Some Aspects of Rasa Theory

Author(s): V M Kulkarni
Publisher: B L Institute of Indology

Page 93

The Relevance of RASA Theory to Modern Literature
K. KRISHNAMOORTHY
"Criticism can never be a science : it is, in the first place, much too personal, and in the second, it is concerned with values that science ignores. The touchstone is emotion, not reason. We judge a work of art by its effect on our sincere and vital emotion, and nothing else. All the critical twiddletwaddle about style and form, all this pseudo-scientific classifying and analysing of books in an imitation-botanical fashion, is mere impertinence and mostly dull jargon.... A critic must be able to feel the impact of a work of art in all its complexity and force. To do so, he must be a man of force and complexity himself, which few critics are. The more scholastically educated a man is, generally, the more he is an emotional bore".
-D. H. Lawrence
While reading this passage, one will be reminded of Anandavardhana's dictum: It (i. e. the suggested meaning intended by the poet) is not understood by those who are learned merely in grammar and lexicography. It is understood only by those who have an insight into the true nature of poetic meaning.1 ,and Abhinavagupta's definition of a sahȚdaya :
Responsive critics are those whose mirror-like minds have become perfectly clear by dint of a constant and close perusal of poetic works and as a result of which they acquire the ability to share imaginatively what is described and to attain a heartfelt response within themselves.2
If great poets are rare, rarer are perceptive critics. In the history of the world's literature on poetry these two figures,-Anandavardhana and Abhinavagupta--stand out as two peaks of Indian thought as they combined in themselves the all too rare endowments of creative poetry and meticulous
1. sabdārtha-sāsana-jiānamitrenaiva na vedyate/
vedyate sa tu kävyārtha-tattvajñaireva kevalam// -Dhvanyaloka, I. 7. 2. Yesāṁ kávyänuśilanabhyasa-vaśād-visadībhūte manomukure varnaniyatanmayibhavana
yogyatā te sva-hrdaya-samvādabhājah sahsdayāḥ. -Locana on Dhvanyaloka, I. 1.