Studies In Sanskrit Sahitya Shastra

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

Page 26

Studies in
The Kāvyānuśāsana 33 of Vāgbhata II (14th Century A. D.) together with the commentary Alankāratilaka by the author himself treats of this topic-plagiarism. The author, however, who largely borrows from the Kāvyamimāṁsā of Rājasekhara, the Kävyaprakāśa of Mammata, the Kāvyānuśāsana of Hemacandra and other works shows absolutely no originality in the discussion of plagiarism. He simply reproduces this portion from Rājasekhara and Kșemendra or perhaps from Hemacandra's work directly, who as has been already stated, draws on Rājasekhara and Kșemendra. He defines the modes of borrowing after his predecessors-with slight change in wording or consti uction. He, however, quotes examples selected from other works barring a few from his predecessors on this theme of plagiarism.
Subhāṣitaratnabhāņdāgāram contains one verse (whose source is not traced) on a plagiarist :
कविरनुहरति च्छायां पदमेकं पादमेकमध वा ।
TROEN 1899 HA11-P. 39 v. No. 12 i. e., "A poet imitates the general colour of a poet's idea, borrows a word or two, a verse-line or half of the verse of former poets. Our salutations (-said ironically) to him, who dares plagiarise a whole work."
The Vajjālagga34, a Prakrit anthology, has two verses in which a poet and a thief are compared :
कहकहवि रएइ पयं मग पुलएइ छेयमारुहइ । चोरो व्व कई अस्थं घेत्तण कहवि निव्वहइ ॥ सद्दावसद्दभीरू पए पए किं पि किं पि चिंततो।
GF Fela quale a 3479 the stica 11- VV. 22-23 This comparison between the poet and the thief, based on double- meaning words such as (word, step) ATC (style, way), F (T) (a kind of alliteration, a breach in the wall), 379 (idea, wealth) faiz (to carry out, complete the poem, extricate or maintain oneself), qe qe (at the end of each quarter of the stanza, at every step), REAU (a word, and an ungrammatical word; noise and censure) is striking indeed ! A Scrutiny of the Views of the Sanskrit Writers on Plagiarism:
It is a fact that a literary thief figures in prefaces to poetical works ‘seldom in comparison with the poet's more usual enemies, the Khala, or the hostile and the Piśuna, the envious man'. It is Bāna who distinctly condemns, perhaps for the first time, in the preface to his Harşacarita the poet-thief. This condemnation suggests that the plagiarist, in Bāņa's days, was a menace to good and great poets.
knew, and consequently he does not hesitate to reproduce the wisdom of his Brāhmana predecessor
while making substantial addition to the stores he has inherited." 33 Kävyamālā edition (vol. 43) Chapter 1 pp. 12-14. 34 It is a late work, of uncertain dato, dous not mention th: sources from which the writer has
culled the verses.