Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

A History of Sanskrit Literature c25.s4: 4. The Critics and Supporters of the Doctrine of Dhvani

A History of Sanskrit Literature c25.s4

Language
English

4. The Critics and Supporters of the Doctrine of Dhvani

c25.s4.1

The idea of suggestion did not pass unchallenged. Bhaṭṭa Nāyaka in the *Hṛdayadarpaṇa*,¹ perhaps an independent work though there is some evidence of it having been a commentary on the *Nāṭyaçāstra*, who wrote before Abhinavagupta, insisted on his own theory of the effect of words. In addition to denotation, he ascribed to them the faculty of generalization, Bhāvakatva, which consists in making the meaning intelligible as universal to the audience, while a third power, Bhojakatva, results in the audience relishing the enjoyment of the poem. This condition is one of an enjoyment which cannot be described, but which is marked, as we have seen, by the melting, expansion, and extension of the mind. The loss of his work makes it very difficult to appreciate what Nāyaka exactly intended to convey.

c25.s4.2

¹ Cf. M. Hiriyanna, POPC. 1919, ii. 246 ff., who regards him as expressing the Sāṁkhya view of aesthetic joy as arising beyond nature to something finer if not real, while the Vedānta view rests on the revelation of the absolutely real which is joy.

c25.s4.3

More fortunate is Kuntala, probably a contemporary of Abhinavagupta, whose *Vakroktijīvita*¹ is an effort to present in a new and improved form the idea vaguely present to Bhāmaha and those who laid stress on figures as the essential feature of poetry. He insists that Vakrokti, crooked or figurative speech, is the life of poetry, distinguishing it from science and any merely ordinary or natural mode of expressing facts of any sort. It is, therefore, a deviation from the ordinary language of life in order to produce a certain striking effect (*vicchitti*), or an imaginative turn of speech (*bhaṅgī-bhaṇiti*). Poetry, therefore, is to be defined as embellished sound and sense, the embellishment being figurative speech, and as this is the only Alaṁkāra possible, and as it is essential to poetry, it is absurd to have any definition which omits figures or makes them subordinate. He goes in great detail through all the forms of poetry in order to show that the principle of Vakrokti covers adequately all developments, citing copious examples from the poets, especially Kālidāsa. It is to the imagination or skill of the poet, his work (*kavikarman*), that we owe the presence of Vakrokti in any poem, and this work can be classed according as he exhibits it in regard to the letters, to the base or termination of words, to a sentence, a particular topic, or a treatise as a whole. It is clear that we have here in part a reminiscence of the doctrine of an element of hyperbole in all poetry asserted by Bhāmaha; a poem attains at best a transcendental charm (*lokottara vaicitrya*), which can be judged in the long run only by the man of taste, a result in which Kuntala agrees largely with the theory which he attacks.

c25.s4.4

¹ Ed. S. K. Dé, Calcutta, 1923.

c25.s4.5

The strength of this position is clearly the room it finds to allow of accepting figures on their own merits, and not as ancillary to a sentiment as essential features of poetry; we have their cause in the poet's imagination (*kavipratibhā*), and their effect is a definite fact, a species of charm. Mammaṭa gladly accepts this fact and, when figures do not affect sentiment, still declares that they have charm (*vaicitrya*), and Ruyyaka built up his treatment of figures on this basis. To complete his theory Kuntala naturally endeavours to bring both sentiment and suggestion under the scope of his principle, with just as much success as the opposite effort achieved.

c25.s4.6

Mahiman Bhaṭṭa,¹ who was later than Abhinavagupta, developed in lieu a doctrine which declined to accept the views of Kuntala, but claimed that Dhvani could always be reduced to inference (*anumāna*), and that there was no such thing as immediate apprehension of sentiment, but that between the factors and the result there intervened some space, however short, during which the function of inherence was active. He criticized severely the failure of Dhvanikāra to give a definition of poetry which would be comprehensive, and in his second chapter he deals at some length, incidental to his main object, with propriety (*aucitya*) dealing with defects of sense, such as the wrong use of the factors, &c., and of form, such as the failure to co-ordinate the parts of a proposition, break in regular order, violation of syntax, tautology, and pleonasm. The work, however, is hardly of much consequence, for it deals merely with the question of the form of apprehension which is artistically of negligible importance.

c25.s4.7

¹ *Vyaktiviveka*, with comm. (poss. by Ruyyaka), TSS. 5, 1909.

c25.s4.8

Other authors remained outside the sphere of the influence of the new doctrine. Thus the section on poetics of the *Agni Purāṇa*,² which is of uncertain date, and Bhoja's large *Sarasvatīkaṇṭhābharaṇa*³ show that other theories were prevalent, though their scope extended to minor issues. The Purāṇa adopts the ordinary definition of poetry as possessing qualities and figures and being free from defects, while Bhoja requires it to possess sentiment, but neither has any effective discussion of the vital character of poetry. The Purāṇa, however, recognizes the doctrine of styles, making four as in Rudraṭa, and combining their marks of distinction so as to include the kinds of letters used, the length of compounds, and the use of metaphor. Bhoja adds two more styles, Āvantikā, intermediate between Vaidarbhī and Pāñcālī, and Māgadhī, which is a defective style (*khaṇḍarīti*). The Purāṇa introduces a new complication in the shape of distinguishing particular and general qualities; the latter are given as seven of sound, six of sense, and six of both, while figures are classed as of sound, of sense, and of both. Bhoja accepts this and gives absurdly twenty-four of each. His extensive citations and authority lent him some popularity without affecting substantially poetic theory. His treatment of sentiment in the *Sarasvatīkaṇṭhābharaṇa* is supplemented by the *Çrṅgāraprakāça* where, as in Rudra Bhaṭṭa's *Çrṅgāratilaka*, the erotic sentiment is made the chief feature.

c25.s4.9

² cc. 336-46. Kane (*Sāhityadarpaṇa*, pp. iii-v) puts it after Ānandavardhana, contrary to Dé's view (*Sanskrit Poetics*, i. 103).

c25.s4.10

³ Ed. A. Borooah, Calcutta, 1883-4.

c25.s4.11

The doctrine of Dhvani was adopted by Mammaṭa, as we have seen, who with Alaṭa (Alaka, Allaṭa) set out the theory in the *Kāvyaprakāça*¹ about 1100 in a complete and careful form in the shape of Sūtras with a commentary; the theory of a different origin of these two is unfounded, and his coadjutor aided him or wrote parts of Ullāsas vii and x at least. Mammaṭa attempted to supply the lacuna criticized by the *Vyaktiviveka* and defined a poem as sound and sense, free from defects, possessing qualities and sometimes figures, ignoring as essential sentiment, although he makes the qualities essentially attributes of the sentiment, a defect which Viçvanātha sought to remedy by defining poetry as having sentiment as its soul, rejecting thus either subject or figure as a real object of suggestion. Mammaṭa has three qualities, reducing others to them and including under them the styles and manners of earlier writers, while defects he classes as those of sentiment, of word, proposition, and sense, a division later often followed. Figures he treated as of sound, of sense, and, a small number, of both. Viçvanātha's *Sāhityadarpaṇa*¹ (*c.* 1350) largely follows Mammaṭa, but it uses also the treatises on drama which it includes. He, however, accepts the doctrine of styles, regarded as an arrangement of words (*pada-saṁghaṭanā*) in a special way and admits four: Vaidarbhī or dainty, with letters indicating sweetness and no or short compounds; Gauḍī, with letters indicating strength and long compounds; Pāñcālī, containing other letters than those mentioned and compounds of five or six words; and Lāṭī, intermediate between Pāñcālī and Vaidarbhī. On figures he shows often the influence of Ruyyaka. His work takes the now usual form of Sūtra and commentary. Similar in spirit and manner are the *Ekāvalī*² of Vidyādhara and the *Pratāparudrayaçobhūṣaṇa*³ of Vidyānātha, both written *c.* 1300, the one for Narasiṁha of Orissa, the other for Pratāparudra of Warangal, whose glory is celebrated in a drama included in it to illustrate the rules of dramaturgy. Both are more orthodox than Viçvanātha in accepting subject and figure as objects of suggestion as well as sentiment. Vidyādhara, however, follows Bhoja in enumerating twenty-four qualities in defiance of the reduction of this head to three of sound only by the school.

c25.s4.12

¹ Ed. with various commentaries, Calcutta, 1866; Benares, 1866; BSS. 1917; ĀnSS. 1911; KM. 63, 1897. Cf. Sukthankar, ZDMG. lxvi. 477 ff., 533 ff. Trans. G. Jhā, Benares, 1918. Māṇikyacandra's comm. (1160 A. D.) is ed., Mysore, 1922.

c25.s4.13

¹ Ed. and trans. BI. 1851-75; Kane, Bombay, 1923. Cf. Keith, JRAS. 1911, pp. 848 f.

c25.s4.14

² Ed. BSS. 63, 1903.

c25.s4.15

³ Ed. BSS. 65, 1909.

c25.s4.16

In the contemporary of Mammaṭa, Hemacandra, we find a placid borrowing from Mammaṭa, Abhinavagupta, Rājaçekhara, the *Vakroktijīvita*, and so on. His *Kāvyānuçāsana*,⁴ with the *Viveka* by himself, is destitute of originality, but contains a section on dramaturgy. Even less valuable are the works of the two Vāgbhaṭas, of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries respectively, who wrote the *Vāgbhaṭālaṁkāra*⁵ in verse and the *Kāvyānuçāsana*⁶ in the normal form. The older tries a new definition of poetry to include quality, figure, sentiment, and style, but makes no effort to weld these into a whole, while he adopts the old set of ten qualities; the younger accepts Hemacandra's definition, which is merely a rehash of Mammaṭa's in a worse form, and allows only three qualities. Neither seems to accept Dhvani as essential; the younger mentions it under the figure Paryāyokta and refers readers to Ānandavardhana.

c25.s4.17

⁴ Ed. KM. 71, 1901.

c25.s4.18

⁵ Ed. KM. 48, 1915.

c25.s4.19

⁶ Ed. KM. 43, 1894.

c25.s4.20

Of very different importance is the work of Ruyyaka, the teacher of Maṅkha, who wrote (*c.* 1100) the *Alaṁkārasarvasva*,¹ text and commentary, though the commentator Samudrabandhu² (*c.* 1300) ascribes the comment to Maṅkha, who may have helped in his teacher's work. Ruyyaka summarizes cleverly all earlier systems and asserts the validity of the Dhvanikāra's view. His own aim is to deal with the pictorial poem which does not suggest anything, and therefore with figures which are its essence. In doing so he clearly accepts the principle of the *Vakroktijīvita* that it is a certain charm which gives a figure its being and value. Such charm does not permit of exact description, as it is as infinite as the poet's imagination which produces it, but it is this which forms the basis of any figure, and justifies our asserting that it is a figure and differentiating it from others. In detail he often follows with improvements Udbhaṭa whom he much admired. He disagrees with Mammaṭa on the vexed issue of Çleṣa; the latter admitted figures both of sound and sense in this case, basing the distinction on the fact that in Çabda-çleṣa the substitution of a synonym would ruin the effect, in Artha-çleṣa it would make no difference. Ruyyaka's view is that the real thing to consider is whether the word in question yields the double meaning without change of form, that is by having another sense, when it is Artha-çleṣa, or whether the word must be differently divided and read when it is Çabda-çleṣa. He rejects, on the other hand, Udbhaṭa's dogma that a Çleṣa destroys the operation of any other figure with which it is joined. Though comparatively early in date, Jayadeva's *Candrāloka*³ is no more than a convenient manual of figures with happy illustrations, on which (*c.* 1600) Appayya Dīkṣita the polymath based his *Kuvalayānanda*.⁴ Very different is the *Rasagaṅgādhara*⁵ of Jagannātha (*c.* 1650), where we find the revised definition of poetry as sound expressive of a charming idea (*ramaṇīyārthapratipādakaḥ çabdaḥ*), and charmingness is ascribed to knowledge begetting transcendental pleasure (*lokottarāhlāda*); this characteristic of pleasure is a distinct entity which one realizes by experience, and it is also denoted by Camatkāratva. The cause of this form of pleasure is a form of meditation (*bhāvanā*), consisting of continued application to the object characterized by the pleasure. It is quite different from the joy produced by the thought of the meaning of what is said to one, e. g. ‘A son is born to you.’ Poetry, therefore, can be redefined as sound expressing a sense which is the object of a contemplation producing transcendental pleasure. This is, it will be seen, a development to a logical conclusion of the doctrine of the enjoyment of sentiment; that was essentially universal and impersonal, therefore purely pleasurable, and this test Jagannātha now applies to the whole field of poetry. In his treatment of figures in like manner he applies, but more ably even than Ruyyaka, and very critically as regards earlier writers, the test whether any alleged figure produces charm of a different kind from some other accepted figure.

c25.s4.21

¹ KM. 35, 1893; trans. H. Jacobi, ZDMG. lxii.

c25.s4.22

² TSS. 40, 1915.

c25.s4.23

³ Ed. Calcutta, 1917.

c25.s4.24

⁴ Ed. and trans. Calcutta, 1903. Cf. IOC. ii. 340 ff.

c25.s4.25

⁵ Ed. KM. 12, 1913. Cf. Jacobi, GN. 1908, pp. 1 ff.

c25.s4.26

Of other treatises it is necessary to mention the works of the polymath Kṣemendra, *Aucityavicāra*¹ and *Kavikaṇṭhābharaṇa*,² as they stand rather apart from the ordinary line. In the former Kṣemendra develops the conception of Aucitya, propriety as essential to sentiment, indeed the life of sentiment, and as founded in the charm underlying the relish of sentiment. He finds twenty-seven cases in which propriety can be exhibited or violated, and the value of his work lies in his rich illustration and his criticisms of what he deems defects. Such critiques on an extended scale are rare, and Kṣemendra is a better critic than a poet. The *Kavikaṇṭhābharaṇa* discusses the possibility of becoming a poet, the issue of borrowing on a small or large scale, and the legitimacy of doing so in the case of the epic and similar works, the charm of poetry with illustration of its ten aspects, the defects and excellencies with regard to sense, sound, or sentiment, and the various arts which a poet ought to be familiar with. The *Kāvyakalpalatā*,³ with a commentary, by Arisiṅha and Amaracandra (13th cent.) is still more of a practical book of advice to poets, while Bhānudatta in the fourteenth century wrote on sentiment in his *Rasamañjarī* ¹ and *Rasataraṅgiṇī*.²

c25.s4.27

¹ Ed. KM. i. 115 ff.; Peterson, JBRAS. xvi. 167 ff.

c25.s4.28

² Ed. KM. iv. 122 ff.; I. Schönberg, SWA. 1884.

c25.s4.29

³ Ed. Benares, 1886. Cf. IOC. i. 339 ff.; ii. 337 f.

c25.s4.30

¹ Ed. BenSS. 83, 1904.

c25.s4.31

² Ed. Benares, 1885; Regnaud, *Rhétorique Sanscrite* (1884).

c25.s4.32

In the *Sarasvatīkaṇṭhābharaṇa* ³ we find an elaborate discussion of a theme dealt with in some detail by Rudraṭa alone of the earlier writers, the mingling of languages. Thus, while we may and normally do have a single language used throughout, we may have cases in which the same words can be read, for instance, both as Sanskrit and Prākrit with one and the same meaning; or, again, a verse may be made up of distinct párts in different languages, or different languages may simply be mixed together, giving a consecutive sense, or they may be written consecutively without such a sense, or degraded forms of Prākrit or Apabhraṅça may be used in parody or in imitation. Rudraṭa ⁴ mentions the two simple forms in which the same words can be read in another language in the same sense or in a different sense. Of this we have an early example in Canto xiii of the Kāvya of Bhaṭṭi, where the text can be read as Prākrit as well as Sanskrit without alteration of sense. There is little to be said for these absurdities, though occasional instances of happy adoption of these devices can be cited.

c25.s4.33

³ ii. 17 with Ratneçvara's comm. Cf. Rāma Tarkavāgīça, iii. 15. 4 ff. (AMJV. III. i. 138 ff.); Schubring, *Festgabe Jacobi*, pp. 89 ff.

c25.s4.34

⁴ iv. 10–23. Cf. *Sāhityadarpaṇa*, x. 10 (642).

c25.s4.35

On the classification of figures of speech no serious thought appears to have been expended. Mammaṭa, whose actual treatment of individual figures dominates Ruyyaka, gives no guidance, while Ruyyaka ⁵ offers a division of figures of sense based on the principles of comparison (*aupamya*), incongruity (*virodha*), linked succession (*çṛṅkhalā*), logical reasoning (*nyāya*), sentence economy (*vākyanyāya*), popular maxims (*lokanyāya*), apprehension of a secret sense (*gūḍhārthapratīti*), and combination of figures (*saṁsṛṣṭi* or *saṁkara*). Nothing substantial is added to this in the later texts by Vidyādhara and Viçvanātha. It is not worth while investigating the precise meaning attached to this division, especially as some of the figures included in these divisions, such as Yathāsaṁkhya in which, for instance, epithets are asserted in the same order as the subjects are set out, are denied any true quality of charm by Jayaratha and Jagannātha. The division even in Ruyyaka is not logical, manifesting a characteristic defect of Sanskrit investigation, and in a number of cases the justification for the existence of distinct figures is quite wanting. The validity in other cases of the distinctions does exist, and the real criticism is that it is hardly worth while inventing special terms for the variant forms. Thus the idea that the face of the beloved is like the moon can be utilized to illustrate a long series of figures, based on similarity. ‘Thy face is like the moon’ is simile, Upamā; ‘The moon is like thy face’ is the converse, Pratīpa; but in ‘Thy face shineth ever, the moon by night alone’ we have contrast, Vyatireka. ‘The moon doth reign in heaven, thy face on earth’ illustrates typical comparison, Prativastūpamā, while ‘In the heaven the moon, on earth thy face,’ is an instance of exemplification, Dṛṣṭānta; illustration, Nidarçanā, is seen in ‘Thy face doth bear the beauty of the moon,’ and indirect eulogy, Aprastutapraçaṅsā, in ‘The moon doth pale before thy face.’ Or the simile may be repeated, Upameyopamā, ‘The moon is like thy face, thy face is like the moon,’ or we have remembrance, Smaraṇa, ‘The sight of the moon doth bring thy face before me.’ Or we have metaphor, Rūpaka, in ‘Thy moon-face,’ which develops into commutation, Pariṇāma, in ‘By thy moon-face, the heat of passion doth wane.’ In ‘Is this thy face or the moon?’ we have doubt, Saṁdeha; in ‘The Cakora, thinking it to be the moon, flieth toward thy face’ confusion, Bhrāntimat; while different representations, Ullekha, may be seen in ‘This the moon, this the lotus; so the Cakora and the bee fly to thy face.’ Or we may have negation, Apahnuti, ‘This is the moon, not thy face,’ or self-comparison, Ananvaya, ‘Thy face is like thy face alone,’ with which may be compared the famous verse of the *Rāmāyaṇa*¹ cited above. Or we may have lively fancy, Utprekṣā, as in ‘This is indeed the moon,’ or hyperbole, Atiçayokti, in ‘This is a second moon.’ Or we may have equal pairing, Tulyayogitā, ‘The moon and the lotus are vanquished by thy face,’ or illumination, Dīpaka, as in ‘Thy face and the moon rejoice in the night.’² Or, to conclude, we have the typical comparison, Prativastūpamā, in another form illustrated by a beautiful verse from the *Çakuntalā*, as a welcome change from these aridities:

c25.s4.36

⁵ Cf. Kane, *Sāhityadarpaṇa*, pp. 336 f.; Trivedi, *Ekāvalī*, pp. 526 f.; Ruyyaka, pp. 143, 148, 164.

c25.s4.37

¹ Above, chap. ii, § 3.

c25.s4.38

² Dé, *Sanskrit Poetics*, ii. 87 f.

c25.s4.39

*mānuṣīṣu kathaṁ vā syād asya rūpasya sambhavaḥ?*
*na prabhātaralaṁ jyotir udeti vasudhātalāt.*

c25.s4.40

‘Nay, how could such beauty be born among men? Not from the earth doth the tremulous loveliness of the lightning arise.’

Cites (23)