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Sahitya-kaumudi by Baladeva Vidyabhushana

by Gaurapada Dāsa | 2015 | 234,703 words

Baladeva Vidyabhusana’s Sahitya-kaumudi covers all aspects of poetical theory except the topic of dramaturgy. All the definitions of poetical concepts are taken from Mammata’s Kavya-prakasha, the most authoritative work on Sanskrit poetical rhetoric. Baladeva Vidyabhushana added the eleventh chapter, where he expounds additional ornaments from Visv...

Text 9.1 [Vakrokti]

Vakrokti

पूर्वत्र लक्षितान� अलङ्कारान् दर्शयन� शब्दस्� प्रथमं धी-विषयत्वात् तद�-गतांस् तावद� आह,

pūrvatra lakṣitān alaṅkārān darśayan śabdasya prathama� dhī-viṣayatt tad-gatāṃs tāvad āha,

To illustrate the ornaments, defined earlier (8.2), at first he only describes the ornaments of sound, because out of sound and meaning, sound is the first to reach the mind:

Vakrokti

yad uktam Բⲹٳ ⲹ Բⲹٳnyena yojyate |
śṣeṇa 챹 ñ vakroktis ٲٳ 屹 ||9.78||

yat—which [sentence]; uktam—uٳٱ; Բⲹٳ—in another way; —a sentence; Բⲹٳ—in other way; anyena—by another [person]; yojyate—is syntactically linked; śṣeṇa—with a double meaning; —with a modulation of the voice; —o; ñ—is to be known; —t󲹳; -ܰپ�—is the ornament called vakrokti (ambiguous expression) (�crooked utterance�); ٲٳ—in that way; —tɴǴڴDZ.

A sentence said in one way by one person and construed in another way by another person, either by śṣa or by , is the ornament called vakrokti (ambiguous speech). Thus it has two varieties.

tatheti, śṣa-vakrokti� -vakroktiś ca.

There are two kinds: śṣa-vakrokti (ambiguous speech due to a literal double meaning) and -vakrokti (ambiguous speech due to a modulation of the tone of voice).

Commentary:

The difference between vakrokti (ambiguous speech) and the ǰپ ornament (artful concealment) (10.179) is this: vakroktau parokter Բⲹٳ-karaṇam, vyājoktau tu svokter iti 岹�, “In vakrokti, the hearer construes the speaker’s statement differently, whereas in ǰپ the speaker construes his or her own statement in a tricky way afterward� (ṛṣṇānԻ徱ī 9.1).

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