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Jain Literature and Performing Arts
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who used to show to rice-dealers scrolls depicting scenes from three popular tales. The showman thus kept the dealers absorbed in the show and this gave a free hand to his two abetters to steal rice from the shops!
The Jain texts throw light also on the mode of presentation and the actual method of showing the pictures. According to Samghadāsa's commentary on the Bịhatkalpa-sūtra, the picture showman, while pointing at the various scenes on the picture board or scroll, sang story-verses and explained the purport in plain prose.
From the Buddhist text Asokāvadāna, we know that the showman held in his left hand the scroll which was fixed between two bamboo sticks, and pointed at pictures with a pointer held in his right hand. The Jain texts Kuvalayamālā and Lilāyatisāra also record the same method of making audio-visual presentation".
2. Dramatic Types
The Classical Indian dramaturgy recognised and described many dramatic types : Ten major types variously designated as Pāthya-Preksya, Vākyārthābhinaya or Rūpaka, and numerous minor types known as Geya-Preksya, Padārthābhinaya or Uparūpaka.
In one Jain text we find the earliest specimen of the Rūpaka called Utsrşţikānka and in another. there is a reference to the types Dima and Vithi.
(a) Utsrstikānka or Arka
In his Prakrit work Caupannamahäpurisacariya, giving the lifeaccount of the fiftyfour Great Men in the Universal History according to Jainism, Silānkācārya has given a dramatic composition which forms a part of the biography of Rşabhasvāmin, the first Tirthankara10. In the account of the fourth previous birth of Rşabha as king Mahābala, the minister Vimala mati is described als staging a drama before the king with a view to induce him to renovace the world. The drama is called Vibudhānanda. It consists
