topics: |  india | philosophy | ancient | aesthetics | art |

Ever since I encountered his Outlines of Indian Philosophy, I have viewed Hiriyanna as the master of simplicity, when it comes to explaining the esoteric nature of ancient Indian thought. Here he brings this talent to bear on the voluminous literature of aesthetics in India.

The excerpts below opens with a later chapter which serves here as an introduction to the theme excerpted from ch.1 next.

[book cover is for the 1997 IGNCA edition]

rasa and dhvani

[this thesis by A. Sankaran] deals with sanskrit poetics or alaMkArashAstra as it is called - a subject in which the Indian mind has achieved particular excellence.

its literature is vast; and, though the works that have been already published are numerous, there are many still awaiting publication. the theories propounded in them are diverse - as many as eight of them being of distinctive importance according to our author.

the most important of these theories is that contained in the dhvanyAloka of Anandavardhana, a work of the 9th century A.D. it is known as the theory of dhvani or 'suggestiveness' which is based upon the view that what we may call the poetic ultimate is essentially incommunicable and can at best be only suggested.

the present thesis treats of its subject with special reference to this
work. the dhvanyAloka is not to be regarded as merely a treatise
on empirical aesthetics as several others are; for it develops its views
in close connection with philosophical theories, raising now and
again questions like the logical status of verbal testimony and the
psychological basis of shAnta-rasa.

another feature in which it differs from the common run of alaMkAra works is
that the theory which it enunciates, though in the first instance intended to
explain the method and aim of poetry, is equally applicable to all forms of
fine art. this is indicated by Anandavardhana's own references to other arts
like music for purposes of illustration.  it is also clear from the nature of
dhvani itself; for the means of suggestion need not be confined to linguistic
forms, but may extend beyond to the media employed in arts other than
poetry.  features such as these show that the dhvanyAloka is a difficult work
to comprehend; and the difficulty is considerably increased by the imperfect
character of the only edition of it published so far.
[However, this] is an essay which contains many well-tested facts and
inferences, all set forth in a lucid manner. p.71-72

	[a review of the ph.d thesis by A. Sankaran: "Some Aspects of
	 Literary Criticism in Sanskrit or the Theories of Rasa and Dhvani",
	 University of Madras, 1929.]

aesthetics in Indian thought

		 	from ch.1 (Indian Aesthetics - 1)
			first published 1919; Proceedings of the First
				All-India Oriental Conference.

it has become somewhat of a commonplace in these days to speak of the ancient
hindus as having achieved distinction in philosophy.  but the word
'philosophy' is so loosely used and the phases of philosophic investigation
are so many and so varied in character that such an opinion, standing by
itself, cannot be taken to indicate anything beyond a certain aptitude of the
hindu mind for abstract speculation.

a signal illustration of the indefiniteness of this opinion is furnished by
max muller, the very scholar that was largely responsible for giving
currency to the view that the ancient hindus were highly gifted
philosophically; for while he at one time described them as 'a nation of
philosophers', yet, at another time, gave out as his considered opinion
that 'the idea of the beautiful in nature did not exist in the hindu
mind.'(*)

(*) The Philosophy of the Beautiful, by William Knight, Part I, p. 17.]

the fact is that a vague and general statement like the above is of
little practical value unless it is supported by evidence of progress made
in the various departments of philosophic study, such as logic, psychology
and metaphysics. here is a vast field for the student of indian antiquities
to labour in and the harvest, if well garnered, will be of advantage not
only for the history of indian thought but also, it may be hoped, for
universal philosophy.

the object of the present paper is to indicate, however slightly it may be,
the nature of the advance made by the indians in one bye-path of
philosophy, viz., aesthetics or the inquiry into the character of beauty in
nature as well as in art.

philosophy and life

the most noticeable feature of indian philosophy is the stress which it
lays upon the influence which knowledge ought to have on life. none of the
systems that developed in the course of centuries in india stopped short at
the discovery of truth; but each followed it up by an inquiry as to how the
discovered truth could be best applied to the practical problems of life.

the ultimate goal of philosophic quest was not knowledge (tattva-jn~Ana)
so much as the achievement of true freedom (mokSha).
Indian philosophy was thus more than a way of thought; it was a
way of life; and whoever entered upon its study was expected
to aim at more than an intellectual assimilation of its truths and
try to bring his everyday life into conformity with them.

consistently with this pragmatic aim, ethics occupies a very important
place in indian philosophy. like ethics, aesthetics is dependent upon
philosophy and like ethics, it aims chiefly at influencing life. when such
is the kinship between ethics and aesthetics, is it probable that a people
who devoted so much attention to one of them, altogether neglected the
other?  [p.2]

older, or pracina school of poetics

tradition is at one in counting bhAmaha among the earliest writers on
poetics; but in him we see the subject has already assumed a definite
shape. his name, along with those of some others like udbhaTa, rudraTa,
daNDin and vAmana is associated with a distinctive canon of poetry. p.5

the attention of this school is practically confined to the outward
expression of poetry, viz., shabda (word [sabda]) and artha
(sense). certain forms of these are regarded as doShas and certain others
as guNas; and it is held that what confers excellence on poetry is the
absence of doSha and the presence of guNa.

[mostly MH focuses on the other school known as the later or navina school of
critics.]

later (navina) school: dhvanyAloka

[the later school has many views, but here MH considers primarily the text
dhvanyAloka by Anandavardhana, 9th c.; authoritatively commented upon
in the 10th century A.D. by abhinavagupta.] p.5

though the dhvanyAloka is the oldest work of the kind extant; but this very
work contains evidence of the fact that the point of view which it adopts in
judging poetry had been more or less well known for a long time before.

dhvanyAloka starts by distinguishing between two kinds of
meaning - the explicit and the implicit - and attempts to estimate
the worth of a poem by reference to the latter rather than to the
former.   the explicit meaning, no less than the words in which
it is clothed, constitutes, according to this view, the mere vesture 
of poetry. they together are its outward embodiment - the 	     
necessary conditions under which a poetic mood manifests itself.

these external and accidental features alone appealed to the earlier
school. but the critic of the new school concentrated his attention on the
implicit meaning which forms the real essence of poetry.  from this new
standpoint things like doShas or guNas, in settling the nature of which
there was once so much controversy, are easily explained. it is as though we
are now in possession of the right key to the understanding of all
poetry. whatever in sound or sense subserves the poetic end in view is a
guNa; whatever does not, is a doSha.  			     

doShas and guNas are relative in character.  there is no absolute
standard of valuation for them. they are to be judged only in reference to
the inner meaning which constitutes the truly poetical. the artist never
really feels concerned about them; for, a thought or feeling experienced with
poetic intensity is sure to find expression. the expression is also likely to
be more or less imperfect, but the question is not whether it is perfect, but
whether it is adequate to convey the thought or emotion to others. if it is
adequate it is good poetry, otherwise it is not.

the implicit meaning is threefold and the poet may aim at communicating a
fact (vastu) or transferring an imaginative (alaMkAra) or an emotional
mood (rasa). the first is obviously the least poetic and whatever artistic
character it may possess is entirely due to treatment and not to subject. we
may, therefore consider here only the remaining two, which have their bases
respectively in imagination and feeling. true art is no doubt a compound of
feeling and imagination. [...]

in this view art represents the almost spontaneous expression of a responsive
mind when it comes under the spell of an imaginative or an emotional mood. it
was this expression - the outward element of poetry and not its inner springs
which the older school of critics analysed. the later school, as we have
already seen, occupied itself with what this expression signifies. the
expression was important to them only as a means of suggesting or pointing to
the implicit significance.  p.5

here we find a theory of art which exactly corresponds to the doctrine of
Atman. just as the passing things of experience are not in themselves
real but only imperfect manifestations of reality, so word and explicit
meaning are but the exterior of poetry and until we penetrate beneath that
exterior, we do not reach the poetic ultimate.

[initially, it was thought that the essence of poetry consisted equally] in
the imaginative thought or the emotional mood, but gradually more stress came
to be laid upon the emotion or mood, ... art came to be more and more viewed
as [something that] can not only teach, but also please and while it can
successfully persuade, it can keep its persuasive character concealed from
view.

it was thus that poetry came to be viewed as possessing a double aim - the
direct one of giving aesthetic delight (sadyaH-paranirvr.ti) and the
indirect one of contributing toward the refinement of character. 
this particular use to which art was put made rasa more important than
either vastu or alamkAra.  [...]

when the predominance of rasa came to be insisted upon as indispensable to
artistic excellence, many of the systems of philosophy applied their own
fundamental principles to its interpretation so that in course of time there
came to be more than one theory of rasa.  p.7

[goes on to expound the difference in the incorporation of rasa into
sAmkhya and vedAnta theories. ]

how many rasas?

		from the foreword to The Number of Rasas by V. Raghavan, 1940

while some thinkers have held that there is but one rasa, others have
maintained that the rasas are many, there being a wide divergence of opinion
respecting their exact number. the usual view, however, is that there are
eight rasas or nine, with the addition of what is termed shAnta: p.62

	shr.MgArarahAsyakaruNA raudravIrabhayAnakAH |
	bibhatsAdbhutashAntAsh ca rasAH pUrvair udAhr.tAH ||

[list: 1. shr.MgAra [shringAr]
	 2. rahAsya
	 3. karuNA
	 4. raudra
	 5. vIra
	 6. bhayAnaka
	 7. bibhatsa
	 8. adbhuta
	 9. shAnta]

although Dr. Raghavan considers all these views more or less in detail, the
main part of his discussion is concerned with the admissibility of shAnta as
the ninth rasa. His treatment of the question is quite comprehensive, and
he examines it both from the historical and the aesthetic sides.

bharata's view in the matter is somewhat doubtful, by reason of the
unsatisfactory character of the nATyashAstra it has come down to us.
dr. raghavan adduces several convincing arguments to show that the references
to this rasa in bharata are all spurious.

thus in the case of the sAkuntala, dushyanta's love for sakuntala forms the
chief theme while the emotion, which it awakens in us as we witness the drama
enacted, is shr.MgAra.  when we ask whether shAnta can be a rasa, we mean
whether situations in life involving the quietistic sentiment lend themselves
to be similarly dealt with in literature.  if they do, then shAnta is a
rasa; otherwise, it is not.

the practice of great poets like kAlidasa, which is after all the true
touchstone in such matters, shows that santa situations can certainly be thus
delineated in literary works. in the last act of his play, just alluded to,
kalidasa describes the tranquility and holiness of mArica's hermitage in a
manner which affects us most profoundly. but, however splendidly depicted,
the shAnta rasa occupies only a subordinate place there; and a doubt may
therefore arise whether it can be the leading sentiment in a work, i.e.,
whether it can be portrayed in such a manner that it will impress us at the
end as the predominant element in the unity of rasas which, according to
the indian view, every work of art is expected to achieve.

dr. raghavan makes a valuable contribution to the study not merely of
sanskrit literary criticism but of indian aesthetics as a whole, for the
conception of rasa, though it is here dealt with chiefly in its relation to
poetry, is general and furnishes the criterion by which the worth of all
forms of fine art may be judged. p.64

contents

 1. indian aesthetics-1					1
 2. what to expect of poetry?  				17
 3. art contemplation   					22
 4. art experience-1 						25
 5. art experience-2 						29
 6. indian aesthetics-2 					43
 	introductory - nature and art - art experience -
 	the content of art - the method of art -
	art and morality
 7. art and morality  					55
 8. the number of rasas 					62
 9. the problem of the rasavAdAlaMkAra 			65
10. rasa and dhvani 						71
11. the philosophy of aesthetic pleasure 			73
12. some concepts of alaMkAra literature 			75
13. sanskrit poetics 						77
14. process and purpose in art 				79
15. experience: first and final 				82

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