Sanskrit Poetics In The Postcolonial Space

The book positions Sanskrit poetics in a postcolonial context to understand its contemporary relevance and proposes a productive future direction for this system of knowledge. The fundamental argument against Sanskrit poetics in modern literary circles is that it is a system of knowledge that does not have any contemporary relevance, since the idea of literature conceptualised by Sanskrit poetics is incompatible with the modern notion of literature. The general argument is that Sanskrit poetics has only the archaic value of a museum piece. This book which resists such an extremist approach to Sanskrit poetics aims to provide a new direction for Sanskrit poetics to generate new knowledge about this epistemology. The new approach that the author proposes is explicated through three major theoretical positions in Sanskrit poetics, namely dhvani, aucitya and vakrokti.

The book positions Sanskrit poetics in a postcolonial context to understand its contemporary relevance and proposes a productive future direction for this system of knowledge. The fundamental argument against Sanskrit poetics in modern literary circles is that it is a system of knowledge that does not have any contemporary relevance, since the idea of literature conceptualised by Sanskrit poetics is incompatible with the modern notion of literature. The general argument is that Sanskrit poetics has only the archaic value of a museum piece. This book which resists such an extremist approach to Sanskrit poetics aims to provide a new direction for Sanskrit poetics to generate new knowledge about this epistemology. The new approach that the author proposes is explicated through three major theoretical positions in Sanskrit poetics, namely dhvani, aucitya and vakrokti.

This book has inspired many scholars to study the numerous works on Alankara, to produce papers dealing with several aspects of Alankarasastra and to publish several important texts. The author has made substantial additions and changes in this edition and has included valuable new material.The book is divided into two parts. The first part contains an account of the important works on Alankarasastra, a brief analysis of their contents and the chronology of writers on Alankarasastra and other kindred matters. The second part comprises a review of subjects that fall under the purview of Alankarasastra. The author has attempted to show how from very small beginnings various theories of Poetics and Literary Criticism were evolved, to dilate upon the different aspects of an elaborate theory of Poetics and trace the history of literary theories in India.

This innovative study develops a unified theory of literature by critically evaluating the categories of sanskrit poetics from a single theoretical standpoint that of rasa the theory that holds that poety is essentially emotive discourse. Literature Chariargues is defined not by the use of any formal linguistic devices but rather by the emotive meaning embodied is therefore the proper aim and the common denominator of all literary works.

Study on Sanskrit poetics.

This volume explores how postcolonial texts have determined the evolution or emergence of specific formal innovations in narrative genres. While the prominence of questions of cultural identity in postcolonial studies has prevented due attention to concerns of literary form and aesthetics, this book gives premium to the literary, aiming to delineate the evolution of specific narrative techniques as part of an emerging postcolonial aesthetics. Essays delineate elements of an emergent postcolonial narratology across a variety of seminal generic forms, such as the epic, the novel, the short story, the autobiography, and the folk tale, focusing on genre as a powerful tool for the historicizing of literature and orature within cultural discourses. Investigating the heuristic value of concepts such as mimicry, writing back, translation, negotiation, or subversion, the book considers the value of explanatory paradigms for postcolonial generic models. It also explores the status of postcolonial comparative aesthetics versus globalization studies and liberal concepts of the transnational, taking issue with the prominence of Western concepts of identity in discussions of postcolonial literature and the favoring of mimetic forms. This volume offers a unique contribution to the study of narrative genre in postcolonial literatures and provides valuable insight into the field of postcolonial studies on the whole.