2023-06-05 16:38:51 by ambuda-bot
This page has not been fully proofread.
XV
prapancha of which he makes such glorious fun elsewhere. And
he aware of it, as will be seen from his rueful apology to
Sarasvati (1-7)
That delightful melange of prose and verse, the Champu, has
its own conventions, though they are not rigorous. Bhoja, in the
Ramayana Champu, suggested that the prose should be hardly
more than a connecting link for the verse; he compared its
place in the Champu to that of the instrumental accompaniment
in a vocal concert. And Samarapungava Dikshita, whom our
author mentions with the reverence due to a teacher, calling him
Sahitya-marga-sampradāya-guru, pointedly draws attention to the
fact that in his own work, the Yatra-prabandha, the prose occupies
a subordinate place. The better class of Champus has followed
this rule. It is works like the Nala-champu, with their avowed
purpose of displaying the poet's skill in slesha, that have long
and arid stretches of prose modelled on the later degenerate
romances, with their yard-long compounds, their otiose adjec-
tives, their far-fetched analogies and outrageous puns.
But, if there is too much of prose in the Nilakantha-Vijaya,
it is marked, even in its least inspired passages, by that play of
mind which sustains the reader's interest. In the first Ucchvāsa,
the poet attempts the almost impossible task of making heaven
and the gods credible and vivid to our earth-bound minds. So,
like the lawyer arguing to his brief, he nonchalantly suggests
that heaven is far superior to the bodiless bliss of Nirvāṇa, and
upbraids the Veda with mock-severity for prescribing numberless
means, such as sacrifices, for winning the delights of Svarga, only
to dash the hopes of the aspirant by enjoining Nishkama karma
in the same breadth! In managing his paradoxes, he resorts to
humorous exaggeration, suggesting that men and gods are made
of much the same stuff. Thus when, as the result of Durvāsas'
curse, Amaravati is invaded by the asura hosts, the Karmadevas,
who have won their place in heaven by arduous sacrifice and
penance, do not want to imperil their new-found joys by siding
with Indra; they prefer to observe a specious neutrality :
"Whether Rama rules or Ravana, it makes no difference to us."
On the other hand, the asura heroes, who have fallen in battle
and are thus automatically translated to heaven, are only too
ready to play the fifth columnist in the interests of their whilom
associates. Again, the deposed gods have no scruples in exploi.
ting the credulity of those who hanker after heaven (p. 96).
prapancha of which he makes such glorious fun elsewhere. And
he aware of it, as will be seen from his rueful apology to
Sarasvati (1-7)
That delightful melange of prose and verse, the Champu, has
its own conventions, though they are not rigorous. Bhoja, in the
Ramayana Champu, suggested that the prose should be hardly
more than a connecting link for the verse; he compared its
place in the Champu to that of the instrumental accompaniment
in a vocal concert. And Samarapungava Dikshita, whom our
author mentions with the reverence due to a teacher, calling him
Sahitya-marga-sampradāya-guru, pointedly draws attention to the
fact that in his own work, the Yatra-prabandha, the prose occupies
a subordinate place. The better class of Champus has followed
this rule. It is works like the Nala-champu, with their avowed
purpose of displaying the poet's skill in slesha, that have long
and arid stretches of prose modelled on the later degenerate
romances, with their yard-long compounds, their otiose adjec-
tives, their far-fetched analogies and outrageous puns.
But, if there is too much of prose in the Nilakantha-Vijaya,
it is marked, even in its least inspired passages, by that play of
mind which sustains the reader's interest. In the first Ucchvāsa,
the poet attempts the almost impossible task of making heaven
and the gods credible and vivid to our earth-bound minds. So,
like the lawyer arguing to his brief, he nonchalantly suggests
that heaven is far superior to the bodiless bliss of Nirvāṇa, and
upbraids the Veda with mock-severity for prescribing numberless
means, such as sacrifices, for winning the delights of Svarga, only
to dash the hopes of the aspirant by enjoining Nishkama karma
in the same breadth! In managing his paradoxes, he resorts to
humorous exaggeration, suggesting that men and gods are made
of much the same stuff. Thus when, as the result of Durvāsas'
curse, Amaravati is invaded by the asura hosts, the Karmadevas,
who have won their place in heaven by arduous sacrifice and
penance, do not want to imperil their new-found joys by siding
with Indra; they prefer to observe a specious neutrality :
"Whether Rama rules or Ravana, it makes no difference to us."
On the other hand, the asura heroes, who have fallen in battle
and are thus automatically translated to heaven, are only too
ready to play the fifth columnist in the interests of their whilom
associates. Again, the deposed gods have no scruples in exploi.
ting the credulity of those who hanker after heaven (p. 96).