Kuttanimatam

Author(s): Damodar Guptakavi, Sukhram Sharma
Publisher: Dharmsukhram

Page 8

FOREWORD.
With what a great longing, my father looked forward to the joy of seeing this work published ! He had great hopes of writing a masterly introduction, in which, he intended to present every thing that was worth knowing about the subject-matter of this poem. But this was not to be;-he passed off, leaving the writing of an introduction for a friend, and the duty of thanksgiving for me.
My father loved the work very much, and many happy hours of his life were spent in the company of our poet Damodar Gupta. He enjoyed the poem as he read it; he enjoyed it more and more in the course of writing the commentary as new beauties and parallel passages suggested themselves to him. He took great delight in it by reading select portions and explaining their finer beauties, which he intended to point out in his commentary, to friends of poetic taste, who enjoyed the readings so much that they often came to him simply to drink in the beauties of the poem, as served out by my father. At such readings imagination ran riot and fun flowed furiously, and time passed by unheeded. The excellence of the commentary is due to these meetings and my first thanks are due to all those who came to listen to his readings, and suggested to him points requiring special treatment in the commentary.
But foremost of all I must mention Babu Govind Dasji. As far as I know, it was he who first encouraged niy father to publish this poem by supplying a complete Ms., and to write a commentary on it by getting a tippani written under his own supervision. My father was in regular correspondence with him and therein many.a knotty point was discussed and settled. Besides Babu Govind Dasji kindly looked into proofs, supplied valuable information and made useful suggestions. For all this I express my sincere thanks to him on behalf of my father.
My best thanks are then due to Mr. Maugesharao Telang for readily responding to my request for writing an introduction. Further, on behalf of my father, I thank him for being kind