Better than the best

श्रेष्ठेभ्यो श्रेय: |

In the superhit 1965 Tamil movie Thiruvilayaadal (Divine Sport), there is a classic scene where the poor poet Dharumi brings a poem for a prize announced by the Pandya king. Nakkeeran, the court poet, happens to doubt the authenticity of the composition. (It was indeed given to him by Shiva and was not Dharumi's original). Dharumi reacts sarcastically -

"பாட்டெழுதி பேர் வாங்கும் புலவர்கள் இருக்கிறார்கள். குற்றம் கண்டு பிடித்து பேர் வாங்கும் புலவர்களும் இருக்கிறார்கள்"

"There are poets who become famous by their own effort. And there are poets who just criticize others and become famous".

But then the world owes much to artists whose claim to fame is only critiquing/commenting somebody's work. Take Mallinaatha for example, without his significant and monumental commentary it would be impossible to understand meghadhUtam or shishupaalavadha. So much so that Mallinaatha says "माघे मेघे वयम् गत:" (Life's gone in reading maaghakaavya and meghadhUtam). There are geniuses who create phenomental stuff and then we need mediators to such geniuses to expound it for us ordinary mortals. Or take Panini vs Patanjali. Panini's pataakhi-sounding pratyaahaara-s like ढक्, डुप्, दप्, घञ्, क्ङित्, तिप्, थस् sounds could only be expounded by a genius like Patanjali. We need a Hardy and several more, just to decipher us the genius of Ramanujan. Some cant stand that - like George Polya, the Hungarian mathematician who refused to get caught in Ramanujan's theorems, for the fear that he would spend his life just proving them, and never discover anything of his own.

शिशुपालवध is no doubt one of the greatest mahakaavya-s. Among the pancha mahaakaavya-s it is considered the greatest. A famous subhaashitam says that माघ has the exceptional qualities of all three poets कालिदास, भारवि and दण्डिन्.

Think about shishupaala for a moment. Forget that he is a villain, thats a simplistic view. He consistently challenged Krishna's superiority, for whatever reasons. He showed scant respect for Krishna, repeatedly insulted him and asked others during the raajasUya-yajna "Isn't there one person who is worthy of honor than this shepherd?". People like shishupaala are not incidental, and are not coy to challenge superiority, no matter who it is. Similarly, Nakkeeran challenged the poem of Dharumi. From Dharumi's point of view, Nakkeeran criticized him. But Nakkeeran challenged the poem, the one written by Lord Shiva himself. The greatness of art is strengthened only if it can withstand any challenges. So it is only natural someone challenged the superiority of Maaghakaavya. And such a challenger was Vadiraja Tirtha.

Like several Sanskritam literature works, this one too is hardly heard of, except in a few elite circles. I had earlier mentioned that it is only our loss not savoring the Sanskritam language of scriptural literature. There appears to be a lot of noise around "secular" Sanskritam literature, whatever that means, side-lining the beauty of the language shining in other fields.

Vadiraja Tirtha is no ordinary poet. He has produced a prodigious amount of work in several fields - kavya, stotra, stuti, travelogue, commentaries, logic, cosmology and a lot more. Some of his works run into thousands of verses. And yes, living for a full 120 years (1480 to 1600 CE) helped him too! And he ensured a productive life. This event is recorded in the biography book shri vaadiraaja guruvara-caritaamRuta:

तत: पुण्यपुरीम् प्राप्तो भेरीताडनपूर्वकम् । काव्यश्रेष्ठं माघकाव्यं गजमूर्ध्नि पूज्यते ॥
इत्याघोषितमाकर्ण्य सभापतिमवोचत । अस्मत्पुरे महाकाव्यमेकम् श्रेष्ठं प्रकाशते ॥
दीयते समय: कश्चित् दर्षयिष्ये परीक्ष्यताम् । अङ्गीकुर्वति विज्ञौघे गुरु: एकोनविंशता ॥
दिवसै: एकदिवसे हि एकसर्ग क्रमेण स: । रुक्मिणीश महाकाव्यं निर्ममे सुरसाकरम् ॥
अवेक्षणाय विदुषां संसदं प्रैषयेत् सुधी: । परिषत्सा परीक्षाय विस्मित आनन्दपूरिता ॥
रुक्मिणीश महाकाव्यमुत्तमं माघतोऽपि च । इत्याघोष्य च सम्मान्य प्रार्चयत् कविसत्तमम् ॥
कवीनाम् कुलमध्ये हि तिलक: अयम् इति प्रथाम् । ख्यापयामास विदुषां परिषद्गुणमोदिनी ॥
(श्रीवादिरज गुरुवर चरितामृतम् ३.४.१०)

The verses are very simple and pretty straight-forward to understand.

"Once in पुण्यपुरी (modern Pune), the best of kaavya namely Maghakaavya was about to be honored on elephant's head. Hearing this, Vadiraja said to the scholars there "Before you honor the kaavya, listen to one kaavyaa written in our place. If some time is given, I will show you and you can verify it yourself. Vadiraja wrote one sarga per day for the next 19 days and completed the work rukmiNIsha vijaya ("The Victory of Lord of Rukmini"). The scholars read and were stunned and filled with joy. They declared रुक्मिणीश विजय to be better than माघकाव्य. They declared Vadiraja as a "tilaka" (foremost) among the poetic society."

An important contention of Vadiraja was that the title of the book is about "killing" shishupala and invokes negative thoughts, while Rukminisha vijaya is about the "victory" of Krishna, which evokes positive feelings. The name of the kavya itself is mangala. One cannot argue with that point though. Replete with अलङ्कार, अनुप्रास, यमक, चित्रपद, a variety of छन्दस्  and lot more that a tiny mind like mine cannot comprehend, Rukminisha Vijaya is as delightful to read as shishupaalavadha. When India loses in a close match, commentators have a cliche for consoling - "cricket is the winner". Borrowing that, we could say whatever may be the reason behind the two kaavya-s, Sanskritam is the winner :-). जयतु संस्कृतम् |

The said unsaid

उक्तमनुक्तम्

After the defeat of DMK and company in May 2011 elections, the Tamil satire journal Thuglak ran a funny cartoon, where the DMK chief laments "We did what we said, we also did what we did not say (still got defeated)". While the common man chides "Yeah right, but they did not say what they did", refering the 2G spectrum scam. Translating this humor to Samskritam is interesting, using the "ktat" pratyaya for past-tense. Though it is blasphemous imagining the DMK chief speaking in Sanskritam, we can sense the brevity of the language here. (Paranthesis are author's additions for emphasis)

DMK प्रमुख:  - उक्तम् कृतम् । अनुक्तमपि कृतम् । (हन्त! तथापि वयम् जिता:!)
कश्चन जन:  - परन्तु (यत्) कृतम् (तत्) न उक्तम् खलु ।

Conveying the meaning not in so many words may not be a Bollywood technique, where heroes and moms dole out tiring breathless dialogs, but is pretty common in speech. Writing or reading between the lines, so to speak. That skill comes in handy in the corporate world whether to blame someone or pass the buck.

Sanskritam literature offers a lot of delightful examples in various degrees of "being left unsaid". Anandavardhana, in his masterpiece dhvanyaaloka (11th century CE) classifies it as a "suggestive technique". We shall look at a few instances.

One of the most beautiful is from kumaarasambhava, a shloka of which we saw in an earlier post about the penance of Parvati for Shiva. But if you go back and read it again, what is left unsaid in that shloka is equally fascinating. Follow the way the raindrop falls on Parvati and moves about. The described kinetics of the raindrop is possible only if Parvati was sitting in a perfect yogic posture. Kalidasa indeed suggests how Parvati is seated just by describing the movement of a raindrop. Perhaps this was the shloka that inspired Jakanachari shilpi to come up with the masterpiece Darpana-Sundari in Belur.

त्रिविक्रम पण्डिताचार्य, whom we referred in an earlier post composed a stuti called hari-vaayu-stuti, where he praises hanumaan (vayu), bhIma, madhvaacaarya and viShNu. It is set in a fascinating meter called srag-dharaa ("worn as a garland") with 21 syllables per paada. That makes 21x4 = 84 syllables per shloka, with a total of 41 shlokas! (The same in anuShTubh meter would have had 84*41/32 = 108 shlokas!). Sri Madhvaacaarya said that a stuti must begin with a praise to hari and instantly composed two shloka-s (some say it is just one) praising just the nails of narasimha (narasimha-nakha-stuti). These shlokas are recited at the beginning and end of hari-vaayu-stuti. But the beauty of these shloka-s also lies in what he did not directly say. The narasimha-nakha-stuti is in two different meters - a rare instance in Sanskritam literature. The first two paada-s are in a meter called "shaardUla vikrIDitam" (= play of a Lion) and the second two paada-s are in srag-dharaa, the same as that of hari-vaayu-stuti. So he also conveys the story of narasimha avatara - play of a Lion and wearing of a garland (hiraNyakashipu) - just by selecting the aptly named Chandas.

In the above instances, its the author who uses indirect suggestive techniques. In hanumannaaTaka we find sItA conveying her thoughts without saying any words. On the way to sItA's svayamvara, her friends enquire that 'if that blue-bodied man' will be her husband. sItA does not say anything, yet conveys the acknowledgement by the mere blushing of cheeks and movement of her eyelids. A superb shloka in maalinii Chandas:


पथि पथिकवधूभि: सादरम् पृच्छ्यमाना कुवलयदलनील: कोऽयमार्ये तवेति ।
स्मितविकसितगण्डं व्रीडविभ्रान्तनेत्रम् मुखमवनमयन्ती स्पष्टमाचष्ट सीता ॥

पदच्छेद:

पथि पथिक-वधूभि: सादरम् पृच्छ्यमाना कुवलय-दल-नील: क: अयम् आर्ये तव इति ।
स्मित-विकसित-गण्डं व्रीड-विभ्रान्त-नेत्रम् मुखम्-अवनमयन्ती स्पष्टम्-आचष्ट सीता ॥

आर्ये! क: अयम् कुवलय-दल-नील: तव? इति पथिक-वधूभि: पथि सादरम् पृच्छ्यमाना सीता, स्मित-विकसित-गण्डं व्रीड-विभ्रान्त-नेत्रम् मुखम् अवनमयन्ती, स्पष्टम् आचष्ट ।


Beginner Sanskritam students can recognize the question form "kim etat bhavata:? - Is this yours?". Obviously there are many more such fascinating examples in the gamut of Sanskritam literature.