Kavyamimamsa of Rajasekhara (Study)
by Debabrata Barai | 2014 | 105,667 words
This page relates ‘Viddhashalabhanjika of Rajashekhara’ of the English study on the Kavyamimamsa of Rajasekhara: a poetical encyclopedia from the 9th century dealing with the ancient Indian science of poetics and rhetoric (also know as alankara-shastra). The Kavya-mimamsa is written in eighteen chapters representing an educational framework for the poet (kavi) and instructs him in the science of applied poetics for the sake of making literature and poetry (kavya).
Part 12 - The Viddhaśālabhañjikā of Rājaśekhara
[Full title: The Dramas of Rājaśekhara: (ii) The Viddhaśālabhañjikā]
It is a Nāṭikā . Viśvanātha in his Sāhityadarpaṇa says about Nāṭikā as:
“nāṭikā klṛptavṛttā syāt strīprāyā caturaṅkikā |
prakhyāto dhīralalitastastatra syānnāyako nṛpaḥ ||”- Sāhityadarpaṇa of Viśvanātha: VI/ 269
And in the Nāṭyaśāstra says:
“pūrvasthito vipadyate nāyako yatra cāparastiṣṭhet |
tamapoha narmagarbha vidvān nāṭ yaprayogeṣu ||”- Nāṭyaśāstra of Bharata: XX/ 62
It composes into four acts by Rājaśekhara. There the heroine Mṛgāṅkāvatī is sent by her father disguised as a boy to king Vidyādharamalla. The king also had already a dream of her. The queen has found a bride, Kuvalayamālā for the boy. But the bride is found as a slave; the king and the jester find Mṛgāṅkāvatī reading a loveletter in the garden. The minister Bhāgurāyaṇa also had employed a magical device to manufacture the kings dream, because a prophesy of her husband attaining preeminence.
Further the king and Vidūṣaka meet with the heroine. The queen persuades the king to marry the boy’s sister, intending to mortify the king with a male bride. After the marriage take place a messenger from the disguised girl’s father comes and say a son is born to him and his daughter may now give up the disguise. The queen also realized that she has been tricked thus she preserve her dignity and gives Mṛgāṅkāvatī and Kuvalayamālā to the king in marriage. In this way with the marriage of Vidyādharamalla with Mṛgāṅkāvatī and Kuvalayamālā the Nāṭikā is end.
There the rasa is Śṛṅgāra and the descriptions of the twilight, spring and moon-light etc. are very nice and attractive. In this Nāṭikā, Rājaśekhara seems too influenced by Harṣa’s Ratnāvalī. About this play, I. Sekhar feel that, “All his works are influenced by Kālidāsa, Harṣa, Bhavabhūti and perhaps even by Murārī, but he fails to improve his style and diction because he considered himself more competent than his predecessors[1].