstances of the emergence and use of the first cult images in Hinduism remain understudied in scholarship. It is extremely difficult to determine when, how, and in what ritual context the anthropomorphic canon was introduced in the Ancient Indian culture. However, it is certain that at the time preceding the rise of Hinduism, Vedic religion made no real use of anthropomorphic images of gods. Even if, notwithstanding the lack of any archaeological or textual evidences, we accept the possibility that the images of deities already existed, it is evident that they did not played any significant role in the ritual practices. The more probable scenario is that they appeared rather late, in the post-Vedic period, when new ritual – puja – replaced the ancient Aryan rite – yajña. The original and innovative element of pūjā-cult consisted in scenic representations of myths in the form of religious drama used as a visual preaching tool in the ritual ceremony. In this paper, I will try to demonstrate that the affinity of image worship and theatre 1 E 6 D performance, as described in the Nā yaśāstra (the most ancient and authoritative text on Indian drama), is much more profound and multifaceted than has been hitherto acknowledged. In my view, the appearance of individual iconographic features in the anthropomorphic representations of various deities derives from the ritual drama performances that actualized before the eyes of the viewer the world of gods, demons, heroes, and numerous supernatural beings. Doubtless, the nature of scenic performance made the differentiation in appearance of various characters absolutely crucial, which led to the formation of a permanent set of individual features, including the elements of costume, make-up and hairstyles. I will try to substantiate a hypothesis that it was this scenic act that lied at the basis of anthropomorphic images of gods in Early Hindu Pantheon. This hypothesis is borne out by the evident proximity in approach of the abhinaya techniques, which helped the actors to feel as if really transformed into their characters, and artistic devices, employed to create pictorial and sculptural representations of gods. Sculptural renderings of Hindu deities on temple facades show them in postures, described in the 1 E 6 D Nā yaśāstra. Statues and relief figures are endowed with gestures from the repertoire used in theatre practices, enabling experts up to this day to illustrate the theoretical precepts of the treatise with actual figures from temple decorations. Thus, it is reasonable to assume that the paintings and sculptures of gods received their attire, make-up and postures from actors who played gods on stage.

Farley Richmond is the pioneering figure in Indian theatre scholarship in the United States. He has taught and headed departments at University of Michigan and SUNY Stony Brook, and is presently teaching at the University of Georgia. He is trained in Kutiyattam, one of India's oldest classical theatre forms, and is a key figure in bringing it to world attention.

The rituals described in the Nāṭyaśāstra for a long time suffered the lack of a thorough scholarly attention. One of the rare exceptions is perhaps F.B.J. Kuiper's monograph Varuṇa and Vidūṣaka. On the Origin of the Sanskrit Drama. Analyses of the ritual-mythological complex of the Nāṭyaśāstra led Kuiper to conclude that drama was at its inception a scenic incarnation of the Vedic cosmogonic myth, while rituals related to the drama were nothing else but the varieties of the Vedic sacrifice – yajña. In his study, Kuiper skipped over the fact that the Nāṭyaśāstra rituals are never referred to as " yajña " but are termed " pūjā ". In this case, the name of the ritual is of essential importance as in the Vedic tradition the religious practice was never defined as pūjā, and no ritual of that name is mentioned nor described in Vedic texts. Yajña and pūjā are known to have been mutually counterpoised in the Indian tradition, and were topical in different periods of its evolution. Yajña held pride of place as a solemn rite in the Vedic time, while pūjā became widespread in the post-Vedic era to become the central ritual of Hinduism. In this paper, I analyzed one of the earliest extant descriptions of the pūjā-type ritual – the Brahmayāga, that came down to us in a source of the late/post-Vedic period – Atharvaveda-pariśiṣṭa XIXb of Śaunaka school. My main point is to demonstrate that the Brahmayāga ritual represents the closest and direct counterpart of the consecration rite of the new templar theatre known from the Chapter III of the Nāṭyaśāstra. Both rituals were performed in order to consecrate a newly built ritual space, which in both texts is referred to as the maṇḍapa. The interior of the maṇḍapa was arranged similarly in both cases: the centre was designated by an image of a lotus, symbolizing the presence of the supreme deity Brahmā; a big circle called maṇḍala was made around it with four cardinal and intermediary points. Moreover, in the Brahmayāga it is possible to single out even the principal stages the of Nāṭyaśāstra ritual. It is hard to imagine that the striking resemblance of the symbolism, as well as of the structure of both rituals is casual. Coincidences are so great that allow conjecture not only typological but also direct genetic links between the Brahmayāga and the analyzed Nāṭyaśāstra ritual. This assumption becomes even more plausible if we take into consideration the fact that the Atharvaveda-pariśiṣṭa XIXb supplements the Atharvaveda-pariśiṣṭa XIX, where the Indra festival is described, during which according to the mythological testimony of the Nāṭyaśāstra the first divine drama was performed.

Viśākhadatta’s Mudrārākṣasa is somewhat unique among Sanskrit dramas in that its plot is concerned
with political intrigue. Though the occurrence of certain stanzas of the Mudrārākṣasa in
other (non-fiction) works has been noted even by early editors of the play, no attempt has yet been
made to fully explore the textual interconnections of the play. The present paper attempts to sketch
a map of the appearance of Mudrārākṣasa stanzas in anthologies of Sanskrit poetry. Such anthologies
containing hundreds of well-phrased (subhāṣita) stanzas – collected from classical literature,
but detached from their context and usually arranged in thematic chapters – made their appearance
on the literary stage at the end of the 11th century and remain popular to the present day. Out of the
total 175 stanzas of poetry in the Mudrārākṣasa, 18 occur in one or more major subhāṣita anthologies
and other literary works. While 12 of these are probably indeed Viśākhadatta’s own compositions
according to the testimony of the anthologies, the authorship of the remaining 6 is somewhat
dubious, since they are attributed in one or more anthologies to a different source, and/or are found
in texts that may be earlier than the Mudrārākṣasa. The paper argues that stanzas of poetry, mostly
of a gnomic/didactic nature, could freely migrate not only from works of fiction into anthologies
but also in the opposite direction. Widespread quotes that sounded relevant to a specific situation
may well have been inserted into the text of dramas (and other opuses) both by the playwrights
themselves and by subsequent copyists or redactors of their texts.

Harṣa (also known as Harṣavardhana, Harṣadeva, Śrīharṣa, Śīlāditya, c. 590–647 CE) is credited with the authorship of three major Sanskrit plays, the Nāgānanda, the Ratnāvalī, and the Priyadarśikā, as well as a few minor works. He is also celebrated as an outstanding personality in the political history of India, the mighty king who ruled over the greater part of northern India for most of the first half of the 7th century.