A History of Indian Literature v3.c35.s6.73

v3.c35.s6.73

Another work, that is frequently attributed to Kālidāsa is Nalodaya¹, although, on account of its style it could not have belonged to a great poet. We nowhere find in Kālidāsa such artificial metres, such fine rhymes and such a work of artistically developed kāvya-style as are presented by this poem. The epic describes in four cantos the well-known tale of Nala and Damayantī "in so artificial a form that to turn an Iliad into sonnets would be a child's play compared to it"². The poet shows extreme fascination for internal rhyming (yamaka)³ and alliteration. Perhaps the writer of the Nalodaya is Ravideva, son of Nārāyaṇa, who wrote also (as is often the case with Indian poets) a commentary on his own work. Ravideva is the writer of also a small poem of 20 stanzas, Kāvyarākṣasa or Rākṣasakāvya⁴, upon which too he wrote a commentary likewise, and what is composed in the same style, a work that in the matter of lack of taste and in euphemism is similar to the Nalodaya and like-wise is attributed to Kālidāsa⁵. We, however, know nothing more about Ravideva or his age⁶.