Aspect of Jainology Part 2 Pandita Bechardas Doshi

Author(s): M A Dhaky, Sagarmal Jain
Publisher: Parshwanath Vidyapith

Page 487

ABHINAVAGUPTA'S IDEAS IN LOCANA ON THE NATURE
OF BEAUTY OF KAVYA
V. M. Kulkarni
In India it was the ālamkārikas, literary critics, and not the philosophers who investigated the nature of beauty in kavya (literature) and for that matter fine arts in general. The attention of the alarkārikas of the earlier period is mainly confined to the body of literature, the outward expression of kavya, namely, śabda and artha, whereas the alamkārikas of the later period mainly concerned themselves with the suggested sense and more particularly with rasa, the soul or the very essence of kāvya. Anandavardhana's Dhvanyālokal (c. latter half of the 9th cent. A.D.) is the first work which allots the first place to the 'suggested sense' in judging the worth of any literary piece of work. In his brilliant exposition of this work in his famous commentary Locana, Abhinavagupta (10th cent. A.D.) expands Anandavardhana's ideas about literary beauty and at times also adds to it his own contribution. The object of the present paper is to collect together all such passages from Locana, classify them under suitable headings, and elucidate Abhinavagupta's ideas on the Theory of Beauty in kāvya-literature (or art in general).
Nature of Beauty
Anandavardhana aptly compares the suggested sense in the work of "great poets” with the incomparable beauty (lāvanya) of women that is distinct from the sum total of loveliness of various parts of their body. Abhinavagupta expands this idea in his characteristic style :
“Beauty which is revealed by the configuration or form of the various (comely) parts of the body is quite distinct and different from their own loveliness. Faultlessness of the limbs or their union with ornaments does not constitute beauty. For we find sensitive critics (sahsdayas) calling a woman, although possessed of various limbs that are free from such defects as "one-eyedness" when each is viewed separately, and although decorated with ornaments, as devoid of elegance, and, on the contrary, calling a woman, who is unlike the above mentioned one, as the “nector of moonlight" (lāvanyāmộta).Abhinavagupta thereby wants to convey that the suggested sense in the form of rasa, etcetera, is quite distinct from the sense denoted by abhidha as well as the sense indicated by laksaņā, gunavrtti and arthāpatti (or anumāna), and as such it does not lend itself to paraphrase.
According to Anandavardhana, a kavya is devoid of rasa etcetera, if the poet has no intention to portray rasa etcetera, and if he aims at merely composing figures of word and/or of sense. And even if in the absence of his intention there