Prakrit Verses in Sanskrit Works on Poetics Part 02

SR No.: 006960
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: V M Kulkarni
Publisher: B L Institute of Indology
Publication Year: 1990
Total Pages: 768
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 12 MB

Page 62

Prakrit Verses in Sanskrit Works on Poetics
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full of obscenity and vulgarity and which glorify illicit or clandestine love, as illustrations because the obscenity remains hidden under the garb of the Prakrit language. This allegation, on the face of it, is false. For the very purpose of citing illustrations is defeated if the verses are unintelligible. The fact is that in the classical period there was no compartmentalisation or bifurcation of studies into Sanskrit and Prakrit. The long-standing practice of writing dramas in Sanskrit and Prakrit will easily bear out this statement. Again, eminent Sanskrit writers like Bāna, Dandi, Kuntaka, Anandavardhana, Bhoja have paid handsome tributes to Hāla Sātavāhana, Sarvasena, Pravarasena for their exquisite Prakrit works. This fact corroborates the statement that there was integration of Sanskrit and Prakrit studies. Naturally, the alamkārikas appreciated first-rate Prakrit works and freely drew upon them - as they did in the case of Sanskrit works — for illustrations in their alamkāra works. It is therefore an insult to the intelligence of these alaskārikas to allege that they quoted Prakrit verses with an ulterior motive.
Now let us examine the charge of obscenity against the Prakrit verses. The alamkārikas have defined in their works what constitutes the poetic blemish of obscenity. Use of words which give rise to feelings of shame, of disgust or convey the sense of inauspiciousness is condemned as obscene and vulgar. They have, with their sharp intellect, recorded and denounced as obscene even particular combination of letters giving rise to words meaning the names of the private parts of the human body. So there is no question of defending obscenity in literature - whether Sanskrit or Prakrit.
These Prakrit verses fall into two groups : Those which are highly erotic and those which portray illicit, calandestine or adulterous love..
We must clearly dinstinguish between the erotic and the obscene. The writings of great poets, both Sanskrit and Prakrit, are highly erotic and artistic or poetic. To brand them as obscene, as impatient critics of Prakrit verses do, would mean putting these great works out of the reach of the sensitive sahrdayas. We must not be carried away by highly erotic descriptions and mistake the highly erotic for the obscene. The Prakrit poets, as a rule, remain strictly within the bounds of propriety and refinement and avoid vulgarity and obscenity. According to the European scholars of the Victorian age or nineteenth century Western morals, the descriptions of rati-kalaha (love's battle), the lover's wounding his mistress with nails (nakha-ksata),