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WORDS OF WELCOME
It was first Prof. R. C. Parikh and then both Prof. Parikh and Dr. V. M. Kulkarni who placed before the learned a critical text of the Kāvyānuśāsana of Ācārya Hemacandra. Both the editors have brought out the real worth of the work which covers the entire span of Sanskrit Alamkāraśāstra and also dramaturgy, a unique feat not performed by any earlier author. True, Hemacandra was not a founder of any system of thought as is the case with the great Anandavardhana, but the latter's ideas got rooted in the minds of literary critics and were fully explained, established and accepted in the literary world of later alamkarikas, chiefly through the efforts of such stalwarts as Abhinavaguptapāda, Mammața and Hemacandra, Visvanātha and others. In fact Ācārya Hemacandra was the instrument in the spread of the tenets of the Kashmir School of thought in Gujarat, to the disadvantage of the Mālava School as represented by Bhoja and others. The real value of His Viveka was brough out by Dr. Kulkarni when with its help he reconstructed almost the whole portion of Abhinavabhārati on the 7th Ch. of the Nātyaśāstra of Bharata. Hemacandra fully inherited the wisdom of his predecessors and presented it in a neat fashion for the next generations to come. The undue criticism advanced by Dr. Kane, Dr. De and Dr. Keith and scholars belonging to that generation should be rightly forgotten. And it is exactly here that Dr. Upadhyay's thesis shows the way. He has not only interpreted Hemacandra in the right perspective but has tried to place him on the high pedestal to which he belongs. I welcome Prof. Dr. Upadhyay's work.
Ahmedabad 380 009
T. S. Nandi
VII
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