उत्तररामचरितम् (महाकवि भवभूति - संस्कृत मूल एवं हिन्दी व्याख्या)

IV INTRODUCTION.
told by the Bhojaprabandha that when Bhavabhūti and
Kālidāsa composed a verse each on a topic prescribed by
Bhoja, all went to the temple of Bhuvanes'varī and weighed
in a balance the parchments on which the verses composed by
the poets were written As the pan of Bhavabhūti's verse
went up, the goddess intervened in favour of Bhavabhūti by
dashing a little honey on to that pan from the lotus on her
head We shall see in the sequel that Kālidāsa is separated
from Bhavabhūti by several centuries All such stories which
partake of the marvellous were invented by the Pandits to
justify their own views about the merits of our author and
the other poets
There is another interesting story about Kālidāsa and
Bhavabhūti Bhavabhūti composed his Uttararāmacharita
and took it to Kālidāsa who was playing at chess Kālidāsa
asked him to read the drama, while he himself seemed to be
engrossed in the play Kālidāsa remarked, when the whole
drama was read by Bhavabhūti, that it was a creditable per-
formance but that there was an anusvāra too much in one
verse.⁹
It is interesting to note that in a MS of the Mālatī-
mādhava, the colophon at the end of two Acts makes the
author of the drama a pupil of Kumārilabhaṭṭa, the great
writer on the Pūrvamīmāmsā.10 There is nothing in the
chronological position of the two writers as established from
independent evidence to make this relationship impossible
II The date of Bhavabhūti
Although our knowledge of the personal history of
Bhavabhūti is very meagre, it is fortunate that there are suffi-
cient materials for fixing the exact period when he flourished
9 viz. in verse 27 of Act I The fourth pāda as written
by भवभूति ran रात्रिरेव व्यरंसीत् Kālidāsa suggested रात्रिरेव व्यरसीत्
It must be said that the latter yields a much happier meaning
than the former
10 Vide Pandit's Introduction to Gauḍavaho 206 ff, 'इति
श्रीमत्कुमारिलशिष्यकृते मालतीमाधवे तृतीयोंक ', 'इति श्रीकुमारिलस्वामिप्रसादप्राप्त-
वाग्वैभवश्रीमदुवेकाचार्यविरचिते मालतीमाधवे षष्ठोंक' Kumārila flourished
(Prof Pathak) in the first half of the 8th century Vide J
B B R A S vol 18 p 217