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 (“prose-romance�). The author, Dhanapala was a court poet to the Paramara king Munja, who ruled the Kingdom of Malwa in ancient west-central India.
Chapter 17 - Bana and Dhanapala—A study in contrast
3 (of 22)
External source: Shodhganga (Repository of Indian theses)
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1021
the sense of jealousy and frustration he aroused in the hea-
rt of his contemporaries as well as posteriors. In the next
verse Dhanapāla suggestively compares Bāna's Kādambarī to
wine and the Harṣacaritam to divine nector, both which earn-
ed him fame unbounded like an ocean and endeared him to the
10 elite of his days.
(3) MISINTERPRETATION BY SCHOLARS :-
Now, scholars like Dr. Keith, Dr. Krishnamachariar,
Dr. De, Dr. Jagannath Pathak, Dr. Harindrabhushan Jain and
Prof. Amaranath Pandey have read in these verses a tacit
admission by Dhanapāla of his indebtedness to Bana when they
contend that our poet imitated, successfully according to so-
me and unsuccessfully according to others, the illustrious
predecessor. All of them seem to have rather shot far below
the bull's-eye. What Dhanapāla seems to have emphasized in
these verses is, not his indebtedness, but rather the extra-
i
ordinarly powerful genius of Bāna, the unrivalled place of
his Sanskrit prose-romances in the hearts of the learned, and
Bb his own covetousness for a matching fame on the strugth
mof his single prose-romance. Dr. Jagannath Pathak is, of
course,quite right when he reads in these verses a deep sense
10. TM(N), Intro vs. 27: कादम्बरी सहोद� सुध्या वै बुधे यदि।
लब्धवान् �
हर्षाख्यायिकया ख्याति
[kādambarī sahodaya sudhyā vai budhe yadi|
labdhavān ||
harṣākhyāyikayā khyāti
] ATUITS FEETRECT
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