Part 15 - Sāhityadarpaṇa of Viṣvanātha

[Post-Dhvani Theory of Sanskrit Poetics (8): The Sāhityadarpaṇa of Viṣvanātha (14th century A.D.)]

In the galaxy of Sanskrit Poetics Viśvanātha is a star for some merits of its own. He was a poet and quotes his own verses in Sanskrit and Prākṛt with illustrating the canon of poetic. His poetical work Sāhityadarpaṇa is that it presents in the compass of single work, which a complete and full treatment of the science of Poetics in all its branches. However it is contains on the technicalities of the dramatic art and forms of Bharata’s Nāṭyaśāstra and Daśarūpaka of Dhanañjaya. This work mainly based on Mammaṭa’s Kāvyaprakāśa and deals with dramatic concepts, which was left by most of the Sanskrit poeticians.

Sāhityadarpaṇa is divided into tenth paricchadas and written in the usual form of sūtra and vṛtti. There Viśvanātha discusses all the topics of Sanskrit Poetics in very simple and easy languages.

In this work he dedicated the chapters as:

1. Definition of Poetry,
2. Three vṛttis of word and sense,
3. Rasa,
4. Dhvani and Gunibhūta-vaṅgya,
5. Establishment of Vyañjanā-vṛtti,
6. Dramturgy,
7. Doṣa,
8. Guṇa,
9. four rītis; Vaidarbhī, Gauḍiya, Pāñ chālī and Lāti and
10. Alaṃkāras.

In the first chapter Viśvanātha defines kāvya as:

“vākyaṃ rasātmakaṃ kāvyam |”

- Sāhityadarpaṇa of Viśvanātha: I/ 3

Kāvya (poetry) is a sentence having rasa as its soul. The credit of boldly stating rasa as the soul of poetry goes Viśvanātha’s definition. By this definition we remind the celebrated words of Wordsworth, who says that poetry as: ‘spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings’ and ‘emotion recollected in tranquility’. However Wordsworth view on poetry on the standpoint of the poet, but Viśvanātha’s views stand on the point of sahṛdaya (reader).^[1]

In this definition P. V. Kane remarks that,

‘some give a definition of kāvya which is more difficult than the thing to be defined (such as that of Viśvanātha)’^[2].

And again wrote in the note of Sāhityadarpaṇa, ‘Viśvanātha, on the other hand after a good deal of hair splitting, offer us a definition which does not leave us any the wiser after reading it^[3]. Whatever, in the spite of his giving a supreme position of rasa in poetry, his definition is not free from defects. His work is devoid of originality and shows a placid borrowing from Mammaṭa, Abhinavagupta and Rājaśekhara.^[4]

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

T. G. Manikar. Some Observations of the Definition of Poetry.

[2]:

Kane, P. V. History of Sanskrit Poetics, MLBD, Delhi, 1971, Pp- 352

[3]:

Sāhityadarpaṇa, I,II, IX, with note. P. V. Kane, Oriental Book Agency, Poona, 1951, Pp-16

[4]:

Keith, A. B. History Sanskrit Literature, Pp-359