Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c10.s2.t27: Jaishankar Prasad
Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c10.s2.t27
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Jaishankar Prasad
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Jaishankar Prasad (January 30, 1889 - January 14, 1937), was a Hindi poet, dramatist and novelist. He was born in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India. He was one of the founders of Hindi literature.
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Jaishankar Prasad was born in a Vaisya family and received formative education and learned Sanskrit, Hindi, Urdu and Persian from his father since he was a child. He was forced to drop out from school due to a family tragedy when he was
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*Jaishankar Prasad*
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in grade 8. Later, he studied at home and began to write. He was deeply interested in Indian languages, literature, history and philosophy, and was greatly influenced by Indian classic philosophy of religion, such as Vedas, Upanishads and Puranas.
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As one of the representatives of Indian literature ‘Chhayavad’ in 1920s and 1930s, he mainly wrote lyric poems with strong romantic elements and the contents mainly describe the natural scenes, free love and the expression of religious feelings. Such collections of poems include *Kanan Kusum* (1912), *Chitradhar* (1918), *Jharna* (1918), *Ansu* (1925) and *Lahar* (1933). *Ansu* made him a famous poet. *Ansu* consists of 190 quatrains and expresses his recollection of love and parting disappointment with rich figures of speech. Another of his representative works is Kamayani (1935) that was composed based on an Indian myth of creation of the world by Manu, and expresses the metaphor of modern society. Kamayani is regarded as an epic in the late period of Chhayavad. Moreover, he created some patriotic poems, which played an active role in Indian national independent movement.
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Jaishankar Prasad also made some achievements in drama writing. He composed over 10 dramas with historical themes, full of philosophy and poetry. His dramas were composed to inspire Indian people’s national spirit and patriotic feelings. His representative dramas include Ajatshatru (1922), Kamna (1925), Skandagupta (1928), Chandragupta (1931) and Dhruvasvamini (1933).
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He wrote three full-length novels and five collections of short stories, but they were not as influential as his poems and dramas.
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Jaishankar Prasad paid close attention to Chinese history and once integrated Chinese elements into his creations. He described Xuanzang as the embodiment of tolerance and mercy in his drama Rajyashri (1915) and depicted his contact with Harshavardhana, which has improved the transmission of Chinese culture in India to some extent. Chinese scholars began to study Jaishankar Prasad in 1980s. In 1982, On Kamayani, the first master thesis studying Jaishankar Prasad in China, was published. Liu Anwu introduced the life and major works of Jaishankar Prasad in his book, The History of Hindi Literature (1987), and translated some sections of Ansu, Lahar and Kamayani. Jiang Jingkui also makes a systematic and comprehensive analysis and discussion of the creation process, works, contents and characteristics of Jaishankar Prasad’s dramas in Hindi Dramatic Literature (2002).
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(*Jiang Jingkui & Jia Yan*)