A History of Sanskrit Literature c19.s4.3.3

c19.s4.3.3

In the first he is carried off in sleep and ends by espousing another Vidyādhara maiden, Lalitalocanā, with whom he spends time on mount Malaya, but is saddened by longing for Madanamañcukā; Lalitalocanā disappears, but a hermit, Piçaṅgajaṭa, comforts him by telling him the tale of Mṛgāṅkadatta, a prince of Ayodhyā, who won in marriage Çaçāṅkavatī, daughter of his enemy Karmasena of Ujjain, who gives the book its name (ix). The next consolation is administered by Kaṇva and consists in the narration of a vast cycle of legends of the emperor Vikramāditya, though it is inconceivable that Guṇāḍhya himself could have been guilty of so flagrant an anachronism; the title is Viṣamaçīla (x). In xi, Madirāvatī, the prince is encouraged to persevere by the tale of two Brahmins who by manly effort (*puruṣakāra*) succeeded in defying the decrees of fate (*karman*) and achieving their desire, and he also recovers the missing and apparently not much regretted, Lalitalocanā. Yet another episode follows: Gomukha tells the tale of the emperor Muktāphalaketu and his beloved Padmāvatī, who gives the book its name (xii).