Gaudavaho

Author(s): Vakpatiraj, Narhari Govind Suru, P L Vaidya, A N Upadhye, H C Bhayani
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

Page 97

(Lxxx)
for his descriptions of ladies in their various conditions, such as removal of bodice, the after-bath toilet and make-up, floral decorations, meeting the lover, scenes of carousal, consequent inebriation, fore-play consisting of kissing and embracing, bites, bruises and scratches on lips and hips, the love-making, resultant exhaustion and sleep thereafter. It must be confessed that there is nothing subtle or sublime in the depiction of the love-scenes, which aspect we find in Bhavabhūti's writings. It is all between voluptuous men and flirtatious women and stinks of rank carnality. There is too much of 'wallowing in the flesh' on the part of the Poet, especially when he tries to extol his patron-monarch for his enjoyment of sex-pleasures in the company of a bevy of courtesans or young, beautiful girls. This smacks of indulgence of what Vātsyāyana describes as of Goyūthika type (-one bull in the midst of a herd of cows-). One wonders how far his Patron appreciated such a discription of himself, since it is certainly not very complimentary to him. This, however, is perhaps the 'fault' of the age in which the poet lived and moved about, -the age which knew of no inhibitions whatsover in the matter. We have, for instance, the case of Kālidāsa who, unashamedly' describes in details the honeymoon delights of Siva and, Pārvatī, the parents of the world', in the cool recesses of the Himālyan heights in his Kumārsambhava and the morbid sex-indulgence of Agnivarna, the last king of the Raghu dynasty. Poets like Bhāravi and Māgha, too, are not found wanting in this respect. The Kirātārjuniya of Bhāravi has three cantos, numbering 198 verses, distributed in 8th, 9th and 10th cantos dealing with these topics and the Siśupālavadha, too, in its 3 cantos, 7th, 8th and 9th, gives us a total of 223 verses, masterfully depicting the aspects of love in its different stages and phases, without