Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c11.s3.t5.2

v2.c11.s3.t5.2

*Natyashastra* covers the text theory of drama, music and dance, and standard of stage practice. The first chapter discusses the origin, nature and function of drama. The second to fifth chapters discuss the theater and dance, etc. The sixth and seventh chapters expound the theory of rasa. The concept of “rasa” is from vedic literature, with the original meaning of “juice”, “fluid”, “flavour” etc and in the *Upanisad* it is extended to “one of the five objects of sense (colour, sound, smell, taste and touch). Bharatamuni follows the concept of “taste”, and gives it more comprehensive and profound meaning, making the theory of taste become a theoretical center for stage performance practice. Bharatamuni also puts forward another important concept “feeling”, and thinks it is the cause and means of producing “taste”, it can refer to the situation, character, event, and also action or emotion, thus, “producing the taste associated with various performances”. The theories of feeling and taste in *Natyashastra* exert a profound influence upon Indian literature and art at that time. Later, they are widely used in the fields of poetics and art, and are still the soul of the aesthetic theory system in India up to now, as Bharata Gupt says: “Taste is not only the soul of poetry and drama, but also the soul of music, dance and painting”. *Natyashastra* thinks that feeling in the drama includes “common feeling”, “unsteady feeling” and “true feeling”, among them, eight common feelings include “love, laugh, sadness, anger, courage, fear, boredom and shock”, and unsteady feeling is actually “flexible feeling”, like true feeling, it is also attached to common feelings. These common feelings will produce the tastes that