Hindu-Literature PDF

# Chapter 5: Hindu Literature ## Objectives: 1. Identify facts and figures on India 2. Discuss India's system of government 3. Trace its history since 1947 to present 4. Find pleasure in discussing the general view of the Indian literature, i.e., religious and secular works 5. Appreciate the great...

# Chapter 5: Hindu Literature ## Objectives: 1. Identify facts and figures on India 2. Discuss India's system of government 3. Trace its history since 1947 to present 4. Find pleasure in discussing the general view of the Indian literature, i.e., religious and secular works 5. Appreciate the great epics of India, Mahabharata, and Ramayana 6. Study the life and writings of India's great writers ## Introduction: INDIA India, the world's second most populous nation (after China) and the seventh largest in area, is located in South Asia on the Indian subcontinent. It is about 3,000 km (1,865 mi) wide and has, because of its peninsular shape, a shoreline of about 7,000 km (4,350 mi) along the Bay of Bengal on the east and the Arabian Sea on the west. India's land frontier of about 5,700 km (3,540 mi) is shared with Pakistan on the west; with China (mostly Tibet), Nepal, and Bhutan on the north; and with Bangladesh and Burma.on the east. In-dia's seventh neighbor is the island nation of Sri Lanka, located off the southern tip of the peninsula. Northeast India is virtually isolated from the rest of the nation by the country of Bangladesh. Also part of India are the Laccadive Islands off the western coast and the Andaman and Nicobar islands, located in the eastern portion of the Bay of Bengal. India and Bharat are both official names. The early settlers called their land "Bharat Varsha" or "Bharat" and during medieval times it was known as "Hind." The name India, which derives from the Indus River and was used by the ancient Greeks and Persians, came into wide usage during the colonial period. Indian culture is of great antiquity. The earliest Indian civilization grew up in the Indus Valley from 4000 to 2500 B.C. Beginning about 1500 B.C., Aryan invaders entered India from the northwest and intermingled with the local Dravidian population. The foundations of Indian society, including Hinduism and the caste system, were established from these two groups. Buddhism and Jainism also began in ancient India. The culture was subject to strong Islamic influences beginning in the 11th century and continuing under the Mogul Empire (established 1526). After 1750 the subcontinent was absorbed piecemeal into the British Empire, the local princes and rulers retaining some of their autonomy. India can be divided into three main topographic regions: the Himalayan mountain system on the north; the Northern Plains, drained by the Indus, Ganges, and Brahmaputra rivers in north central India; and Peninsular India in the south. The Himalayas form parts of India's borders with Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Tibet in the west and with Nepal, Bhutan, and Tibet in the east. The region is topographically complex and divided into prominent elongated valleys and mountain ranges. The highest mountains are in the Karakoram Range, where more than 30 peaks rise above 7,300 m (24,000 ft). South of the Karakoram are the Great Himalayas, which include Nanda Devi (7,817 m/ 25,645 ft), the highest peak in the country. Between the two major ranges is the narrow valley of the Upper Indus River. Southwest of the Great Himalayas and between them and the lower front ranges of the mountain system is the 160 km-long (100-mi) Vale of Kashmir, which focuses on the town of Srinagar. To the east, the mountains from most of Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh. The Northern Plains are part of a vast lowland extending across the subcontinent from Pakistan in the west to Bangladesh (formerly East Pakistan) in the east. The plains are bordered on the north by foothills of the Himalayas; south of the Bramaputra basin are the Khasi Hills and Shilong Plateau; and south of the Indo-Gangetic Plain rise the Beas and Sutlej rivers, which are tributaries of the Indus; in the east by the Brahmaputra; and in the rest of India by the Ganges and its many tributaries. ## People India has one of the world's most diverse populations, with most of the major areas represented. Over thousands of years, countless groups have migrated into the subcontinent, and many of these groups have maintained distinctive cultures down through the ages. India's tribal people and the large number of later migrant groups represent a wide variety of physical types and cultural traditions. The earliest Indians may have migrated from Australia and the South Pacific islands. Most subsequent invading groups, however, entered the subcontinent through the mountain passes in the northwest. A great deal of ethnic, racial, and cultural intermingling occurred during these successive waves of migration, contributing directly to the pluralistic nature of modern Indian society. Except in the case of isolated tribal groups, linguistic and cultural practices have become far more important bases of classification than racial criteria. ## Languages More than 200 languages are spoken in India, and linguistic diversity provides an important key to understanding Indian civilization. Four major language groups are represented. The most important of these are the Indo-Arab branch of the Indo-European group (the major linguistic family of Europe) and the Dravidian language group. Hindi, the fourth most widely spoken language in the world, is the language of 30 percent of the population and the official language of India. Hindi and the other Indo-Aryan languages-including Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Kashimiri, Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi, and Urdu-are spoken mainly in the northern part of the country and derive their script from ancient Sanskrit, which is no longer a spoken language. The leading Dravidian languages-Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, and Kannada-are spoken languages. The leading Dravidian languages-Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, and Kannada-are spoken in four southern states. Sino-Tibetan and Austroasiatic languages generally survive only in small and isolated regions. ## Religion India is the birthplace of Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism. Today, it is a secular state, and its constitution guarantees religious tolerance to all groups. Hinduism's adherents constitute about 83% of the population. Another 11% are followers of Islam, and Jains and Buddhists less than 1%. Aside from the Sikh concentration in the Punjab and the Parsis (who practice Zoroastrianism) in the Bombay area, there is no marked regional distribution of religious groups. The Indian caste system, an important facet of Hinduism, is a major social system that groups people according to birth. Although caste should not be confused with class, lower caste groups do perform much of the manual labor and fill most unskilled jobs in the economy. Harijans, formerly known as Untouchables, have traditionally occupied the lowest rung of the social ladder. The Indian legislature provided employment for Harijans and tribal people, but caste consciousness remains important. ## Education India's literacy rate was more than doubled between 1950 and 1988. Literacy is higher among men than among women; it is also much higher in urban areas than in rural ones. Education is the responsibility of both the central and state governments, with the national government setting major policies and the states accountable for their implementation. The education system is free and open to all children through the university level. It provides for eight years of primary education, two years of lower secondary education, and two years of upper secondary education. In all but two states, education is compulsory for children aged 6 to 14, although not all children are able to take advantage of this opportunity. India's universities are generally large, with clusters of affiliated colleges. ## Government The constitution adopted in 1950 provides for a federal system with a parliamentary form of government. Sovereignty is shared between the central government and the states, but the national government is given far greater powers. The office of president is largely ceremonial, with real authority vested in a prime minister and a council of ministers responsible to Parliament. The president, however, has constitutional authority to impose president's rule should a state government appear unable to maintain order and to declare a national state of emergency and supersede parliamentary rule. President's rule was invoked in a number of states in the 1970s and 1980s, and emergency national rule was imposed in 1975 at the urging of then prime minister Indira Gandhi. Parliament consists of two houses, the Raiya Sabha (Council of States) and the Lok Sabha (House of the People). Real power resides in the Lok Sabha, whose members are elected directly by all eligible voters and sit for 5 years unless Parliament is dissolved earlier. The Indian National Congress, the party most identified with the Indian nationalist movement, has remained in control of the central government for all but three years since independence. Despite two major party splits in 1969 and 1978, both led by Indira Gandhi, and many victories by various state and local parties in regional elections, the Congress party has maintained almost unbroken power on the national level. In addition, one family provided India's prime ministers for all but 5 years between 1947 and 1989. Rising discontent with India's leadership caused Congress to lose its parliamentary majority in the November 1989 elections. It won a plurality, but not a majority, of seats in the 1991 elections; P.V. Narasimha Rao, who had succeeded Rajiv Gandhi as party leader, became prime minister in June 1991. ## History The history of India as a sovereign state under its own constitutional government began on August 15, 1947, when the subcontinent was partitioned into the two states of India and Pakistan. Pakistan became an Islamic state, while India opted to become a secular state. The decision to partition British India and turn over power to the new nations within a period of six months left bloody turmoil in its wake. Following independence some 17 million Hindus and Muslims were uprooted and began the long march to their respective new homelands. There were at least one million casualties in the ensuing sectarian violence despite efforts to restore calm by Mahatma Gandhi, the revered father of modern India. Gandhi himself was assassinated on January 20, 1948, by a militant Hindu who believed him to be too kind to Muslims. Nationalist leader Jawaharlal Nehru assumed the prime ministership in 1947 and held the post until his death in 1964. The new government succeeded in integrating more than 500 princely states into the new nation and finally absorbed the last vestiges of empire in 1962 by taking over Portuguese Goa, Daman, and Diu and the French territories of Pondicherry, Karikal, Mahe, and Yanam. Nehru launched India on the path of economic self-sufficiency and gave it an international role far out of proportion to its power by championing a nonaligned foreign policy that was to become the model for many newly independent nations. Territorial disputes with China escalated into a brief border war in 1962, however, and the Nehru government was unable to promote cordial relations with its new neighbor, Pakistan. The struggle for Kashmir, a northern princely state with a Hindu maharaja and a largely Muslim population, led to the first (1947-49) of several armed conflicts between the two countries. In addition, more than 40% of the population remained below the official poverty level. Nehru was succeeded as prime minister by Congress party leader Lal Bahadur Shastri. In 1966, shortly after a peace treaty ending a second war with Pakistan over Kashmir was signed, Shastri died suddenly. Indira Gandhi, Nehru's daughter, emerged as a compromise candidate only to surprise the old-guard Congress leaders with her determined leadership. Gandhi, a strong nationalist, was somewhat more realistic than her father about the nature of Indian society and grew in popularity with the working classes and small farmers. She continued to pursue the ideals of nonalignment while moving close to the USSR, partly because of a 1954 U.S. decision to provide significant military assistance to Pakistan as part of cold-war strategy. Relations between India and the United States reached a low point in 1971, when India supported East Pakistan (now the independent nation of Bangladesh) in the Pakistani civil war. During Gandhi's first decade in office, agricultural production increased; India exploded (1974) its first nuclear weapon; and Sikkim became (1975) a state of India. In June 1975, Gandhi persuaded President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed to invoke a state of emergency that gave her near-dictatorial powers. Opposition leaders were jailed without trial and many constitutional freedoms were curtailed. In March 1977, Gandhi suddenly called a new election, perhaps to legitimatize the powers she had taken under the emergency. Surprisingly, a coalition of parties ranging in ideology from socialists to conservative Hindus (the Janata party) won control of the Lok Sabha. Morarji Desai, a longtime opponent of Gandhi, became prime minister. President Ahmed died that same year, and Neelam Sanjavi Reddy was elected president. The Janata party almost immediately began to break apart, and Desai resigned as prime minister in July 1979. His successor, Charan Singh, resigned in August but headed a caretaker government until January 1980, when new elections returned Gandhi to power. In 1982, Zail Singh was elected president, the first Sikh to serve in that office. His election occurred at a time when Sikhs were calling for more autonomy in Punjab and radical Sikh youths were resorting to violence in an attempt to win a separate Sikh state (Khalistan). Several years of Sikh violence culminated in the invasion of the Golden Temple at Amritsar by Indian troops in June 1984 and the assassination of Gandhi by her own Sikh bodyguards on October 31, 1984. As the government tried to respond to the growing political crisis in Punjab, Gandhi's formerly political older son, Rajiv Gandhi, was thrust into the prime ministership. The youthful Gandhi had an auspicious beginning. His party won the December 1984 general election by a landslide. In 1987, Ramaswami Venkataraman was elected president of India, and the country celebrated its 40th anniversary of independence. Allegations of corruption involving some of Gandhi's close associates began to grow, however, and increasing cynicism about the government was apparent. Successive bad monsoon years in 1987 and 1988 caused India's worst drought of the century, although accumulated food reserves helped the nation weather the drought years. Gandhi's sending of peacekeeping forces to Sri Lanka (1987-90) and his decision to intervene militarily to foil a coup in Maldives in 1988 were criticized by some of his neighbors. Because of violence by Sikh and Kashmiri Muslims the central government imposed harsh police measures. Ethnic groups in other parts of India were also calling for greater autonomy. Despite the central government's acquiescence in creating the new ethnic states of Nagaland and Mizoram in the northeast and a 1988 peace accord with rebels in Tripura, demands for greater cultural and ethnic political power persisted in that area. The Gurkhas of Darjeeling district won local autonomy in 1988. Tribal peoples in northeastern India agitated for the creation of a new state of "Jharkaland," and citizens of Tamil Nadu also called for greater autonomy. In the November 1989 elections, Congress-1 lost its parliamentary majority, Gandhi resigned, and the National Front, led by V.P. Singh, formed a minority government. Internal power struggles led to Singh's resignation on November 7, 1990. He was succeeded by Janata Dal dissident Chandra Shekhar. During new elections in May-June 1991, Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated. His successor as Congress-1 leader was P.V. Narasimha Rao, who became prime minister on June 21. Shankar Dayal Sharma was elected president of India in 1992. As prime minister, Rao move to reduce government involvement in the economy. He faced a rise in Hindu nationalism; the destruction of a mosque in Ayodhya by Hindu extremists in December 1992 sparked India's worst communal violence since independence. Tension in Kashmir, where India and Pakistan fought two of their three post-independence wars, also increased. In early 1996 the country was severely shaken when the Central Bureau of Investigation charged 24 leading politicians, including several government ministers, with accepting bribes from businessmen in exchange for favors. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, leader of the Indian nationalist movement and known in his later life as Mahatma ("great soul") was one of the greatest national leaders of the 20th century. His methods and philosophy of nonviolent confrontation, or civil disobedience, not only led his own country to independence but influenced political activists of many persuasions throughout the world. Gandhi was born in Porbandar, India, on October 2, 1869. Although his father was a chief minister for the maharaja of Porbandar, the family came from the traditional caste of grocers and moneylenders (the name Gandhi means "grocer"). His mother was a devout adherent of Jainism, a religion in which ideas of nonviolence and vegetarianism are paramount. Gandhi stated that he was most influenced by his mother, whose life "was an endless chain of fasts and vows." When, in the company of boyhood friends, he secretly smoked, ate meat, told lies, or wore Western clothing, he suffered intense feelings of guilt. These feelings forced him to make resolutions about his moral behavior that were to remain with him. Married by arrangement at 13, Gandhi went to London to study law when he was 18. He was admitted to the bar in 1891 and for a while practiced law in Bombay. From 1893 to 1914 he worked for an Indian firm in South Africa. During these years Gandhi's humiliating experiences of overt racial discrimination propelled him into agitation on behalf of the Indian community of South Africa. He assumed leadership of protest campaigns and gradually developed his techniques and tenets of nonviolent resistance known as satyagraha (literally, "steadfastness in truth"). Returning to India in January 1915, Gandhi soon became involved in labor organizing. The massacre of Amritsar (1991), in which troops fired on and killed hundreds of nationalist demonstrators, turned him to direct political protest. Within a year he was the dominant figure in the Indian National Congress, which he launched on a policy of non-cooperation with the British in 1920-22. Although total non-cooperation was abandoned, Gandhi continued civil disobedience, organizing protest marches against unpopular British measures, such as the salt tax (1930), and boycotts of British goods. Gandhi also fought to improve the status of the lowest classes of society, the casteless Untouchables, whom he called harijans ("children of God"). He believed in manual labor and simple living; he spunned thread and wove cloth for his own garments and insisted that his followers do so, too. He disagreed with those who wanted India to industrialize. ## Literature Sanskrit literature has its origins in an oral tradition that produced the Vedic holy texts, sometime after 1500 B.C. These homilies and hymns gave rise to many commentaries, the most famous of which are the Upanishads. Oral history, legend, and moral tales were later fused into the two great books of Hindu tradition, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, which have since been used as the sources for countless literary works. Other major additions to Sanskrit literature are the Puranas (400 B.C-A.D. 1400) and the Panchatantra (c. A.D. 450). Beginning about 400 B.C., when PANINI produced his Sanskrit grammar, there was an outpouring of literature that sought to systematize all learning in the form of laws for the arts and sciences, called shastras, as well as devotional, epic, and lyric poetry and stylized drama treating either traditional heroic themes or invented plots often set in the Gupta cities of the 4th and 5th century A.D. By the second century A.D. several dialects known collectively as Prakrits were being used in literature. This development was especially notable in Sanskrit drama, where characters below the rank of royalty and priesthood often spoke in Prakrits. By A.D. 1000 these languages had evolved to the point of being recognizable as the forerunners of modern regional tongues. Sanskrit scholars of that time saw them as evidence of a cultural decline and labeled them Apabhramsa. During the Middle Ages Sanskrit was used only in religious contexts by the priesthood. Bengali, Marathi, and old Gujarati were among the first Northern languages to emerge as literary vehicles. A major figure of this period was the poet AMIR KHUSROU (1253-1325), who included Hindi verses among his Persian writings. In the south under the expanding Chola Empire (10th-13th centuries) the Kannada, Malayalam, and Telugu languages achieved a literary status previously held only by classical literature written in Tamil. The best known work of this tradition is perhaps an anthology of love lyrics, Kuruntokai (A.D. c. 750). Tamil and, later, Telugu writing exercised a lasting influence on literature in the south, both through its courtly and mystical verse and through its many versions of Sanskrit sacred texts. In the latter part of the Middle Ages the courts of the Mogul emperors produced Perso-Arabic writing, which inspired a literature in Urdu. The major artistic form was the ghazal, a stylized form of lyrical folk song, and notable exponents of the form include MUHAMMAD QULI QUTB SHAH (c. 1550-1611), VALI (1668-1744), and several others. The beginnings of modern Indian literature can be traced to the establishment of civil service training schools and printing presses early in the 19th century. While vernacular languages and culture was taught to British colonial officials, an awareness of an Indian heritage as well as new Western literature and philosophical writing produced a cultural renaissance. In 1835, THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, then an advisor to the British government on Indian affairs, scornfully dismissed the entire Indian literary heritage, thereby inspiring a reaction in favor of Indian literary works and the vernacular among Indians. MACAULAY established English-language schooling for Indians; consequently, English became a major tool for political polemic and social reform, as well as for literary expression, and its literature began to shape vernacular writing. Pioneers such as RAJA RAMMOUHUN ROY (1772-1833), MAHAVIR PRASED DVIVEDY (1864-1938), and ARUNACALA KAVI (fl. c. 1780) developed a utilitarian prose style, whereas Michael MADHUSUDAN DUTT (1824-73) and JAYASHANKAR PRASAD (1889-1937) introduced blank verse and the sonnet into Indian poetry. MADHUSUDAN DUTT wrote the first plays modeled on Western drama, and SIR RABINDRANATH TAGORE introduced the short story to vernacular writing in India. The novel was pioneered in India by such writers as BANKIN CHANDRA CHATTERJEE and HARI NARAYAN APTE (1864-1919). The major poets of the period include LAKSMINATH BEZBARUA (1868-1938) and MU-HAMMAD IQBAL (c. 1876-1938). Twentieth-century writing has kept alive the sentimental romanticism of the 19th century. The social realism of earlier works developed first under the influence of nationalist leaders such as Mahatma Gandhi and later under Marxist ideology. Reaction to the figureheads of the Indian "renaissance" led to experimentation with surrealism, symbolism, and the style of Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot. Contemporary writing seems to demonstrate a general trend toward introspection, an interest in psychology, and experimentation with new forms of writing within a general existentialist framework. ## General View of Literature Most of the literature of ancient India was written in Sanskrit, the oldest extant Aryan language. A small portion of the literature was written in Prakrit, a vernacular form of Sanskrit. The history of Indian literature falls into two periods: (1) the Vedic period, which extends from about 1500 B.C. to about 200 B.C. and of which the writings are made up principally of religious and lyric poetry (although some fairly successful attempts to establish a prose style were made) and (2) the so-called Sanskrit period, which extends from about 200 B.C. well on into the Middle Ages, and, in a sense, down to the present day. In the Sanskrit period many types of literature achieved distinction-epic, lyric, and didactic poetry; drama, fairy tales; fables; romances; and philosophy. ## Religious works **Poetry** The oldest sacred literature of India is found in the four Vedas ("Books of Knowledge"). The Rig-Veda (c. 1400 B.C.). is an anthology of 1028 hymns to various gods - many of them impersonal nature deities. The prevailing religion of the Rig-veda is Hindu pantheism; its chief object of worship is Brahma, the eternal, self-existent god. The most notable single poem in this collection is the "Creation Hymn." The Sama-Veda or "Book of Chants." It consists principally of liturgies, of which most are repetitions of hymns in the Rig-veda. The YAJUR-Veda or "Prayer Book." This is also liturgical and repetitions of the Rig-veda, but it contains, in addition, many original prose formulas. The Atharva-Veda or "Book of Spells." Containing some hymns, consists chiefly of spells, incantations, and notions about demonology and witchcraft. **Prose** The Brahmanas. Commentaries on the Vedic hymns and religious rites, these are possibly the earliest extant pieces of Indo-European prose. The Upanishads (c. 800-500 B.C.). A collection of 108 discourses on the Brahman religion. Though they fail to establish a coherent system of philosophical belief, they give a great deal of information concerning the conceptions of maya (the illusory world) and nirvana (absorption into the universal soul). The Upanishads were influential on Emersion and Schopenhauer. The Sutras (c. 500-200 B.C). Extremely concise, often unintelligible treatises concerning ritual. ## Secular Works **Epics** Though classified as secular works, the two epics contain a great deal of Indian mythological and religious matter. The Mahabharata (c. 500 B.C.). The longest poem in the world (about 200,000 lines, nearly eight times as long as the Iliad and the Odyssey combined), it is divided into eighteen books. The epic nucleus of the poem (about 80,000 lines) concerns the battle between the Kauravas (Kurus), representing the principle of good and the Pandavas, representing the principle of evil. The remainder of the Mahabharata contains glosses, descriptions, legends, and treatises on religion, law, philosophy, and military matters. Interpolations make the poem cumbersome and sometimes hard to follow. Two notable interpolations are: (1) the Bhagavad-Gita ("divine song"), a long, didactic poem (eighteen cantos) in which Krishna (an incarnation of Vishu, one of the great Indian gods) discuss philosophy and the good life with Arjuna, one of the Pandavas; and (2) Nala and Damayanti, a love story concerning conjugal patience and fidelity. The Bhagavad-Gita was influential on Emerson. The Mahabharata is perhaps the greatest epic of India. It relates the story of a civil war that may have taken place in the very early years of the Aryan occupation of northern India. The poem in its present form is a huge thing almost as large as the combined epics of all Europe. Obviously it is the work of many, many centuries and many, many hands. The original story was fairly simple. It tells the story of two rival bands of brothers, both descendants, of a common grandfather, who came to war over their heritage. King Pandu when he died had left his five sons in the care of his brother who was to reign during their minority. But the regent brother himself had a hundred sons and these were not going, without an active protest, to let their cousins come to the throne. The result was a series of intrigues as well as of violence, and finally the expulsion of the five brothers. These, now in the wilderness, win for wife Draupadi, a charming heroine. And while they are making alliances they entertain themselves with visits from neighboring holymen-Rishis, who tell them stories of allegorical significance. The story of Savitri is one of these charming stories told in the wilderness by a chance Rishi to teach the lessons of wifely devotion. Finally the five brothers under the leadership of Arjuna gather their forces and make the grand attack, which is the story of a large portion of the epic. They win their kingdom and then in expiration of their violence retire to the mountains where one by one they are received into the peace of the gods. Some have compared the story of this poem to the Iliad, which likewise is a story of wars between rival cities. Perhaps the best date that can be assigned to this poem in its near-present form is the first century B.C., but for the origins of the poem one must look far earlier. The Ramayana (begun c. 500 B.C., finished c. A.D. 200). A poem of about 96,000 lines, in seven books. It concerns Rama (an incarnation of Vishnu) and his wife Sita; Rama's exile; Sita's faithfulness when tempted by Ravana, an evil spirit; and Rama's eventual destruction of Ravana. The poem is much more compact and readable than the Mahabharata. **Dramas** Very little is known about the origin of Indian drama; literary historians disagree as to the amount - and even the presence - of Greek influence. It seems likely, however, that the origin was indigenous and that the first real drama arose out of ceremonies connected with the worship of Vishnu-Krishna. There was no special theater; the dramas were presented in the banquet hall or ballroom of the rulers' palaces. The chronology, too, is uncertain, but the sixty-odd plays of which we know were probably written between 100 B.C. and A.D. 600; most of them came after A.D. 400. Indian drama shows a mixture of joy and sorrow, but the ending is always happy. Each drama has a prologue and is divided into scenes and acts (from one to ten). Most of the plays have intricate though not very original plots, realistic characterization, a court jester, and a mixture of prose dialogue and lyrical poetry. The custom of employing both Sanskrit (for the men of high rank) and Prakrit (for the lower classes) in the same play probably led to the death of the drama. The Toy Clay Cart (c. 500 B.C. present form, c. A.D. 450). Attributed to King Sundra. It has three acts. A courtesan saves the life of a merchant because of his former kindness and generosity. There are many romantic elements and some good portrayal of real human emotions. Sakuntala or the Fatal Ring (attributed to KALIDASA, "the Hindu Shakespeare," c. A.D. 500), While King Dushyanta is absent, a Brahman sage hurls a curse at Queen Sakuntala. As a result, Dushyanta fails to recognize her when they are reunited, and she is whisked away to heaven. When a fisherman returns the lost ring to the king, the curse is broken, and Dushyanta's memory. Sakuntala returns. After years of sadness and vain searching, Dushyanta finds his wife on a sacred mountain, and all ends happily. The play has superior plot construction and excellent characterization, especially of Sakuntala. **Tales** The ancient Indians had a great talent for telling stories. The several collections of Indian tales have often been considered the sources of many of the folk tales which have appeared in various forms all over the world. A large percentage of the tales were written for didactic or religious purposes. The most important collections were the following: The Jatakas (c. 300 B.C.). Imaginative legends concerning the 550 births of Buddha and his early life, supposedly related by himself. Many are animal fables, and most are didactic folklore. The Panchatantra or "Five Books" (c. A.D. 300-500). a series of tales (derived chiefly from the Latakas) probably intended as a manual of instruction for king's sons. The tales are arranged in a framework; a Brahman attempts to instruct six young princes by relating "moral" tales to them. The "five books" are (1) "Separation of Friends," (2) "Acquisition of Friends," (3) "War of the Crows and Owls," (4) "Loss of What Has Been Acquired," and (5) "Inconsiderate Action." The collection shows much humor. It contains many animal stories and has often been considered the source of a large number of medieval tales, especially those in the, Gesta Romanorum. The Hitopdesa or "Book of Good Counsels," a series of forty-three tales, of which twenty-five, in four books. are from the Panchatantra. The tales are more sententious than those in the earlier collection. The Sukasaptati or "Seventy Stories of a Parrot." A frame-work series of fairy tales. **Lyrics** In addition to sacred poetry, many secular lyrics were composed in ancient India, most of them after 100 B.C. Many contain great passion and real beauty. The leading lyricists were (1) KALIDASA (c. A.D. 350-500), famous for a large number of poems of sentiment; for example, the Maghaduta ("The Cloud Messenger"); and (2) JAVADEVA (fl.c. A.D. 1200), author of the "Gitagovinda" ("Cowherd in Song"), a semidramatic lyric concerning the love-making of Krishna. The Bhagavad Gita (Sanskrit, "The Lord's Song") is one of the most widely studied sacred writings of Hinduism. Taken from book six of the Indian epic Mahabharata, the Bhagavad Gita, written as a poem, is Krishna's response to questions posed by Arjuna, a warrior prince, concerning his responsibility in good and evil as he is about to go into battle. Krishna, incarnated as Arjuna's charioteer, laid the cornerstone of Hindu philosophy by instructing Arjuna with the following principles: the world of matter and individual consciousness are grounded in the same spiritual reality; intuition can grasp the divine reality; human beings possess two natures, a divine self within a material being; and life is intended to lead people to unity with the divine spirit. ## Famous Poet Sir Rabindranath Tagore. Born in Calcutta, May 7, 1861, died on August 7, 1941, won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1913 for his most famous collection, *Song Offerings* (1910; Eng. trans., 1912). A prolific writer (3,000 poems, 2,000 songs, 8 novels, 40 volumes of essays and short stories, 50 plays), he drew inspiration both from his native Bengal and from English literary tradition. His major theme was humanity's search for God and truth. From 1878 to 1880 he studied law in England, and in 1890, having returned to India, took charge of his father's estates, where he saw firsthand the suffering and backwardness of India's rural poor and grew to love the serenity of the Indian countryside. Devoting himself to the agricultural development of the land and the health and education of the people, he founded, in 1901, Santiniketan ("Abode of Peace"), which became an international university with a wide-ranging curriculum. He was knighted in 1915, an honor he renounced 4 years later as a protest against British actions in the Punjab. In 1890, Tagore published a volume of poetry, *Manasi* (The Mind's Embodiment), which foreshadowed the lyricism, eloquence, and grandeur of *Song Offerings* and *A Flight of Swans* (1914; Eng. trans., 1955). His profound symbolism, abetted by the free-flowing nature of his verse, create a universe of haunting beauty that expresses God's infinite love and humanity's deep compassion for all things beautiful. Tagore's novels, particularly *Gora* (1910; English translation, 1924), and short stories have strong underlying philosophical themes. The plays-notably *Sacrifice* (1890; Eng. trans., 1917), *The King of the Dark Chamber* (1910; Eng. trans., 1914), *Chitra* (1892; Eng. trans., 1913), and *Post Office* (1912; Eng. 1914)- although allegorical in form and political in content, remain rich in characterization, sentiment, and spectacle. Tagore was also an accomplished composer, musician, and singer, as well as a painter and an actor. Later in life he wrote a number of experimental dance dramas, the best of which, *Shyama* (193