महावीरचरितम् (महाकवि भवभूति - वीररस-प्रधान रामकथा नाटक सम्पूर्ण ७ अङ्क सटीक)

Introduction [lxxx
not and could not. Secondly, there is, to my mind, a peculiarly dramatic
appropriateness in the fact that the play—I mean the play proper—should
open with a speech of Rāma (i. 8⁴) that was meant to console his wife for a
thing which had happened and which could not but happen: the separation
from her dear relatives and elders. Here we have the very keynote of the
play struck once and for all. When to all this we add that the language of
the entire act is exceptionally rich and poetic, that there is hardly a sentence
or even a phrase which we would wish were not there,¹ hardly a word which
is not just the right word, that the poet affords us a deep insight into the
workings of the human heart so that the emotional tone is genuine and
not mawkish or sentimental (as it was in some parts of his earlier plays),
and that the whole is arranged in a sequence which is entirely natural and
clearly shows that Bhavabhūti has at last mastered the art of condensing
and enlarging, of choosing and omitting, and above all has learned the value
of restraint,—with that we have said our last word in praise of this act and
of the dramatic technique that is involved in the writing of it.
41. The Uttara-Rāma-charita as a psychological study.—In acts ii
and iii we have Bhavabhūti in yet another light. Vālmīki's Rāmāyaṇa
gives the story of Śambūka in vii. 74–82, and the Padma-Purāṇa gives it
in v. 32, 33 and elsewhere. Both these works tell us that Rāma, after
killing the Śūdra ascetic, visited the hermitage of Agastya in the Pañcha-
vaṭī, but neither is alive to the great poetic opportunity afforded by Rāma's
reappearance in the old familiar scenes after the great event of Sītā's
abandonment. The Padma-Purāṇa does perhaps vaguely realize the poetic
possibilities of the theme (cp. v. 35²⁶ ff.), but the treatment is not to be
compared with the splendid descriptive and reflective passages that we find
in the Uttara-Rāma-charita, acts ii and iii. For all practical purposes then
these acts might be said to be an original work of Bhavabhūti, and we have
seen (§ 39) that he had a strong psychological reason for the invention.
Let us now see what the poet makes of his opportunities.
¹ For the stage-omission of i. 30⁹ to i. 31ᵈ
see appendix 8. With this single ex-
ception the themes of the pictures are
all well chosen. Each has a distinct
purpose. The poet's treatment, of course,
is necessarily allusive and the audience
could easily fill in the details. His
dramatic sense is shown as much by
what he keeps as by what he omits; e.g.
the Ahalyā incident and the fight with
Vālin. Note also that Rāma does not in
the play, as he does in the epic (vii. 43 f.),
expressly seek information about the
kimvadantī (rumour); and he abandons
Sītā immediately after his interview with
the spy, not the next morning, as in the
epic. That the cry for help (i. 49³) should
come just at the right moment to remind
him of his kingly duty, while at the
same time the allusion to Rākshasa-
trāsa (fear of demons) should make his
heart soften, is also highly artistic.
So far as we know, the episode of the
picture-gallery is original with Bhava-
bhūti.