Author: Usha Bhatia
Publisher: Lalit Kala Akademi
Year: 2001
Language: English
Pages: 4+6
ISBN/UPC (if available): 8187507055
Description
A portfolio of 6 large-size prints of Gita Govinda, a composition between song and drama and a melodrama. A 4-page commentary gives the historical background of the Gita Govinda which was illustrated in an extensive series in the Basholi style of Pahari painting.
The Gita Govinda is regarded by the Chaitanya Vaishnavas not only as a poetic composition of great sensitivity and lyrical charm, but is also interpreted in terms of Vaishnava dogmas, though it is doubtful whether Jayadeva had anything of the nature in mind, for he is primarily a poet and not a doctrinaire. He has woven into his songs an eroticism of fascinating beauty, imageries which the poems throb with passion and above all word-music which flows like a murmuring brook gushing in a verdant forest.
Jayadeva, the court poet of the Sena King Lakshmanasena (AD 1185-1206), whose reign saw the end of the Hindu empire in the north, was the son of Bhojadeva of Kindubilva. The poet had the genius to create a novel form of literature which has been regarded by the later generations as a thing of enduring beauty. Within a century after his death Jayadeva's fame spread all over India and the songs of the Gita Govinda were sung and danced in the temples and to gatherings of the Vaishnavas both in the south and north.
Usha Bhatia is the Editor.
THE ILLUSTRATIONS
Plate 1 The Music of Love
Plate 2 Radha's Longing
Plate 3 The Union
Plate 4 Radha commanding Krishna to adorn her
Plate 5 Arranging the Earring
Plate 6 Krishna's Flute