Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/418

398 398 DRAMA [INDIAN. &quot; What,&quot; inquires the manager of an actor in the induc tion to one of the most famous of Indian plays, &quot; are those qualities which the virtuous, the wise, the venerable, the learned, and the Brahmans require in a drama ] &quot; &quot; Pro found exposition of the various passions,&quot; is the reply, &quot; pleasing interchange of mutual affection, loftiness of character, delicate expression of desire, a surprising story, and elegant language.&quot; &quot; Then,&quot; says the manager (for the Indian dramatists, though not, like Ben Jonson, wont to &quot; rail&quot; the public &quot; into approbation,&quot; are unaffected by mauvaise honte) &quot; I recollect one.&quot; And he proceeds to state that &quot; Babhavuti has given us a drama composed by him, replete with all qualities, to which indeed this sentence is applicable : How little do they know who speak of us with censure ! This entertainment is not for them. Possibly some one exists, or will exist, of similar tastes with myself ; for time is boundless, and the world is wide. &quot; This self-possessed disregard of popularity, springing from an imperturbable consciousness of lofty aims, accounts for much rhat is characteristic of the higher class of Indian plays. It explains both their paucity and their length, renders intelligible the chief peculiarity in their diction, and furnishes the key to their most striking ethical as well as literary qualities. Connected in their origin with religious worship, they were only performed on solemn occasions, chiefly of a public nature, and more especially at seasons sacred to some divinity. Thus, though they might in some instances be reproduced, they were always written with a view to one particular solemn representation. Again, the greater part of every one of the plays of Northern India is written in Sanskrit, which ceased to be a popular language by 300 B.C., but continued the classical, and at the same time the sacred, form of speech of the Brahmans. Sanskrit is spoken by the heroes and principal personages of the plays, while the female and inferior char acters uss varieties, more or less refined, of the Prakrit languages (as a rule not more than three, that which is employed in the songs of the women being the poetic dialect of the most common Prakrit language, the Cauraseni). Hence, part at least of each play cannot have been under stood by the large majority of the audience, except in so far as their general acquaintance with the legends or stories treated enabled them to follow the course of the action. Every audience thus contained an inner audience, which could alone feel the full effect of the drama. It is, then, easy to see why the Hindu critics should make demands upon the art, into which only highly-trained and refined intellects were capable of entering, or called upon to enter. The general public could not be expected to appreciate the sentiments expressed in a drama, and thus (according to the process prescribed by Hindu theory) to receive instruc tion by means of amusement. These sentiments are termed rasas (tastes or flavours), and said to spring from the bhdvas (conditions of mind and body). A variety of subdivisions is added ; but the santa rasa is logically enough excluded from dramatic composition, inasmuch as it implies absolute quiescence. The Hindu critics know of no distinction directly corre sponding to that between tragedy and comedy, still less of any determined by the nature of the close of a play. For, in accordance with the child-like element of their character, the Hindus dislike an unhappy ending to any story, and a positive rule accordingly prohibits a fatal conclusion in their dramas. The general term for all dramatic composi tions is rupaka (from riipa, form), those of an inferior class being distinguished as uparupakas. Of the various sub divisions of the riipaJca, in a more limited sense, the nafaka, or play proper, represents the most perfect kind. Its sub ject should always be celebrated and important it is virtually either heroism or love, and most frequently the ] latter and the hero should be a demigod or divinity (such I as Kama in Babhavuti s heroic plays) or a king (such as I the hero of Sdkunlald). But although the earlier drama tists took their plots from the sacred writings or Purauas, they held themselves at liberty to vary the incidents, a licence from which the later poets abstained. Thus, in accordance, perhaps, with the respective developments in the religious life of the two peoples, the Hindu drama in this respect reversed the progressive practice of the Greek. The prakararias agree in all essentials with the nafakas except that they are less elevated ; their stories are mere fictions, taken from actual life in a respectable class of society. 1 Among the species of the uponHpaka may be mentioned the trofaka, in which the personages are partly human, partly divine, and of which a famous example remains. 2 Of the b/iana, a monologue in one act, one literary example is extant a curious picture of manners in which the speaker describes the different persons he meets at a spring festival in the streets of Kolahalapur. 3 The satire of the farcical prahasanas is usually directed against the hypocrisy of ascetics and Brahmans, and the sensuality of the wealthy and powerful. These trifles represent the lower extreme of the dramatic scale, to which, of course, the principles that follow only partially apply. Unity of action is strictly enjoined by Hindu theory, though not invariably observed in practice. Episodical or prolix interruptions are forbidden ; but, in order to facilitate the connection, the story of the play is sometimes carried on by narratives spoken by actors or &quot; interpreters,&quot; some thing after the fashion of the Chorus in Henry V., or of Gower in Pericles. &quot; Unity of time&quot; is liberally, if rather arbitrarily, understood by the later critical authorities as limiting the duration of the action of a single year ; but even this is exceeded in more than one classical play. 4 The single acts are to confine the events occurring in them to &quot; one course of the sun,&quot; and usually do so. &quot; Unity of place &quot; is unknown to the Hindu drama, by reason of the absence of scenery ; for the plays were performed in the open courts of palaces, perhaps at times in large halls set apart for public entertainments, or in the open air. Hence change of scene is usually indicated in the texts ; and we find 5 the characters making long journeys on the stage. under the eyes of spectators not trained to demand &quot; real&quot; mileage. With the solemn character of the higher kind of dramatic performances accord the rubs and prohibitions defining what may be called the proprieties cf the Indian drama. Not only should death never be inflicted coram popido, but the various operations of biting, scratching, kissing, oating, sleeping, the bath, and the marriage ceremony should never take place on the stage. Yet such rules are made to be occasionally broken. It is true that the mild humour of the vidushalia is restricted to his
 * gesticulating eating &quot; instead of perpetrating the

obnoxious act. 6 The charming love-scene in the Sdkuntald (at least in the earlier recension of the play) breaks off just as the hero is about to act the part of the bee to the honey of the heroine s lips. 7 But later writers are less squeamish. or less refined. In two dramas 8 the heroine is dragged on the stage by her braid of hair ; and this outrage, a worse one than that imputed to Dunstan, is in both instances the motive of the action. In a third, 9 sleeping and the marriage ceremony occur in the course of the representation. The dramatic construction of the Indian plays presents no very striking peculiarities. They open with a benedic- 1 e.g., MrichchhaMti; Malati and Mddhava. 2 Vikrama and Urvasi. a Safada-Tilaka. 4 Sakuntald; Uttara-R.dma-Charitra. 5 Arichandra, act iv. 6 ffdgdnanda, act i. 7 Act iii. ; cf. Ndgdnanda, act iii. 8 VeAi-SamJidra; Prachanda-Panddca. 9 Viddha-Salalhanjika. The &quot; unitii Pro prieties tioii.