Author: Arthur Berriedale Keith
Publisher: Motilal Banarsidass
Year: 2007
Language: multilingual
Pages: 575
ISBN/UPC (if available): 9788120809796
Description
Taken in conjunction with my Sanskrit Drama, this work covers the field of Classical Sanskrit Literature as opposed to the Vedic Literature, the epics, and the Puranas. To bring the subject-matter within the limits of a single volume has rendered it necessary to treat the scientific literature briefly, and to avoid discussions of its subject-matter which appertains rather to the historian of grammar, philosophy, law, medicine, astronomy, or mathematics, than to the literary historian. The mode of treatment has rendered it possible, for the first time in any treatise in English on Sanskrit Literature, to pay due attention to the literary qualities of the Kavya.
It is in the great writers of Kavya along, headed by Kalidasa that we find an in-depth feeling for life and nature matched with perfection of expression and rhythm. The Kavya literature includes some of the great poetry of the world.
The contents include: The Origin of Sanskrit, the Origin and Development of Kavya Literature, Kalidasa, Bharavi, Historical Kavya, Lyric Poetry, the Didactic Fables, the Brhatkatha, the Great Romances, Theories of Poetry, Lexicography and Matrices, the Beginnings of Grammatical Study, Dharmasastras, the Science of Politics, Philosophy and Religion, Medicine, Astronomy, Astrology and Mathematics and many more topics of vital interest.
Contents
Preface
Kumaralata and the early Kavya, Sanskrit, and Prakrit
Kalidasa’s Date and Place of Birth
Greek and Indian Fables
The Dramas of Bhasa
Dandin and the Avantisundarikatha
The Authenticity of the Arthacastra
The Dates of the Philosophical Systems
Medical Fragments from Turkestan
The Indian Origin of the Numerals
Sanskrit as a vernacular
PART I – THE LANGUAGE
I. Sanskrit, Prakrit, and Apabhranca.
PART II – BELLES – LETTRES AND POETICS
II. The Origin and Development of Kavya Literature
III. Aevaghosa and Early Buddhist Kavya
IV. Kalidasa and the Guptas
V. Bharavi, Bhatti, Kumaradasa, and Magha
VI. The Lesser Epic Poets
VII. Historical Kavya
VIII. Bhartrhari, Amaru, Bilhana, and Jayadeva
IX. Lyric Poetry and the Anthologies
X. Gnomic and Didactic Poetry
XI. The Didactic Fable
XII. The Brhatkatha and its Descendants
XIII. The Romantic and the Didactic Tale
XIV. The Great Romances
XV. The later Romances and the Campus
XVI. The Aims and Achievement of Sanskrit Poetry
XVII. The West and Indian Literature
XVIII. Theories of Poetry
PART III – SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE
XIX. The Origin and Characteristics of the Scientific Literature
XX. Lexicography and Metrics
XXI. Grammar
XXII. Civil and Religious Law (Dharmacastra)
XXIII. The Science of Politics and Practical Life (Artha-castra, Niticastra)
XXIV. The Science of Love (Kamacastra)
XXV. Philosophy and Religion
XXVI. Medicine
XXVII. Astronomy, Astrology, and Mathematics
English Index
Sanskrit Index