Some Aspects of Rasa Theory

SR No.: 006967
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: V M Kulkarni
Publisher: B L Institute of Indology
Publication Year: 1986
Total Pages: 134
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 17 MB

Page 117

APPENDIX-I
105
ing of the rise or beings Wised, i.e. un
they may resemble each to each, those which fill and form the tangible worldthe immediate world from which they are borrowed-stand, however, in an indefinable, but wonderfully accurate, relationship to the modes and laws of our general sensibility. So, the value of those well-known objects and beings is in some way altered. They respond to each other and combine quite otherwise than in ordinary conditions."
Kuntaka, who flourished in the tenth century, refers to the veiling of the real nature of objects (samacchädita-svabhāvāh), when they are presented, by a sudden inspiration, in the poet's imaginative world. He adds that when this special predicament (tathāvidha-visesa) finds a masterly utterance in words, it becomes a thing of wondrous beauty to the mind.
It was Bhatta Nāyaka who had, a century before Kuntaka, enunciated the idea of generalised emotion (sādharanikarana), which proved to be the greatest aid in unlocking the meaning of the rasa-theory. It showed how the aesthetic consciousness resulted when objects or beings were visualised not as related to the immediate tangible world, but in a generalised, i.e. universal manner.
Valery almost suggests this when he says that the poetic state or emotion occurs when the values of the objects and beings of the world are altered because of their relationship to the laws of our general sensibility, i.e. when they cease to have personal or individual interest and appear in a generalised, universal way. Eliot also hints at the same thing when he talks of an escape from personality.
Abhinavagupta and his guru Bhatta Tauta say that this poetic emotion or aesthetic consciousness or rasa is primarily of the poet. The actor on the stage as well as the spectator or the reader of the work consequently attain it. The generalised consciousness pertaining to the poet (kavi-gata-sådhāraṇībhūtasamvit) alone is in reality rasa (paramarthatah rasah).
So, those who appreciate the work of a poet need an equal measure of genius. Rājasekhara calls the creative genius 'kärayitri pratibhå' and the appreciative genius bhāvayitri pratibha.' One, who experiences the work of art, has to re-live the poetic emotion of the creator. He has to re-evoke the aesthetic consciousness of the poet, re-construct the aesthetic object. : The best connoisseur of aesthetic beauty is called 'sahrdaya'one who is of the same heart. Abhinavagupta describes him as one, the mirror of whose mind has become clear due to constant contact with poetic works and who has the capacity to identify himself with what is presented i.e. with the heart of the poet.
The art-experience of such a sahrdaya is, indeed, subjective. Abhinavagupta describes it as ending in prakāśa'-illumination and ananda'beatitude.
7. Paul Valery, Ibid, p. 138.