Essay name: Tilakamanjari of Dhanapala (study)
Author:
Shri N. M. Kansara
Affiliation: Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda / Department of Sanskrit Pali and Prakrit
This is an English study of the Tilakamanjari of Dhanapala, a Sanskrit poem written in the 11th century. Technically, the Tilaka-manjari is classified as a Gadyakavya (鈥減rose-romance鈥�). The author, Dhanapala was a court poet to the Paramara king Munja, who ruled the Kingdom of Malwa in ancient west-central India.
Chapter 7 - The Katha form of literature
13 (of 30)
External source: Shodhganga (Repository of Indian theses)
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of the age is perhaps the most important factor
At a certain level of general culture, with certain
combinations of economie and social conditions
certain artistic and literary forms impose themselves.
These forms the writer is almost compelled to accept,
either because he relies on his writing for his living,
or because he feels instinctively that he must embrace
the means necessary to reaching the largest possible
audience. When the fates are peculiarly kind, the writer
will find himself naturally attracted to the predominant
form of the age
the form that is vital in his own time, he is confronted
by the Herculean task of making a form vital by imposing
it upon the contemporary taste." This, though meant for
English novel, nonetheless applies, to some extent, to
the Sanskrit2prose-romance as well. The forms of litera-
ture change, but not the form of creative literary genius.
But it must be remembered that the type of fiction
that has developed in Europe during the last few centu-
ries, is essentially meant to be read rather than liste-
ned to. This essential difference makes all the differe-
nce in the norms of the form and its appreciation. In
the case of the European novel " there is nothing more
. For if the writer cannot accept
