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parallels or revealing connection and linkages. They blend well with the. translation of the slokas and explanatory passages. All in all, for a nonSanskrit-knowing reader or a foreigner, Radhakrishnan's book is an updated commentary with the flavour of contemporaneity.
It is my firm belief that but for the translations of the Bhagavadgita by Dr. Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan, Christopher Isherwood and Juan Mascaro, a "near miracle" in the musical history of the Western World could not have happened, Could we in India ever imagine that an American composer would write an opera in which the entire libretto (text of the vocal music) would be from the Bhagavadgita? Yet it has happened.
The American composer, Philip Glass, has composed the music for "Satyagraha", an opera in three acts for which Constance Dejong adopted the slokas from the Gita in Sanskrit, from the 23rd sloka in the first adhyaya to the fifth in the fourth sloka adhyaya (Later chapters are not omitted by any means). The opera is based on the life and work of Mahatma Gandhi in South Africa from 1893 to 1914, during the course of which Gandhiji invented "Satyagraha" for the benefit of mankindas a political strategy. In the opera, Gandhiji's past, present and future are evoked by three "witnesses" in the three acts. They are Tolstoy, Tagore, and Martin Luther King and they sit as silent figures atop a podium and view the action on the stage. The Sanskrit verses are sung in the Western style and we Indians may have to get used to it by and by.
It was the privilege of the city of Rotterdam in Netherlands that commissioned Philip Glass to compose the opera. (Oddly enough Gandhiji struggled against the Boers, descendants of the very same Dutch people,) Satyagraha was first performed in 1980 at Rotterdam and subsequently in several other American cities, starting with New York in 1981 and also in Europe.
Unfortunately we in India have not been grateful to Philip Glass by inviting him though belatebly we did invite Peter Brooks and his marathon film, "The Mahabharat" recently. Even Cassette recordings of the opera are difficult to get in India. At least we were involved with Sir Richard Attenborough's film on Gandhiji and we have been lucky to see this award-winning film.
D Sad is the state of affairs that we who used to rave over Indologists and Indophiles in the past have not done a single gesture of recognition to Philip Glass. He had come to our country several times, met Ravi Shankar and Alla Rakha, studied our musical systems, read several
