Chapter XXV: Part III: Dramatic Theory

XIII

THE THEORY OF THE DRAMATIC ART

1. THE TREATISES ON DRAMATIC ART

Pāṇini, whose date falls doubtless before 300 B.C., alludes in his grammar to the Naṭasūtras, books of rules for Naṭas, compiled by Çilālin and Kṛçāçva, and Professor Hillebrandt [597] has suggested that we should recognize in these works the earliest text-books of the Indian drama. But we have no other suggestion that Pāṇini knew of dramatic performances, and the only legitimate conclusion is that these rules were laid down for the guidance of dancers or, perhaps, pantomimes, and with this accords admirably the fact that the dramatic tradition knows nothing of these names, and instead makes the sage Bharata the eponymous hero of the drama. True it was Brahmā, highest of gods, himself who, at the instance of the gods, produced as a counterpart to the four Vedas, which contain the science of religion and magic, the more mundane Nāṭya-Veda, consecrated to the drama, but this Veda is not current among men. Bharata, on the other hand, whose task it was to direct the production by the Apsarases in heaven of plays for the delight of the gods and who thus had practical experience of the art, has set forth for men the principles of the drama in the Nāṭyaçāstra which, if not inspired, has at least a measure of sanctity, and thus supplies an authoritative basis for practice.

The legend is interesting because it precisely interprets the spirit of India towards authority; Bharata occupies in the theory of the drama a place analogous to that of Pāṇini in grammar, but unfortunately the Nāṭyaçāstra has fared badly in comparison with the Aṣṭādhyāyī, which has, through the care of its commentators, come down to us in a form but little changed from that it assumed in the hands of its author. The work, which we have under the title Bhāratīya Nāṭyaçāstra, [598] is extremely badly preserved in the manuscript tradition, a fact due in part to the comparatively late date of any commentary upon it. We have only a few references to an exposition of the Nāṭyaçāstra by Mātṛgupta, a somewhat mysterious figure with a more or less legendary connexion with Kālidāsa, with whom he has even been identified; [599] if we are to place any faith in his contemporaneity with Kālidāsa, he may date from the close of the fourth century A.D. It is significant that tradition makes him for a time king of Kashmir, for it is to that country we owe the commentaries of Çan̄kuka, who wrote the epic Bhuvanābhyudaya under Ajitāpīḍa (A.D. 813–50), and of Bhaṭṭa Nāyaka, who belongs to the period of Çan̄karavarman (A.D. 883–902). In the same line of tradition is the great work of Abhinavagupta, the Abhinavabhāratī, which has been lucky enough to come to light after long oblivion, and which represents the erudition of the close of the tenth century.

The treatise, as we have it, is elaborate, covering the whole ground connected with the drama. It deals with the architecture of the theatre, the scenery, and the dress and equipment of the actors; the religious ceremonial to be observed at every representation; the music, the dance, the movements and gestures of the actors, and their mode of delivery; the division of rôles; the general characteristics of poetry; the different classes of drama, and the emotions and sentiments which form a vital element in the drama. There is confusion, complexity, and repetition in the work, but that much of it is old cannot be doubted. It appears clearly to be based on the examination of a dramatic literature which has been lost, eclipsed by the more perfect dramas of Kālidāsa and his successors. In the description of classes of drama we seem to have hasty generalizations on insufficient material; the Samavakāra, for instance, is described in terms which, with the precise definition of the time to be occupied by the acts, can be interpreted only as based on a single drama, and the Ḍima seems to have a similar origin. The elaborate description of the preliminary scene or Pūrvaran̄ga, which is practically non-existent in the classical drama, suggests a period of a less cultivated taste. A more definite result may be derived from comparison of the Nāṭyaçāstra with the works of Açvaghoṣa and of Bhāsa. The Prākrits recognized by the Nāṭyaçāstra are clearly later than those of Açvaghoṣa and more akin to those found in Bhāsa; again the Nāṭyaçāstra recognizes the use of Ardha-Māgadhī, found in these two dramatists, but not later, while, like them, he ignores the Māhārāṣṭrī of the later dramas. Moreover Bhāsa expressly alludes to a Nāṭyaçāstra [600] and it is most probable that both he and Kālidāsa had knowledge of the prototype of the present text. That Bhāsa by no means slavishly adheres to the rules of the Nāṭyaçāstra, either as regards the formal mode of terminating his dramas or the exclusion of scenes of death from the stage, [601] merely shows that when he wrote the Çāstra had not attained any binding force. There is nothing to contradict the date thus vaguely indicated, [602] for the treatment of poetics in general is simple and early, and it is impossible to draw any conclusion as to date from the remarks on music, apart altogether from the constant possibility that incidental additions and alterations have been made in the work.

It was inevitable that the complicated and confused work of Bharata should be superseded for many purposes by something more accessible and easy to follow, and this need was supplied by the Daçarūpa of Dhanaṁjaya, son of Viṣṇu, and protégé of the ill-fated king Muñja of Dhārā (974–95). The work takes its name from the ten primary forms of drama recognized in the Nāṭyaçāstra, which is followed closely by Dhanaṁjaya, his deviations being unimportant and trivial, such as a new division of types of heroine or of the erotic sentiment. On the other hand, Dhanaṁjaya omits by far the greater part of the topics of his model; his four books of wooden verses treat first of the subject-matter and plot; then of the hero, the heroine, and other characters, and the language of the drama; thirdly of the prologue and the different kinds of drama; and lastly of the emotions and sentiments, thus concentrating attention on the essential dramatic features. The text is naturally often unintelligible save in the light of the Nāṭyaçāstra itself and of the commentary, Avaloka, which is ascribed to Dhanika, son of Viṣṇu, and minister of Utpaladeva, a term which is an alias of Muñja. The identity of the two writers is suggested by the fact that later writers ascribe passages of the Daçarūpa itself to Dhanika, and that without the commentary the work is in a sense incomplete. But, on the other hand, in a few passages the commentator more or less distinctly differs from the text, and it seems sufficient to assume that they may have been brothers. The Avaloka must have been completed after Muñja’s death, since it cites Padmagupta’s Navasāhasān̄kacarita, which was written under Sindhurāja, and this throws some doubt on the identification of Dhanika with the Dhanika Paṇḍita to whose son, Vasantācārya, a land grant was made by Muñja in A.D. 974. Dhanika quotes stanzas of his own in Sanskrit and Prākrit and also a treatise, Kāvyanirṇaya, elsewhere unknown. [603]

Of the fourteenth century in all probability are three works of unequal importance and merit. The Pratāparudrīya [604] of Vidyānātha is a mediocre compilation from the Daçarūpa and the Kāvyaprakāça of Mammaṭa, covering the whole field of poetics; it illustrates the formal rules of the drama by the composition of a wretched drama in honour of Pratāparudra of Warangal, whose inscriptions show dates from A.D. 1298 to 1314. Of much greater interest is Vidyādhara’s Ekāvalī; [605] like Vidyānātha, the author celebrates in his illustrations of his text his patron, in this case Narasiṅha II of Orissa, perhaps A.D. 1280–1314; as a poet his merits are negligible, but he shows a lively interest in his subject and intelligence in his views. Of greater popularity than either is Viçvanātha Kavirāja, the author of the Sāhityadarpaṇa, [606] a general treatise on poetics. His handling of the drama is based largely on the Daçarūpa and its commentary, but he introduces a good deal of matter from the Nāṭyaçāstra in his sixth chapter, including details of the characteristics and ornaments of the drama, which the Daçarūpa omits. In this Viçvanātha indicates his servile character, which, however, renders his work the more valuable as an exposition of the orthodox doctrine. Of his ancestry and his own works he makes free mention, but the most definite evidence of his date is the existence in the library at Jammu of a manuscript of his work whose date appears to be A.D. 1383. The lack of order and the errors in his work are made the basis of criticism by Rūpa Gosvāmin in the early part of the sixteenth century, but his own Nāṭakacandrikā shows little improvement on the work of his predecessor, whence it draws much of its material; its real purpose is to eulogize the saint Caitanya, whose disciple Rūpa was and in whose honour he composed dramas of no merit. Equally dependent on Viçvanātha and the Daçarūpa is Sundaramiçra, whose Nāṭyapradīpa was composed in A.D. 1613. Many other treatises on drama are known by name or exist in manuscript, but none apparently of any great importance or repute. Of the fourteenth century also is the Rasārṇavasudhākara [607] of Çin̄ga Bhūpāla, lord of Rājācala and the land between the Vindhya and Çrīçaila about A.D. 1330, who cites Vidyādhara.

The development of a theory of drama progressed in the closest relation to the general theory of poetics, for the Indian theory of poetry does not admit any distinction in essence between the aesthetic pleasure produced by the drama and any other form of poetry. Thus we find in Abhinavagupta in full application to the drama the theory of suggestion, Dhvani, as the essence of poetry, which appeared in strength about A.D. 800 and was rendered popular by Ānandavardhana (A.D. 850) and by Abhinavagupta himself in his comment on the Dhvanyāloka of the former. Attacked by Mahiman Bhaṭṭa, author of the Vyaktiviveka (A.D. 1050), the doctrine was again developed with special care by the Kashmirian Mammaṭa [608] at the close of the eleventh century. In slightly varied forms it appears in Vidyānātha, Vidyādhara, and Viçvanātha.

Apart from this important development, which, however, has no special application to the drama, there is little progress in the course of the literature. The later authorities are bound by the authority of the Nāṭyaçāstra; they repeat unintelligently its descriptions of literary forms such as the Ḍima, the Samavakāra, the Īhāmṛga, the Vīthī, and the An̄ka, which had ceased to be in popular use, if indeed the definitions of the Nāṭyaçāstra were not merely hasty generalizations from a single play or so in every one of these cases. The most that they do is to omit or to vary details, but not in independence; normally the changes can be traced to variants in the text of the Çāstra or to maxims current under Bharata’s name, though not included in the Çāstra as we have it. Often the authors differ in the definition of terms in the Çāstra which, as often in Sanskrit technical phrases, present ambiguity and admit of various renderings. These divergences are especially frequent in the long lists of characteristics and ornaments or the different means of effecting dramatic results; the Indian love of meaningless subdivision here can indulge itself to its fullest and least profitable extent. A rich variety of such ambiguities is apparent in the verses in which the Agni Purāṇa [609] describes the drama, including dancing and the mimetic art, true to its aim to constitute itself a treasure-house of all learning, popular as well as divine. The chief value of the work is the occasional light which it throws on the variants in the text of the Çāstra, and its comparative antiquity, for it is cited in the Sāhityadarpaṇa and is probably some centuries older.

2. THE NATURE AND THE TYPES OF THE DRAMA

A drama is the imitation or representation of the conditions or situations (avasthānukṛti) [610] in which the personages who form the subject of treatment are placed from time to time, by means of gesture, speech, costume, and expression, and, one version of the definition adds, the situations must be such as to produce pleasure or pain, that is, they must be tinged with emotion. It is the presence of these ancillaries which distinguishes the drama from an ordinary poem; a poem appeals to the ear only, a drama is also a spectacle to delight the eyes; hence the term Rūpa or Rūpaka as applied generically to the drama, for Rūpa primarily denotes the object of vision, though the Indian tradition gives the artificial explanation that Rūpaka denotes a drama because the actors are credited with different parts.

Further light is shown on the nature of drama (nāṭya) by the discrimination of it from dance (nṛtta) and mimetic art (nṛtya), which united with song and speech serve to make up the drama. [611] The dance is based on time and rhythm; the mimetic art is concerned with representing the feelings or emotions (bhāva), while the essence of the drama is the sentiment (rasa) which it evokes in the spectator, a fact which places it on a higher level than either of its handmaidens. But there may be dramas in which these auxiliaries take first place, and on this fact is based a distinction between the primary forms, Rūpakas, in which the poetry is the dominant element and the secondary forms, Uparūpakas. Of Rūpakas ten are distinguished, Nāṭaka, Prakaraṇa, Bhāṇa, Prahasana, Ḍima, Vyāyoga, Samavakāra, Vīthī, An̄ka, and Īhāmṛga, which vary in regard to subject-matter (vastu), hero or heroine, and sentiment.

3. THE SUBJECT-MATTER AND THE PLOT

The scene of the plot must be laid in India, and the period must be one of the three ages succeeding the Golden Age, for pleasure and pain, essential elements as we have seen in the drama, cannot be experienced elsewhere than in Bhāratavarṣa, and even there they do not exist in the age of happiness unalloyed. [612] Otherwise the choice is free; the poet may take an incident familiar from tradition (prakhyāta), or may invent his plot (utpādya) or may combine both forms (miçra). But, if he follows a current legend, it is necessary that he shall not ruin the effect of it by incongruous invention; he must confine his ingenuity to episodes, for otherwise the audience will be painfully disturbed by departure from tradition. On the other hand, it is not merely legitimate but also necessary that the dramatist should ennoble his hero, if tradition assigns to him deeds incompatible with the character which he normally exhibits. [613] The epic is not encumbered with such considerations; it can represent Duḥṣanta as merely forgetful of his vows to Çakuntalā, but Kālidāsa must clear the character of the king from this seeming baseness by attributing his loss of memory to a curse provoked by a negligence of the heroine herself. The Rāmāyaṇa admits, and seeks to explain, if not convincingly, the death of Vālin, king of the monkeys, at the hands of the virtuous Rāma; Māyurāja in the Udāttarāghava passes over the episode in silence, while Bhavabhūti, with greater boldness, in the Mahāvīracarita perverts tradition to represent Vālin as an ally of Rāvaṇa, and as slain by Rāma in legitimate self-defence, and exonerates Kaikeyī.

The subject-matter takes two forms, the principal (ādhikārika) and the incidental (prāsan̄gika) actions. The first owes its name to the fact that it is connected with the attainment (adhikāra) of the purpose of the hero, whether that be love, or some material interest, or duty, or two or all of these. In the incidental action the end achieved is not that aimed at by the hero, but it serves as a means towards the fruition of his aims. [614] The incidental action may take the dimension of an episode (patākā), as is the case with the exploits of Sugrīva as an ally of Rāma, or it may be a mere incident (prakarī), as in Act VI of the Çakuntalā the scene in which the two attendants converse. [615]

An action, when developed in full, as normally it is in the Nāṭaka, the most perfect of forms of drama, involves of necessity five stages of development (avasthā); [616] there must be as the beginning (ārambha) the desire to attain some end, which leads on to the determined effort (prayatna) to secure the object of desire; this leads to the stage in which success is felt to be possible (prāptyāçā, prāptisambhava) having regard to the means available and the obstacles in the way of achievement; then arrives the certainty of success (niyatāpti), if only some specific difficulty can be surmounted; and finally the object is attained (phalāgama). Thus in the Çakuntalā we have the king’s first anticipation of seeing the heroine, then his eagerness to find a device to meet her again; in Act IV we learn that the anger of the sage, Durvāsas, has in some measure been appeased, and the possibility of the reunion of the king and Çakuntalā now exists; in Act VI the discovery of the ring brings back to the king remembrance, and the way for a reunion is paved, to be attained in the following act. The Ratnāvalī, no less perfect an example of the minor type, the Nāṭikā, reveals to us the aims of the minister to secure the union of the heroine and the king; a definite step to this end is taken when the heroine decides to depict the face of Vatsa on the canvas; in Act II the lovers are united for the moment, but subject to the risk of discovery by the queen; then the king recognizes that his success in love depends on winning the queen’s favour, which is successfully accomplished in the last act.

There are also five elements of the plot (arthaprakṛti), [617] which the theory not very accurately parallels with the five stages of the action. The first is the germ (bīja) whence springs the action, as in the Ratnāvalī from Yaugandharāyaṇa’s scheme to secure the princess for the king. The second, with change of metaphor, is the drop (bindu) which spreads out as oil on water; the course of the drama, which has seemed to be interrupted, is again set in activity; thus in the Ratnāvalī, when the festival of the god of love is over, the princess gives a decisive impulse to the motion of the drama by recognizing in him, whom she deemed the god himself, the king for whom she was destined as a bride. The other three elements are the episode, the incident, and the dénouement (kārya).

Based on these parallel sets is a third division of the junctures [618] (sandhi), which carry each of the stages of the action to its natural close. They are the opening (mukha), progression (pratimukha), development (garbha), pause (vimarça), and conclusion (nirvahaṇa), corresponding clearly and closely with the stages [619] set out above. Thus in the Çakuntalā the opening extends from Act I to the point in Act II where the general departs; the progression begins with the king’s confession to the Vidūṣaka of his deep love, and extends to the close of Act III. The development occupies Acts IV and V, up to the point where Gautamī uncovers the face of Çakuntalā; at this moment the curse darkens the mind of the king, who, instead of rejoicing in reunion with his wife, pauses in reflection, and this pause in the action extends to the close of Act VI, while the conclusion is achieved in the last Act. In the Ratnāvalī the opening extends to that point in