I share this short narrative only to verbalize the ideas that inspired this piece. The idea of art is to create the same bhava in the observer. Art makes you experience a bhava while language rationalizes it. Hence, language is, by its very nature, reductive. And if one is not careful, it can sometimes act against the very bhava that the art attempts to create. I pray that adding this description will only enhance the experience of the art:
वागर्थाविव संपृक्तौ वागर्थप्रतिपत्तये ।
जगतः पितरौ वन्दे पार्वतीपरमेश्वरौ ॥
COMMENTARY
“Having come by the bow of Vishnu which he had in his former life, Raghava-Rama appeared extraordinarily charming: if a fresh raincloud is beautiful even by itself, how much more then if it be marked with celestials' rainbow.”
- 11.80 Kalidasa’s Raghuvamsham c.4th Century CE (Krishnarao Mahadeva Joglekar’s translation from sanskritdocuments.org)
After marrying Sita, as young Rama is returning to Ayodhya, he is met with Parashurama on the way who challenges him to bend Vishnu’s bow. On seeing Rama easily do it, the “fiery” Bhargava Rama quietens like a “smoking ember”. This entire episode is the inspiration behind the piece and attempts to capture Kalidasa’s description.
Kalidasa, perhaps the greatest poet to have walked on this earth, masterfully describes the beauty of the transition of the Avatara in the 11th chapter of Raghuvamsham.
- Created: November 11, 2021
- Collections: Raghava राघवः