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

Introduction [lx
24. Later modifications of the Rāma-story : 1. Buddhistic form.—
The Buddhistic form of the Rāma-story is to be found in the ‘Daśaratha-
Jātaka’ (Faüsboll, iv. pp. 124 ff.). The story is as follows. Daśaratha,
king of Benares, had three children: Rāma, Lakshmaṇa, and Sītā, all born
from his first wife, after whose death he marries a second, and has by her
a fourth child, a son named Bharata. Overjoyed at having another son
born to him, Daśaratha grants a boon to his wife. After seven or eight
years the wife remembers the boon and asks Daśaratha to fulfil it by giving
the throne to her son. The king refuses to grant her request; but fearing
the machinations of the woman, he advises the three children by his first
wife to stay away from the court for twelve years. He makes it twelve
years, because astrologers had told him that he would live so long. Rāma,
with his brother Lakshmaṇa and his sister Sītā, repairs to the Himalayas.
Contrary to the prophecy of the astrologers Daśaratha dies in the ninth
year. The widowed queen tries to secure the throne for Bharata, but he
sternly refuses and goes to seek his eldest brother, to whom the throne by
right belonged. Rāma, however, is unwilling to come immediately, seeing
that the period of twelve years assigned to him by his father was not yet
over. He stays away another three years and then returns, marries Sītā,
and rules in peace.
This feeble, distorted, unmotivated story was once regarded as a possible
source of Vālmīki’s Rāmāyaṇa. Professor Jacobi (Das Rāmāyaṇa, pp. 84–93)
has already shown the utter untenability of such a view. And now we
have definite evidence to prove that the Rāma-Rāvaṇa story was already
well known¹ before 300 B.C.
**25. Later modifications of the Rāma-story : 2. Jain forms.—**The Jain
forms of the Rāma-story are to be found in works like the Padma-Purāṇa
of Ravisheṇa, the Dharma-parīkshā of Amitagati, and the Trishashṭhiśa-
lākāpurushacharita (chap. vii) of Hemachandra. The story in the main
follows Vālmīki’s Rāmāyaṇa, and the evident object of these works must
be to utilize an already existing story for preaching the special doctrines of
the cult. Thus they make Rāma a pious Jain, a total abstainer from meat.
This of course involved the omission of the golden deer incident (see § 18, J);
Rāvaṇa abducts Sītā while Rāma is engaged in the battle with the fourteen
thousand. Similarly Rāma kills Vālin in a fair fight (contrast § 18, K).
Years after her abandonment, when Rāma meets Sītā once more, it was not
through the instrumentality of Vālmīki, or through the incidents attending

¹ See Kauṭilīya, p. 11, line 3 from the bottom.          the reference to the Rāmāyaṇa in one of
    As Bhāsa’s date is uncertain, the fact of          his plays (Avimāraka, p. 16, line 2) cannot
    his having written two Rāma-plays and          have much significance chronologically.

lxi] History of the Rāma-story
the horse-sacrifice (a Jain could not perform a sacrifice involving the death
of any living animal), but merely and simply because people told him
about her forlorn state; and he finally loses her again, not because Sītā
disappears into the earth, but because, after her purity is attested anew by
the fire-ordeal, she is convinced of the vanity of the world and becomes
a Jain nun, tearing out her hair with her own hand. Rāma himself takes
the mendicant vow soon after. We may note in passing that the Jain
accounts tell us that the monkeys and bears and demons who took part
in the battle at Laṅkā were not really monkeys or bears or demons. They
were human beings who carried the images of a monkey or a bear or
a demon on their banners.
26. Later modifications of the Rāma-story : 3. Hindu forms.—A whole
treatise could be written discussing the various forms which the Rāma-
story assumed in the later Hindu tellings of it, either in Sanskrit or in the
different vernaculars of the country. And the special interest of such
a treatise would lie in the attempt to show how the story came to be
modified in accordance with changing beliefs and varying standards of
judgement. We shall content ourselves with indicating merely the several
tendencies that are discernible in the process. .
26, A. Exaggeration.—In these later tellings of the story mere
exaggerations are what we naturally expect. Thus, even in the present
form of the Rāmāyaṇa, the battle at Laṅkā is spun out and made to last
for months, the intervals being filled in with one superhuman deed after
another on both sides. There is a good deal of repetition. The same
applies to some of the later descriptions of the battle of the twins with
the army attending the sacrificial horse of Rāma. The twins are made to
defeat all the great heroes who fought by Rāma’s side at Laṅkā, including
Māruti, Lakshmaṇa, and even Rāma himself. Or, to take another instance
which is significant in connexion with Bhavabhūti’s treatment of the
theme, Rāvaṇa himself is represented as having been present at Sītā’s
svayaṁvara, but unable to bend the bow (see § 18, C), which Rāma
alone did.
26, B. Deification.—The beginnings of this process are already observable
in the later portions of the Rāmāyaṇa, especially books i and vii, where
Rāma is exalted into an Avatar of Vishṇu or the Supreme Spirit. This
tendency was in course of time so much exaggerated that it eventually
defeated its own purpose. Rāvaṇa also came to be considered as a regular
devotee of Rāma; for, works on devotion admit intense enmity as a form
of worship no less efficacious than friendship or service. So Rāvaṇa longs
to be killed by Rāma and thereby to attain salvation (see U.R.C. ii. 11).

Introduction [lxii
If he robs Sītā, it is simply to hasten the wished-for end, and without any
sinful designs against Sītā, whom he revered as his mother.
26, C. Idealization.—Attempts were made quite early to clear the
character of the intriguing queen Kaikeyī. Thus her nurse Mantharā
(see § 18, E) becomes a special messenger sent by the Gods to secure Rāma's
exile, and, as a necessary consequence, Rāvaṇa's death. Mantharā is the
spirit of Kali (Quarrel), and she possesses Kaikeyī's soul, and makes her
say and do what she, a paragon of virtue and kindness, would never
otherwise have said and done. Similarly in regard to the episode of Sītā's
residence at Laṅkā, the capital of the demon Rāvaṇa. The point was to
establish her purity beyond the possibility of a suspicion. To effect this
we found that the Uttara-kāṇḍa brought in the story of the curse (see § 18,
L, note). Even that apparently did not suffice. The Adhyātma Rāmāyaṇa
(iii. 7) goes farther and says that Rāvaṇa did not abduct Sītā at all: only
her shadow. When the golden deer appeared, Rāma, being an omniscient
God, knew that it was a trick of the demon, and he rather welcomed it as
it would give him a pretext to kill Rāvaṇa. So he tells Sītā to remain
invisible for a while, himself creating in her place an illusory Sītā, which
Rāvaṇa carries away. At the time of the fire-ordeal, this illusion is
consumed and the real Sītā, untouched by the hand of the demon, shows
herself. It is not necessary to mention the other fantastic devices adopted
for the same purpose.
26, D. Curse-motif.—Curse as a motif in explaining conduct and fate
came to be increasingly applied. Thus Daśaratha dies of grief for separa-
tion from his son Rāma, because Daśaratha had himself been the unwitting
instrument of causing separation between a father and his son (see Rāmā-
yaṇa, ii. 63–64), and so had been cursed to that effect. Similarly almost
every demon whom Rāma in his wanderings meets and kills, was repre-
sented as a God or a superhuman being who had been, for one fault or
another, cursed to assume the form of that particular demon, the release from
the curse following immediately after his being killed by Rāma's hand.
Quite a number of these additions also resulted from the attempt to
describe the earlier lives of the characters that figure in the Rāmāyaṇa,
the object being to explain their conduct in this birth by the influence
of a previous birth.
26, E. Philosophizing.—Nor, we may be sure, were the interests of
philosophy neglected. The Yoga-Vāsiṣhṭha, a philosophical poem even
larger than the Rāmāyaṇa, and attributed to Vālmīki himself, is in form
a dialogue which takes place between Vasiṣhṭha and Rāma on the occa-
sion of Viśvāmitra's visit (§ 18, C) to Daśaratha's court. This work is in

lxiii] Early Plays: Mahāvīra-Charita
substance a huge discursive treatise on the Vedānta philosophy. Adhyātma-
Rāmāyaṇa, vii. 5, is popularly known as Rāma-gītā, and is in fact a
condensed statement of the Vedānta doctrine after the fashion of the
Bhagavad-gītā. And there are any number of lesser treatises exhibiting
a tendency to philosophize in and out of season.
26, F. Invention and poetic embellishment.—Finally, single episodes
from the Rāmāyaṇa, such as the marriage of Sītā, or the embassy of
Aṅgada to Rāvaṇa just before the commencement of the battle, came to be
embellished and enlarged, while a few other episodes not actually in the
Rāmāyaṇa were invented and treated with much poetic feeling.
The number of writers who have in these and various other ways
treated the story of the Rāmāyaṇa can be easily counted by hundreds,
among them some exceptionally gifted female authors; and their works
are even to the present day read by hundreds of thousands of people
throughout India; and those who cannot read, go to hear other people—
the Kathakas or the Purāṇikas—read and explain them. The Rāmāyaṇa
in India is not—and never will be, let us hope—a dead mythology. It is
full of the noblest examples of virtue and truth, of devotion and self-
sacrifice. Its characters have been for centuries, and still are, living forces
moulding the actions and aspirations of the men and women of India.

Bhavabhūti's early plays: Mahāvīra-charita,

Mālatī-Mādhava

27. The Mahāvīra-charita.—Such was the Rāma-story, with a past so
glorious and a future so vast and promising, that fascinated our poet and
was in fact his first love (M. V. C. i. 7). In the Mahāvīra-charita Bhava-
bhūti dramatizes the early history of Rāma, beginning shortly before his
marriage and taking up the story of his exile and the abduction of
his wife and her recovery, and ending with the return from Laṅkā and
the coronation.
Now here Bhavabhūti's most immediate problem was to give dramatic
unity to a vast number of actions and incidents which extended over
a period of fourteen years or more, and which had no intrinsic unity except
in so far as they all concerned one person, Rāma. The poet might have
introduced the various characters which figure in this part of Rāma's
history,—Paraśurāma, Mantharā, Śūrpaṇakhā, Khara and the army of the
fourteen thousand, Mārīcha, Jaṭāyus, Sugrīva, Vālin, Hanūmant, Śramaṇā,
Vibhīshaṇa, Kumbhakarṇa, Rāvaṇa, and so on,—like a series of moving

pictures, and then dismissed them as quickly as they appeared. The result
would have been a panoramic procession and not a play with a unified
plot.
It is likely that the earliest dramatizations of the Rāma-story were
of this kind. The first step in the evolution of these 'epic plays' or
'chronicle plays', as we might call them, was perhaps the division of the
story as a whole into minor episodes of inherent dramatic unity, and the
employment of one of these units as the material for a play. This step
may well have been taken by Bhāsa, who comes at least a century or two
before Kālidāsa. Two of Bhāsa's plays—'The Coronation of Rāma' or
Abhisheka-nāṭaka and 'The Image' or Pratimā—are based upon books iv-vi
of the Rāmāyaṇa. We should expect a third Rāma-play by Bhāsa covering
books i-iii, if not also a fourth covering book vii. At any rate Bhāsa
treated the Mahā-Bhārata story in this fashion, dividing it into a number
of separate episodes, each forming the subject of a single play.
In most of these earlier plays, however, there was presumably no
attempt made to show that the incidents were inevitable. They followed
in a definite sequence, because the epic narrated them in that sequence.
28. Bhavabhūti's departure from the Rāmāyaṇa.—Now consider what
Bhavabhūti does in order to bring about the desired unity of plot and
adequate motivation. When Janaka proclaims his daughter Sītā's svayaṁ-
vara, then Rāvaṇa, king of the demons, offers himself as a candidate for
her hand. He does not indeed come personally, as suitors were expected to
do: he is too proud for that. He sends a messenger who was to ask
or rather demand Sītā in marriage. His suit is not only refused, but, even
in the presence of his messenger, the girl is betrothed to Rāma—a mere
mortal. This was an insult to Rāvaṇa's valour and prowess, and he is
further incensed and mortified to learn that Rāma had killed Tāṭakā and
Subāhu, and a number of other demons. Rāvaṇa is naturally burning for
revenge (act i).
However, Mālyavant, Rāvaṇa's trusted minister and adviser, tries to
pacify him, and promises to secure his ends by gentler means: by diplomacy.
The minister accordingly meets Paraśurāma and instigates him against
Rāma (act ii, interlude). Unexpectedly, Paraśurāma is himself vanquished
(act iii). This was a great blow to Mālyavant's scheme; the old diplomat
does not, however, despair. He sends Rāvaṇa's sister, Śūrpaṇakhā, with
instructions that she was to assume the form of the nurse Mantharā and,
before Rāma returned to Ayodhyā from his marriage, give him the
message (as if coming from his step-mother Kaikeyī) to withdraw into
exile for fourteen years. By this plan Mālyavant hoped to draw Rāma

lxv] Early Plays : Mahāvīra-Charita
and his wife undefended into the forest, where with the army of demons
that Khara had under command, it would not have been very difficult
to overpower Rāma and abduct his wife. The ruse succeeds.¹ Rāma
dutifully accepts his exile, and Lakshmaṇa and Sītā accompany him
(act iv).
The abduction of Sītā now follows as a matter of course (act v,
interlude). Since, however, Mālyavant did not succeed in crushing Rāma
by the help of the army of the fourteen thousand, he prevails upon the
very reluctant Vālin to undertake that task. The fight between Vālin and
Rāma which follows is a fair one, and at its end Vālin dies, commending
his son and his brother Sugrīva to Rāma's care ² (act v). This is the real
climax of the play. Mālyavant has been using one means after another to
secure his desired end, but all things work against him. Diplomacy had
been tried and in vain. Nothing now remained but to risk one last
united effort to overpower the enemy by force. This also succeeds no
better. Rāvaṇa is killed (act vi) and Vibhīshaṇa installed in his place.
Rāma thereupon recovers his wife, returns to Ayodhyā, and is crowned
king (act vii).
29. Technical significance of these changes.—Now it is quite clear
that even from the start Bhavabhūti has here taken great liberties with
his sources. His changes are deliberate, well-advised. He seems to have
had a clear conception of just what he wanted to do, and what to avoid.
He was not satisfied with a mere reproduction in dramatic form of what
the epic gave in a narrative form. He wanted to establish, as far as
feasible, a necessary sequence between the various experiences and adven-
tures through which his hero passes. But this is not all. He so selects
the incidents, and, where there was no choice for him, so modifies them
as to bring out, by contrast, all the fine points in Rāma's character.
Bhavabhūti represents Rāma as an embodiment of duty, patience, truthful-
ness, valour, and chivalry. And to set these qualities in high relief, he
brings Rāma into contact with Paraśurāma, who has indeed valour, but
valour marred by a fiery temper; with Vālin, who is chivalrous, but lacks
strength of conviction, and so is easily beguiled by diplomacy; with

¹ Notice how by this one stroke Bhavabhūti beautiful woman (which disguise she
secures three distinct objects. 1. He could, as a she-demon, easily assume).
saves the character of Kaikeyī entirely. 3. Bhavabhūti also gains further oppor-
2. By bringing Śūrpaṇakhā thus early tunity for heightening Rāma's character.
into contact with Rāma he gains adequate ² Thus the poet skilfully avoids 1. Rāma's
motivation for her later conduct; for, if compromising conduct in relation to
Rāma could not see through Śūrpaṇakhā's Vālin, and 2. the spectacle of the un-
disguise as a nurse, no more was he ex- righteous quarrel between the brothers
pected to see through her disguise as a Vālin and Sugrīva.
i [H.O.S. 21]

Introduction [lxvi
Mālyavant, whose misfortune it is to know the better and follow the
worse; and finally with Rāvaṇa, whose great qualities of mind and of
body (and they are great) are rendered futile by the adulterous passion
that dominates and ruins him. In fact, it would not be incorrect to say
that the whole play is a struggle between a noble, sincere, straightforward
policy and a crooked, underhand, unscrupulous diplomacy, ending in an
utter discomfiture of the latter.
30. Merits of the Mahāvīra-charita.—In addition to a unified plot
the play affords us some attempts at genuine characterization. The poet
has taken great pains to make Rāma an ideal of chivalry. He has no
malice against his enemies (i. 31, i. 32¹), generously recognizes their valour
(ii. 35, 36, and passim), and is considerate in his treatment of them after
their defeat (iv. 21, v. 56). At the same time he is fully confident of his
prowess (ii. 33²), and scorns to receive from his enemies any sympathy
or advantage that goes beyond the strict code of chivalry (ii. 46¹, v. 50).
He is generous and devoted to those whom he has once called his friends
(v. 58¹⁷, v. 60), and has a supreme sense of his duty as a pupil (i. 38), as
a son (iv. 42), and as a king (iv. 39). We have already spoken of the
types of character¹ that are contrasted with his. It is necessary, however,
to add that, although Bhavabhūti is conscious of the original divine nature
of Rāma (vii. 2), he has tried to show him (except in one or two places) as
entirely human and normal. The divine does not intrude itself too
prominently and so dull our sympathies, as it does in some of the successors
of our poet. The play contains some splendid poetry, and, especially in
acts iii and iv, some spirited dialogue.
31. Defects of the Mahāvīra-charita.—The main drawback of the play
is the circumstance that its characterization, however clever in some places,
is generally stiff and unconvincing; there is no such thing as character-
development, unless we choose to call the change of mood in Paraśurāma
a development. Thus, from start to finish, Rāma is always the ideal hero,
the Mahā-vīra; what we have is a revelation of the different phases of his
character, or more correctly speaking, the same phase of his character—
bravery, nobility, truthfulness, and what not—revealed under different
circumstances and in relation to different persons. So also with Sītā. We
do not find in her that fine shading of character and blending of opposing
motives, that delicate growth of passion and affection that Bhavabhūti
portrays, for instance, in the heroine of the Mālatī-Mādhava. The same
may be said of the minister Mālyavant (see also § 36), who in this respect
¹ We may also mention the attempt to differentiate the characters (acts iii and iv) of Janaka and Daśaratha, and of Śatānanda and Viśvāmitra and Vasiṣṭha.

lxvii] Early Plays: Mālatī-Mādhava
compares very unfavourably with the sublime character of Rākshasa in
Viśākhadatta's Mudrā-Rākshasa.
Another characteristic defect of the play is the poet's inability to stop
when enough has been already said. Thus Mālyavant's self-revelation—
the painful exposition of his motives, his hopes, and his fears—becomes
positively tedious, especially in the interlude to act iv; it is not called for,
and is technically a blemish. Similarly in act iii, the wordy war between
Paraśurāma on the one hand, and Śatānanda and Janaka and Daśaratha
and Viśvāmitra on the other, is carried to a length that may perhaps serve
to display Bhavabhūti's knowledge of grammar, Yoga, Dharma-śāstra,
Mīmāṁsā, and so forth, but that also betrays a radical defect in our poet,
the lack of a proper sense of form and measure. As a result, awkward
pauses must often have arisen on the stage, one or more characters being
compelled to stop and wait till another had concluded his—perhaps poetic,
but uncalled for—description or declamation. In fairness to Bhavabhūti
however, it must be said that his treatment of the Bharata episode (end of
act iv) and of the Vālin-Sugrīva incident can hardly be bettered. Here he
gives the desired effect by a few bold strokes; and Vibhīshaṇa's remark
(v. 58¹⁸), ‘How touching is this brevity where a prolix statement might have
been looked for!’ can very appropriately be applied to Bhavabhūti's own
treatment of the theme, as indeed he himself probably intended.¹
Finally we may mention that the language of the play is crude and
lacks the grace and polish, and even the directness and vigour, of Bhava-
bhūti's later plays. The descriptions are often lengthy and involved, and
the diction then becomes stilted and unnatural. The poet may also be
charged with some inconsistencies of statement: cp. vii. 16ᶜ with v. 38².
The metrical test (see appendix 1) confirms the impression that the play is
probably the earliest ² of the three plays of Bhavabhūti.
32. The Mālatī-Mādhava.—This play was probably written not very
long after the Mahāvīra-charita. It is in ten acts and is technically called
a prakaraṇa, and its plot, taken as a whole, is the poet's own invention.
Quite possibly, of course, he may have received from various sources hints
for certain incidents and episodes of the story. Thus (as noted at § 4)
some parts of it, such as the journey from the Berars to Padmāvatī, are
perhaps autobiographical; while others, such as the marriage of a nobleman
from the Berars (Mādhava) with a distinguished lady of Northern India

¹ Bhavabhūti is very fond of introducing in
his plays such indirect self-praise : com-
pare M.M. i. 35¹⁰, vi. 13²; U.R.C. iii. 47⁵.
But he generally takes care to introduce
it so skilfully as not to destroy the stage-
illusion.

² Compare also the prologue (i. 7²), where the
work is called new or apūrva; every play
is in a sense apūrva, but it is usually in
his first play that an author tries to excuse
himself on this ground. Cf. Mālavikā, i. 2.,

Introduction [lxviii]

(Mālatī), may have been suggested by historic facts.¹ For the central
story, Bhavabhūti seems to have been indebted to the Bṛihatkathā,
which—to judge from Kshemendra's synopsis thereof ² and from Soma-
deva's Kathāsaritsāgara ³—contained three separate stories of the temple-
runaways (see below, § 33, D) and the marriage in disguise (§ 33, E) and the
immolation and rescue of a princess (§ 33, F).⁴
The play is of the romantic type, the central interest being a love-story,
or rather a dexterous blending together of two love-stories. The plot is
crowded with incident and adventure, thrilling us now with hope and now
with fear, and the sequences are so far removed from the commonplace
that we can never guess what is to come next until near the very end.
And the action is projected upon a weird background, with tigers running
wild in the streets, ghosts squeaking in the cemeteries, and mystic Kāpālikas
performing gruesome rites in their blood-stained temples.
33, A. Analytic statement of the plot of the Mālatī-Mādhava.—Bhūri-
vasu and Devarāta, two young friends and fellow-students at the University,⁵
promise each other before parting that, if they should marry and settle
down, they would endeavour to pass on their friendship to the next
generation by bringing about, if possible, a marriage between their own
children. This promise is made in the presence of another fellow-student,
Kāmandakī, and her pupil Saudāminī. The friends part. Bhūrivasu
becomes minister of the king of Padmāvatī, and has a daughter named
Mālatī; while Devarāta has a similar position at Kuṇḍinapura, the capital
of the Berars, and has a son named Mādhava. The children grow up and
Devarāta sends his son to Padmāvatī, ostensibly to complete his education,
but really to remind Bhūrivasu of his early promise. Devarāta is too cautious
to send his son direct to Bhūrivasu; instead, he sends him to Kāmandakī,
who had now become a Buddhist nun, and was staying in a monastery
(vihāra) at Padmāvatī, much honoured both by the king and his minister.
33, B.—Bhūrivasu comes to know of Mādhava's presence in the city,
and is not averse to giving his Mālatī in marriage to Mādhava; only it so
happens that the king his master has already asked Bhūrivasu to give his
daughter Mālatī in marriage to an old court-favourite of his called Nandana:

¹ For two notable marriages of this kind in the Vākāṭaka dynasty of the Berars, we have epigraphic testimony: JRAS., April, 1914, p. 325.
² See his Bṛihatkathāmañjarī (Kāvyamālā, no. 69), xi. 6–88; 67–78; iii. 218–30.
³ See Kathāsaritsāgara, xiii. 17–150; 158–215; iv. 146–203.
⁴ It would be interesting to study the various artistic changes which Bhavabhūti made in his originals.
⁵ Ancient India had famous seats of learning (Ujjain, Takshaśilā, Nālandā), each housing and feeding and teaching thousands of bachelor students. See Hiuen Tsang's description of Nālandā (book ix: S. Beal's translation, ii. 167).

lxix] Early Plays: Mālatī-Mādhava
It was dangerous to refuse the king's request; so Kāmandakī advises
Bhūrivasu to assent to the king's wish, but to word his assent in such
a way as to leave himself a loophole or chance of evasion in case of need
(ii. 2¹⁰), herself undertaking to contrive to bring the young people together
and arrange for a private marriage. Bhūrivasu could in that case plead
that he was in no wise a party to this clandestine affair, and the king—the
marriage once solemnized—would have no choice but to submit. With
the help of friends, Kāmandakī manages to throw the young people together
in chance encounters on the road or at the spring festival of the God of
Love, or in the city garden; while,—by praising to Mālatī the person and
family and accomplishments of Mādhava, by painting with contrasting
touches the ugliness and stupidity of Nandana, and finally by narrating to
her some ancient stories of girls in like circumstances¹ who chose their
husbands without regard to their parents' wishes,—Kāmandakī so works
upon Mālatī's feelings that when the opportunity comes she is ready to
elope with Mādhava and marry him in a place prepared by Kāmandakī.
33, C.—Such is the main plot. Interwoven with it is a by-plot, also
a love-story, namely between Nandana's sister Madayantikā and Mādhava's
friend Makaranda. This by-plot is clearly intended to be a foil for the main
plot, an element of contrast with it. Thus the first meeting of Mālatī and
Mādhava occurs at the spring festival in a most natural way. The first
meeting of Madayantikā and Makaranda takes place under most exceptional
circumstances: A tiger has broken loose, has killed his keepers, and is
running amuck in the streets, when Madayantikā, who happens to pass by,
is saved from deadly peril by Makaranda.² A second notable contrast
appears in the characters of Mālatī and Madayantikā. Mālatī is a modest
obedient girl whom Kāmandakī finds it hard to persuade to disobey her
father's wishes; while Madayantikā, the sister of the court-favourite, is
a flighty passionate girl who elopes with Makaranda at the very first
opportunity. Further, as compared with Mādhava's love, that of Makaranda
is frankly sensuous. There was nothing to prevent Makaranda from going
in straightforward fashion to Nandana and asking for the hand of his
sister (whom moreover he had saved from the tiger). The actual method
adopted is an elopement under cover of darkness.
33, D.—The story is further complicated and diversified by the intro-
duction of two episodic elements: 1. the marriage of Nandana to Maka-
randa disguised as Mālatī; 2. the two hairbreadth escapes of Mālatī, one
before and one after her marriage. The purpose of the first episode is
¹ Such as Śakuntalā, Urvaśī, and Vāsavadattā.
² His opportune presence is adequately motivated (iv. 0²⁸). The rescuer is wounded.

Introduction [lxx
to link the main plot more closely to the by-plot, since it is the event
of which the union of the two pairs of lovers is the immediate sequel.
The purpose of the second episode is merely to thrill the audience and
to satisfy the human craving for the marvellous and even the gruesome.
The first episode comes about in this way. A clandestine marriage
between Mālatī and Mādhava having been decided upon, Kāmandakī
secures the opportunity as follows: It was announced that the marriage
of Mālatī and Nandana would be celebrated in the evening; and, according
to the custom, Mālatī was to go just before the marriage to one of the
city temples and there duly worship the Goddess. It is prearranged that
Mādhava and Makaranda should go beforehand into the temple and there
remain hidden. Mālatī, who however is quite in ignorance of what was to
follow, approaches; the attendants stand outside, only her trusty com-
panion and confidante, Lavaṅgikā, going with her into the interior. Then
after a scene (act vi) which is one of the best in the play, the whole plot is
revealed. Makaranda was to put on the dress of Mālatī¹ and join the
marriage procession and be married to the unsuspecting Nandana, Mādhava
in the meantime taking the real Mālatī with him to a place prepared for
them and being formally married to her.
33, E.—The same stratagem was to give Makaranda his wife—Mada-
yantikā, sister of Nandana. For, after the marriage of the pseudo-Mālatī
with Nandana, when the latter meets his supposed wife and makes her
advances of love, he receives a cold rebuff, and finally a kick. The bride-
groom walks away in high dudgeon. Now Madayantikā, the bridegroom's
sister, hearing of the infamous treatment her brother received at the
hands of the new bride, comes to her room to expostulate with her. What
follows is easily imagined. Makaranda throws off his disguise and elopes
with Madayantikā. Had he been able to reach the appointed place in
safety and solemnize the marriage, the play would have ended smoothly
but much too early (end of act viii). The only difficulty then would have
been to pacify the king, which would not have been very difficult perhaps.
What actually happens is that, as Makaranda is escaping from Nandana's
house, he unexpectedly comes upon certain night-watches who challenge
him. A skirmish ensues. More guards are sent, and Mādhava, hearing of
the news, runs to his friend's rescue. The two friends fight so bravely
that the king, who was aroused and was watching their valour, is moved to
pardon them; and, coming to know of all the facts, he even acknowledges
the two marriages.
¹ In judging the verisimilitude of this inci- Mālatī herself was very probably taken
dent, we must consider that the part of by a man (see appendix 11).

lxxi] Early Plays : Mālatī-Mādhava
33, F.—Here at any rate the play might very naturally end ; but no.
The poet wants (see i. 6) to make as diversified an appeal as he can, and so
he has introduced the second episode. It seems that at Padmāvatī, in the
cremation-ground close by the river, there was a temple of the Goddess
Karālā (the Terrible). This Goddess is very fond of blood, and her votaries
wear garlands of skulls, and offer her animal sacrifices (sometimes even
human sacrifices), and in return she grants them magic powers, such as
flying through the air, rendering oneself invisible, and so forth.¹ On the
very night of the day when Mālatī and Mādhava meet in the garden, and
Makaranda kills the tiger—it being the uncanny night that precedes
the new moon—a certain Kāpālika, Aghoraghaṇṭa by name, has arranged to
offer a human sacrifice, and Mālatī is chosen as the victim. Kapālakuṇḍalā,
the female disciple of Aghoraghaṇṭa, has all in readiness, and they are
about to immolate Mālatī, when Mādhava, hearing Mālatī's cry, appears
on the scene and rescues her. The opportune presence of Mādhava in the
dead of night, and upon the cremation-ground, was, the poet frankly
admits (v. 28), the merest chance. Mādhava was there trying to propitiate
in some occult way the ghouls and other uncanny beings who infest such
places. Mādhava kills Aghoraghaṇṭa, though he permits Kapālakuṇḍalā—
as she was a woman—to escape.
33, G.—Out of this escape comes the second hairbreadth escape of
Mālatī. Kapālakuṇḍalā longs to avenge the death of her master ; and just
when everything seems to be going well—Mādhava married to Mālatī,
Makaranda securely in possession of Madayantikā, and even the king
himself induced to pardon the two lovers,—she finds an opportunity to
pounce upon Mālatī and lead her off with intent to kill her. There is
general grief and lamentation, which fills the whole of act ix and a part of
act x. This time Mālatī is saved by another fortuitous coincidence. We
have already spoken (§ 33, A) of Saudāminī, the pupil of Kāmandakī.
She apparently had become an adept in occult sciences, and having by
chance come upon Kapālakuṇḍalā, she reproves her, rescues Mālatī from her
hands, and restores her to her sorrowing relatives, and the play ends happily.
34. Mālatī-Mādhava : criticism of the plot.—It would be easy, of
course, to criticize the plot by saying that it is no more than a loose
patchwork : it lacks the consistency, the inevitableness, that should belong
to every dramatic action. The poet evidently wishes to represent Kāman-
dakī as an expert in underhand diplomacy. She is in fact the arch-plotter
¹ Bhavabhūti, like other people of his time
(see Bāṇa, Harsha-charita, iii, story of
Bhairavāchārya), implicitly believed in
these powers, so that we cannot reason-
ably charge him with an illicit intro-
duction of the supernatural.

Introduction [lxxii
in the play; but her own scheming contributes far less to the ultimate
result than does mere chance. In this connexion the Kapālakuṇḍalā
episode is what is most frequently criticized. It gives the poet the chance
to describe the cemetery-scenes, or to indulge (acts ix and x) in a pathetic
outpouring of song, but it serves no other purpose.
Some go so far as to suppose that this entire episode is a later addition
by the poet, prompted by a desire to emulate Kālidāsa (see § 7 above): it
did not belong to the poet's original conception of the plot. It would seem
that a good case could be made in favour of this theory, especially if we
take into account the number of lines and stanzas and parts of stanzas
that we find common¹ to this play and to the Uttara-Rāma-charita, after the
completion of which latter play Bhavabhūti is believed to have reverted to
the former play and enlarged it.
Now although it be true (see appendixes 6 and 8) that Bhavabhūti did
revise his own plays, I

lxxiii] Early Plays : Mālatī-Mādhava
been inserted later into the M. M. But we must remember that much
of the talk of love and grief in the M. M. is purely conventional, and it
need not surprise us if the stanza after all did originally belong to it.
Compare in this connexion M. M. act i, stanza 34ᶜ, where the hero talks of
the moon, when it is full day.
35. Technique of the Mālatī-Mādhava.—From the preceding analysis
of the plot it is clear that in sheer inventiveness of incidents Bhavabhūti
has now attained considerable power, although he does not quite realize
that a mere string of incidents, however exciting or dramatic, does not
necessarily lead to a climax nor give a real unity of plot. Secondly,
the poet recognizes the value of suspense, but it is the sort of suspense
which results from an incipient fatalism. Neither in the situation, nor in
the characters, nor again in the background on which they are thrown in
the early part of the play, is there a foreshadowing of the final dénouement
as a thing inevitable or even antecedently probable.
In defence it may be urged that, after all, chances do occur in the world
as it is constituted, and that the dramatist has really no right to rule
chance entirely out of his creation and make the latter a rational system
conformable to the demands of his own philosophy. Consider, for instance,
Shakespeare's Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet. It is not antecedently necessary
for the dénouement of these plays that Ophelia should die, or that Friar
John be ‘stay'd by accident’ and not deliver the letter. Laertes might
just as well have avenged the death of his father without Ophelia's
drowning, and the Capulets and the Montagues might just as well have
been induced to join hands and merge old feuds at the wedding of their
children as at their funeral. But these irrational accidents came to
Shakespeare as parts of the story proper, and the audience was willing
to accept the dramatist’s statement, just as we should accept that of
a traveller, provided it did not overtax our credulity.
More important it is to inquire if there is any dramatic justification
for these accidents: any attempt, in other words, to place us in that
frame of mind in which we instinctively seem to scent dangers long
before they come—scent dangers that do not come. Bhavabhūti has
done something of the kind. Compare, for instance, passages like iv. 4ᵇ,
iv. 7; v. 27³, v. 28; viii. 10, viii. 14; ix. 8ᵈ, ix. 39, ix. 49; x. 13; &c. Here
the poet seems to be purposely dwelling on the fickleness of Fortune, the
instability of all mundane existence. This gives us the necessary mood.
Stanza viii. 10 is particularly significant in this connexion.
36. Mālatī-Mādhava : its advance over the Mahāvīra-charita.—We
found (see § 31) the Mahāvīra-charita weak in characterization. In the
k [H.O.S. 21]

Introduction [lxxiv
Mālatī-Mādhava Bhavabhūti is, for the first time, truly creating character,
and developing it by making it react upon its environment. This will be
evident if we compare Mālyavant with Kāmandakī, Sītā with Mālatī.
Mālyavant, the diplomat of the Mahāvīra-charita, is purely an academic
figure. He chops logic rather too freely, and shows a preternatural
insight as to the future success or failure of his schemes. There is no
feeling in his strategy, and his very lamentations in act vi seem to be
'made to order'. Contrast with him Kāmandakī, who plays a similar rôle
in the Mālatī-Mādhava. In her we find a genuine old lady, shrewd and
resourceful, and full of learning and devotion and affection (see especially
act vi, end), although one often wishes that her knowledge had not been so
versatile.¹
Compare again Sītā, as she is depicted in the Mahāvīra-charita, with the
Mālatī of this play. Sītā, the moment she sees Rāma, feels a striking
partiality for him, just as Sītā's sister feels for Rāma's brother. All seems
to be pre-arranged: a sort of pre-natal relation, a falling in love at first
sight reduced to a wooden mechanism. The same is true of the passage of
love and tenderness in the second act of the Mahāvīra-charita, where Sītā
seems, in a few minutes, to grow from a demure bride into a matron of
phenomenal maturity of thought and sentiment. How different from her
is Mālatī—tossed in the conflict between her love (intense but never obtru-
sive) for Mādhava and her duty of submission to her parents' wishes, a duty
to which, in spite of all the artful machinations of Kāmandakī (§ 33, B)
and even after the incident in the temple of Karālā (§ 33, F), she holds
firmly, so that she is ready rather to commit suicide (cp. M. M. ii. 2, vi. 8¹⁻⁵)
than do anything unworthy of a modest, well-bred girl! The same traits of
her character are again brought out in that admirable love-scene² between
Mādhava and Mālatī in the beginning of act viii.
Among other merits of the Mālatī-Mādhava we may mention that the
language—particularly of the three or four best scenes in the play—is
extremely good, and we also find some genuinely poetic imagery and
feeling. The description of the cremation-ground at night (act v) and of
the forest scenery (act ix) are some of the best that the poet ever wrote,
although they may here and there seem to be overdrawn and out of place
¹ She had studied the Kāma-śāstra, and, what
is more, she liked to make a display of
her learning; or rather it is Bhavabhūti
who speaks through her and Lavaṅgikā
and Madayantikā. We will return to this
point presently.
² It does not seem to have been sufficiently
realized that Bhavabhūti is in this
scene following very closely the instruc-
tions in Kāma-sūtra, iii. 2, even to such
details as Mālatī's reply (nāhaṁ kiṁ
pi jānāmi: viii. 4¹³) and her earlier
gestures.

lxxv] Early Plays: Mālatī-Mādhava
in a play proper.¹ Taken as a whole the play may unhesitatingly be
pronounced to be, both in substance and in form, a decided advance over
the Mahāvīra-charita. It was written with the distinct purpose of avoiding
some of the faults of his earlier work (see M. M. i. 8), and its technique is
much more conscious and deliberate.
37. Defects of the Mālatī-Mādhava.—We have already commented
upon the defects in the structure of the plot. In a word the play
may be said to give us a particularly vivid form of story-telling, with
a number of conscious critical approaches to dramatic technique. What
the poet needs now is practice and, as a natural result of it, a toning down
of the youthful exuberances that still mar the play. Thus we find here
a constant tendency to exaggerate, to over-emphasize so as to drive a thing
home, and this cannot have been wholly the result of the dullness, the tardy
responsiveness, of his audience; a part of it at least must be charged to the
poet's lack of restraint. He gives us dozens of long descriptions, full of
lengthy compounds and mouth-filling phrases, where his delight in words
as words is quite evident. It may be that his audience also shared his
delight, and if only the passage as a whole conveyed an emotional mood and
if that mood was adequately interpreted in suitable action, they did not
care what the passage really meant. We may also note that the compounds
though long are not usually involved, so that on the whole it is fairly
smooth sailing.
Another characteristic defect of the play is its sentimentality. In the
first act, for instance, Mādhava's love seems to be a purely intellectual
affair. He loves being in love and talking about his love; and throughout
the play he seems to be intent on showing how ‘we that are true lovers’²
love and run into risks and get separated and weep and even commit
suicide à la mode de Kāma-śāstra or some other Śāstra. The long Prākrit
descriptions (iii. 12⁸⁻⁴³, vii. 0⁷⁹⁻⁹¹, vii. 1²⁰⁻⁴⁷, and elsewhere) might just as well
have been, like the love-scene in act viii, taken bodily over from some
ancient treatise;³ and it is quite conceivable, seeing that the descriptions
are in the vernacular, that they were expressly meant for the ‘groundlings’
who perhaps had a special relish for such topics; and in that case the long

¹ We must, however, remember that such
descriptions have a value and a purpose,
especially if the stage-properties be
meagre. To me Hamlet's '’Tis now the
very witching time of night' (iii. 2. 406 ff.)
is more blood-curdling than all the stage-
effects that electricity and modern science
can produce. For a detailed statement
as to the stage-conditions in Ancient
India, see appendix 11.
² As You Like It, ii. 4. 55.
³ Such as that of Aṅgiras which Bhavabhūti
quotes in M. M. ii. 2¹⁵. Vātsyāyana’s
Kāma-sūtra gives the quoted passage as
an anonymous view in iii. 1 (Durgāpra-
sāda's ed., p. 194). We have already
(§ 31) commented upon the poet’s fond-
ness for displaying his learning.

Introduction [lxxvi
compounds would rather show that Bhavabhūti did not care to make the
thing too easily understood. The standards and limits of propriety as well
as of prudery are different for different people, and for different epochs in
the social development of the same people; and since Bhavabhūti was in
this play evidently straining for effect and eager to secure from every
different element of his audience all possible emotional response, any
wholesale condemnation of the poet on this score would be as unfair
as a similar condemnation of certain free passages in Shakespeare's poems
and plays, or of the erotic verse of some of the early Christian writers.¹
The Present Play: Uttara-Rāma-charita
38. Transition to the Uttara-Rāma-charita.—Between the two plays
that we have been hitherto considering and the play before us we must
assume an interval of time sufficient to account for its almost perfect
development in form and technique. The poet himself calls this play
a product of his mature genius.² Presumably therefore in the interval the
poet was acquiring more practice—writing more dramas; but unfortunately
none of these intervening attempts have survived. We have given above
(§ 15) the external evidence that inclines us to assume such lost works;
but were this evidence entirely lacking, it would yet be hard to believe that
the transition from the earlier to the later work—a transition which is no
ess significant than the transition from Love's Labour's Lost to Romeo and
Juliet—was all made without any intermediate steps; and when we
remember that there was no printing in those days and that even the
manuscripts themselves (especially of works not produced for the court and
not patronized by the king) did not command any extensive circulation; and
when we recall further that, even with more favourable conditions, nearly
half the Elizabethan dramatic literature is now almost entirely lost to us,—
we need not wonder at this regrettable loss, nor grow sceptical about the
existence of works other than those that have actually survived the ravages
of human and non-human enemies of letters.
We turn now to a consideration of the present play, which is Bhava-
bhūti's masterpiece and which has earned for him, by a consensus of
opinion among scholars ancient and modern, a position at least equal to

¹ I would therefore entirely dissent from
    Dr. Gray when, in an otherwise very
    kindly intentioned passage, he says (Vāsa-
    vadattā, introduction, p. 28): ‘There
    are personal descriptions more de-
    tailed than would be desirable in the
    Occidental literature, together with evi-
    dent approval of relations and ideals which
    the less sensual Western mind rightly condemns.’
    The italics are mine.
² Compare U. R. C. vii. 20ᵈ. The allusion is
    purposely veiled.

lxxvii] Uttara-Rāma-Charita: Critical Estimate
that of Kālidāsa, the current view being¹ that in the Uttara-Rāma-charita
Bhavabhūti has even surpassed the so-called ‘Shakespeare of India’. We
have given for this play in the sequel (pp. 4–14) a synoptic analysis of its
plot act by act, and have tried to show the bearing of every act (and
scene) upon the dénouement of the play. We will here limit ourselves
to a few general criticisms.
39. Special features of the Uttara-Rāma-charita.—The play, as its
title shows, treats of the later history of Rāma, from his coronation and
the abandonment of Sītā to the final reunion. As we have seen (pp. liv–
lxviii), the main incidents of the story—the circumstances leading to the
abandonment of Sītā, her rescue, the birth of the twins and their education,
the horse-sacrifice and the heroism displayed by the boys in capturing the
horse, their recognition by Rāma, the final ordeal of Sītā, and presumably
also the final reunion,—these were all given to the poet, not excepting even
the Śambūka episode (act ii) and the Lavaṇa affair (end of act i and of
act vii). The poet’s task therefore was not to create a plot, nor even to
make any considerable change in the sequence of given events and connect
them causally, as was the case in the two earlier plays.
The problem to be answered was briefly this: How could Rāma ever
think of abandoning such a wife as Sītā? and, having abandoned her—for
whatever cause—how could they be again united in any real sense until all
clouds, all vestiges of doubt and distrust, had been entirely banished from
their minds? The Dushyanta of Kālidāsa not only repudiates Śakuntalā,
but actually insults her to her face (Śākuntala, act v, Vyapadeśam
āvilayitum, &c.); and yet, when the reunion comes in act vii, Śakuntalā
has no other proof as to the penitence of the king than the indirect report
coming from her mother’s friend, and presumably the sad and wasted form
of her husband when she first beholds him after a separation of years.
True, the king begs her to forgive him (act vii: Sutanu hṛdayāt pratyā-
deśa-vyalīkam, &c.), but Śakuntalā has already acknowledged and accepted
him quietly before that, although her early experience of ‘that jar of
poison with honey on top’ might have taught her a lesson.² Similarly

¹ Uttare Rāma-charite Bhavabhūtir viśishyate.
² Of course, Kālidāsa, with the instinct of an
artist, has tried to lessen the suddenness
of the transition in various ways. One
in particular must here be noted, since
its artistic significance has not been suffi-
ciently recognized; namely the difference
in the background of act vii of the play
as contrasted with that of the first and
the following two acts. That of act vii
is a hermitage in the sky far removed
from the world, its passions, its hopes
(Yat kāṅkshanti tapobhir anya-munayas tas-
miṁs tapasyanty amī); that of acts i–iii is
a forest on earth, a penance-grove if you
will, but it is in the full bloom of spring.
The wild infuriated elephant which
breaks in at the end of act i, and the
mild forgiving lioness in act vii which
Sarvadamana robs of her cub, express

Introduction. [lxxviii
in The Winter's Tale it is a much grosser insult and far too unkind
a treatment which Hermione receives, and yet she is reconciled to her
husband on the evidence of hearsay reports of Paulina, and possibly
his expressions of remorse in the statue-scene. Apparently, Bhavabhūti
was not satisfied with such inadequate motivation: he was not content
to bring somehow the estranged pair together and then leave them to
settle their causes of dispute later—amicably or otherwise. He felt that
a reunion, to be perfect, must first be a reunion of hearts; and this was
the psychological problem which he deliberately proposed to himself in
this play, especially in the first three acts. The complicated chain of
events leading to the actual reunion and the recognition of the princes
forms the burden of the last four acts.
40. Technical perfection of the opening act of the Uttara-Rāma-
charita.—Nothing can show more clearly the advance which Bhavabhūti
had made in his technique than a careful study of the first act of the
Uttara-Rāma-charita in relation to its significance for the final dénouement.
This is the act in which Rāma abandons Sītā. The prologue has already
informed us (i. 6) of the circulation of a rumour which, when it reaches
Rāma, makes him decide upon the abandonment of his wife. Before the
rumour actually reaches him, however, it was necessary for the poet to
make clear to the audience several essential points. (1) That Rāma
himself would put no faith in the rumour; this is effected by U. R. C.
i. 12⁸–i. 14. Lakshmaṇa might just as well have said that the pictures
ended with ‘our return from Laṅkā’, or ‘our meeting with Bharata in
Nandigrāma’; but he (unintentionally) happens to mention Sītā’s fire-
ordeal, and that gives the poet his chance. (2) That in nevertheless
abandoning his wife on the basis of this false rumour, Rāma was obeying
the higher call of what he owed as a king to his subjects. A king and his
affairs must be above even the faintest possibility of suspicion. This stern
conception of duty, and the readiness to sacrifice everything for it, is
illustrated not only by i. 12 or i. 41, 42, 44, but even in the very first
speech that Rāma makes (i. 7⁴–i. 8). We here get the first distant echoes,
as it were, of a storm that is brewing. (3) That Sītā would understand
Rāma’s higher motive, and would have gone herself voluntarily into exile
if necessary (i. 12¹). What Sītā did resent was not that she was abandoned,
but that she was abandoned in so heartless a fashion (i. 49) without her
having the faintest inkling of whither she was being led and why.
symbolically this difference in atmo-
sphere.
It is for a similar purpose that Bhavabhūti
has placed the great reconciliation scene
of U. R. C. act iii in the Pañchavaṭī,
‘every spot in which, unto those manifold
expressions of our unreserved endear-
ments, can bear testimony.’

lxxix]    Uttara-Rāma-Charita: Critical Estimate
Wherefore did Rāma follow this unstraightforward course? In order to
motivate this act adequately the poet (4) places Rāma in a peculiar
situation: He is newly crowned (i. 8⁶) and has just taken upon himself
the heavy responsibilities of the state; and every man who knows what
it is to take charge of a new and important office will fully understand
Rāma's conscientiousness, his anxious care not to seem to be wanting in
the due discharge of his duties. Further Rāma is alone (i. 3); the elders
and advisers, who presumably might have restrained him from such im-
petuous acts, are away (ii. 6¹⁰); and his forlornness has been brought home
to him (i. 11) and has thrown him into a sort of nervous excitement just
a little before the crisis comes which calls for immediate action. If the
matter to be decided upon had been some non-personal affair of state,
Rāma might have settled it in the way best for all; but where it was
a personal affair of state, it was to be expected that he would be more
rigorously self-exacting than was either right or just to himself. Finally,
it was necessary to make clear (5) that, having abandoned his wife,
Rāma would nevertheless suffer, and so would Sītā. The picture-gallery
episode serves to show how dearly they loved each other, how they could
not bear even the thought of living away from each other (i. 27²⁻⁶, i. 30,
i. 33¹⁴).
  To bring out vividly these five points would have been achievement
enough for one act, but Bhavabhūti is not content with that. In act i he
is thinking of act vii, and so, besides giving us the dohada affair (i. 10¹,
i. 33³) which serves as the immediate pretext for Sītā's banishment, the act
gives us also the jṛimbhaka incident (i. 15²), which plays such a signal part
in the recognition of the princes, as well as the allusions to Bhāgīrathī
(i. 23¹) and Pṛithivī (i. 51), who later take charge of the abandoned Sītā¹
and bring her into the action at the proper time. Two more points, which
perhaps are not so very obvious at first sight: When we learn that Rāma
has caused to be painted, on the walls of his palace, scenes from his past
career—that career wherein Sītā was so prominent a figure,—and when we
see the intense feeling and devoutness with which he looks at the pictures
and recalls the memory of his past life with his beloved,—we can then
readily understand his passionate clinging to these dear memories (iii. 14⁴,
iii. 43¹³, vi. 38), and the source of mournful comfort that he will find therein
even after the loss of his wife, so that we do not have to be actually told
that Rāma did not marry a second time. Of course, he did not and would

¹ Herein Bhavabhūti departs from his sources.    in his hermitage. Bhavabhūti wanted to
  It was Vālmīki who, both according to     keep the twins ignorant of their parent-
  the Rāmāyaṇa and the Padma-Purāṇa,     age; hence the change.
  took charge of Sītā and gave her a shelter