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A Recent Study of Indian Kavya Literature
Volume One, recently issued, consists of first eight chapters meant to be an introduction, presenting the Indian aesthetic and critical theorles and also the social milieu of the literature, so as to suggest to the readers, especially Western or Westernized readers, how the literature was meant to be enjoyed.
The author is inspired as well as led by the work of Dr, M. Krishnamachariar in whom for once he found a sympathetic pioneer and an extremely persistent and devoted one. In a sense Dr. Warder's work is simply a commentary on Dr. Krishnamacharar's work as it uses the rich matter the latter has assembled as the basis for an exercise in literary criticisin on the originals. Though the work is a secondary source, the writer has done his best to make it authentic and embody his subject in his work without interposing his own personality.
Chapter One (pp. 1-8), elucidates the scope of the term Kavya as distinguished from scriplures or canonical works (agama), tradition or history (itihāsa) and systematic treatises on any subject (sastra), and gives an account of various languages such as Samskyta and Praktta, the latter being outlined in their origin and development individually under seperate heads like Magadht, Paisaci, Mahārastri and Apabhramsa. The author points out, after Rajasekhara, that Kavya was not restricted in practice to any group of languages and besides the Indo-Aryan languages, Karyas appear in the Dravidian languages, especially Tamil, and in languages as remote as Javanese. Although Dr. Warder feels that to follow the main line of development of Kavya in India we must include samsksta, Prūkyta and Apabhramsa on an equal footing and we must also notice the developments in the modern languages and in the Dravidian languages, he is equally aware that the plan of a general study cannot conveniently embraco such a manifold history. He has, therefore decided that though he concentrates mainly on Sanskrit he should observe those trends in the modern Indian languages which are related to his theme, and he thinks it desirable in the latter period to refer to Kavyas in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam.
In Chapter Two (pp. 9-53) the author considers the dramatic theory of the aesthetic experience and matters related to it. He traces the history of the theory of aesthetics to the existence of parallel streams of the practice of Kavya and critical observation, of the theory of pleasure. The sociologi. cal background depicted in the Kamasūtra is outlined with special reference to Nagaraka, Goșthi, festival, the three careers of Vita, Vidusaka and Puthamarda open to people in the service of a Nagaraka. The fundamentally secular outlook of Kayya is emphasized with reference to its functions Sambodhi 2.3
