{"id":34,"date":"2013-07-13T01:25:28","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=34"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:25:28","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:28","slug":"30-on-translating-kalidasa-vol-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03\/30-on-translating-kalidasa-vol-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","title":{"rendered":"-30_On Translating Kalidasa.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\nOn Translating Kalidasa<\/b><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nT<\/font>HE <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/b>life and surroundings in which Indian
\npoetry moves cannot be rendered in the terms of English poetry.
\nYet to give up the problem and content oneself with tumbling
\nout the warm, throbbing Indian word to shiver and starve in the
\ninclement atmosphere of the English language seems to me not
\nonly an act of literary inhumanity and a poor-spirited confession
\nof failure, but a piece of laziness likely to defeat its own object.
\nAn English reader can gather no picture from and associate no idea of beauty
\nwith these outlandish terms. What can he understand when he is told that the atimukta<\/i> creeper is flowering in the
\ngrove of kesara<\/i> trees and the mullica<\/i> or the…is sending out its
\nfragrance into the night and the chacravaque<\/i><\/font>\u00b9<\/font> is complaining to
\nhis mate amid the still ripples of the river that flows through the jambous<\/i>? Or how does it help him to know that the scarlet
\nmouth of a woman is like the red bimba<\/i> fruit or the crimson bandhoul<\/i>
\nflower ? People who know Sanskrit seem to imagine that because these words have
\ncolour and meaning and beauty to them, they must also convey the same
\nassociations to their reader. This is a natural but deplorable mistake; this
\njargon is merely a disfigurement in English poetry. The cultured may read their
\nwork in spite of the jargon out of the unlimited intellectual curiosity natural to culture; the half-cultured may read it because of
\nthe jargon out of the ingrained tendency of the half-cultured
\nmind to delight in what is at once unintelligible and inartistic.
\nBut their work can neither be a thing of permanent beauty nor
\nserve a really useful object; and work which is neither immortal
\nnor useful what self-respecting man would knowingly go out of
\nhis way to do ? Difficulties are after all given us in order that we
\nmay brace our sinews by surmounting them; the greater the difficulty, the greater our chance of the very highest success. I can
\nonly point out rather sketchily how I have myself thought it best
\nto meet the difficulty; a detailed discussion would require a sepa-<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\u00b9<\/font>cakravāka.<\/i><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 236<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n rate volume. In the first place, a certain concession may be made
\nbut within very narrow and guarded limits to the need for local
\ncolour, a few names of trees, flowers, birds etc., may be transliterated into English, but only when they do not look hopelessly
\noutlandish in that form or else have a liquid or haunting beauty
\nof sound; a similar indulgence may be yet more freely permitted
\nin the transliteration of mythological names. But here the licence
\nends; a too liberal use of it would destroy entirely the ideal of
\ntranslation; what is perfectly familiar in the original language
\nmust not seem entirely alien to the foreign audience; there must
\nbe a certain toning down of strangeness, an attempt to bring
\nhome the association to the foreign intelligence, to give at least
\nsome idea to a cultured but not orientally erudite mind. This
\nmay be done in many ways and I have availed myself of all. A
\nword may be rendered by some neologism which will help to
\nconvey any prominent characteristic or idea associated with the
\nthing it expresses; blossom of ruby may, for instance, render bandhoula<\/i>, a flower which is always mentioned for its redness.
\nOr else the word itself may be dropped and the characteristic
\nbrought into prominence; for instance, instead of saying that a
\nwoman is lipped like a ripe bimba<\/i>, it is, I think, a fair translation
\nto write, "Her scarlet mouth is a ripe fruit and red". This device
\nof expressingly declaring the characteristics which the original
\nonly mentions, I have frequently employed in the Cloud-Messenger<\/i>, even when equivalent words exist in English, because many
\nobjects known in both countries are yet familiar and full of
\ncommon associations to the Indian mind while to the English
\nthey are rare, exotic and slightly associated or only with one
\nparticular and often accidental characteristic.<\/font>\u00b9<\/font>
\nA kindred method, especially with mythological allusions, is to explain fully
\nwhat in the original is implicit; Kalidasa, for instance, compares<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\u00b9<\/font>It is an unfortunate tendency of the English mind to seize on what seems to it grotesque
\nor ungainly in an unfamiliar object; thus the elephant and peacock have become almost
\nimpossible in English poetry, because the one is associated with lumbering heaviness and
\nthe other with absurd strutting. The tendency of the Hindu mind on the other hand is to seize
\non what is pleasing and beautiful in all things and turn to see a charm where the English mind
\nsees a deformity and to extract poetry and grace out of the ugly. The classical instances are
\nthe immortal verses in which Valmiki by a storm of beautiful and costly images and epithets
\nhas immortalised the hump of Manthara and the still more immortal passage in which he
\nhas made the tail of a monkey epic.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 237<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\na huge dark cloud striding northwards from Crouncharundhra
\nto "the dark foot of Vishnou lifted in impetuous act to quell
\nBali", śyāmah pādo baliniyamanābhyudyatasyeva visnoh<\/i>. This
\nI have translated,<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n"Dark like the cloudy foot of highest God<\/font><\/p>\n

\nWhen starting from the dwarf-shape world-immense
\nWith Titan-quelling step through heaven he strode."<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nIt will be at once objected that this is not translation, but the
\nmost licentious paraphrase. This is not so if my original contention be granted that the business of poetical translation is to reproduce not the exact words but the exact image, associations
\nand poetical beauty and flavour of the original. There is not a
\nsingle word in the translation I have instanced which does not
\nrepresent something at once suggested to the Indian reader by
\nthe words of the text. Vishnou is nothing to the English reader
\nbut some monstrous and bizarre Hindu idol; to the Hindu He
\nis God Himself, the word is therefore more correctly represented
\nin English by "highest God" than by Vishnou; śyāmah pādah
\n<\/i>is closely represented by "dark like the cloudy foot", so the word
\ncloudy being necessary both to point the simile which is not apparent and natural to the English reader as to the Indian and to define the precise sort of darkness indicated by the term 
\nśyāmah<\/i>;<\/font> 
\n<\/font>Ball has no meaning or association in
\nEnglish, but in the Sanskrit it represents the same idea as "Titan"; only the particular
\nname recalls a certain theosophic legend which is a household
\nword to the Hindu, that of the dwarf-Vishnou who obtained from
\nthe Titan Bali as much land as he could cover with three steps,
\nthen filling the whole world with himself with one stride measured
\nthe earth, with another the heavens and with the third placing his
\nfoot on the head of Bali thrust him down into bottomless Hell.
\nAll this immediately arises before the mental eye of the Hindu as
\nhe reads Kalidasa’s finely chosen words. The impetuous and
\nvigorous term abhyudyatasya<\/i> both in sound and sense suggests
\nimages, the sudden starting up of the world-pervading deity
\nfrom the dwarf shape he had assumed while the comparison to
\nthe cloud reminds him that the second step of the three referred<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 238<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nto is that of Vishnou striding "through heaven". But to the
\nEnglish reader the words of Kalidasa literally transliterated would be a mere
\nartificial conceit devoid of the original sublimity. It is the inability to seize the associations and precise
\npoetical force of Sanskrit words that has led so many European
\nSanskritists to describe the poetry of Kalidasa which is hardly
\nsurpassed for truth, bold directness and native beauty and grandeur as the
\nartificial poetry of an artificial period. A literal translation would only spread this erroneous impression to the general
\nreader. It must be admitted that in the opposite method one of
\nKalidasa’s finest characteristics is entirely lost, his power of
\nexpressing by a single simple direct and sufficient word ideas and
\npictures of the utmost grandeur or shaded complexity; but this
\nis a characteristic which could in no case be possible in any
\nlanguage but the classical Sanskrit which Kalidasa did more than any man to
\ncreate or at least to perfect. Even the utmost literalness could not transfer this characteristic into English. This
\nmethod of eliciting all the values of the original of which I have
\ngiven a rather extreme instance, I have applied with great frequency where a pregnant mythological allusion or a striking or
\nsubtle picture or image calls for adequate representation, more
\nespecially perhaps in pictures or images connected with birds and
\nanimals unfamiliar or but slightly familiar to the English reader.
\n(At the same time I must plead guilty to occasional excesses, to
\nreading into Kalidasa perhaps in a dozen instances what is not
\nthere. I can only plead in apology that translators are always
\nincorrigible sinners in this respect and that I have sinned less
\nthan others; moreover, except in one or two instances, these
\nadditions have always been suggested either by the sound or
\nsubstance of the original. I may instance the line,<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nA flickering line of fireflies seen in sleep,<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nKalidasa says nothing equivalent to or suggesting "seen in sleep",
\nbut I had to render somehow the impression of night and dim
\nunreality created by the dreamy movement and whispering assonances of the lines<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nalpālpabhāsam khadyotālīvilasitanibhām vidyudunmesadrstim<\/i><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 239<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nwith its soft dentals and its wavering and gliding liquids and sibilants. Unable to do this by sound I sought to do it by verbal
\nexpression, in so far made a confession of incompetence, but in
\na way that may perhaps carry its own pardon.)<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThere is yet another method which has to be applied far
\nmore cautiously, but is sometimes indispensable. Occasionally
\nit is necessary or at least advisable to discard the original image
\naltogether and replace it by a more intelligible English image.
\nThere is no commoner subject of allusion in Sanskrit poetry than
\nthe passionate monotoned threnody of the forlorn bird who is
\ndivided at night by some mysterious law from his mate, divided
\nif by a single lotus leaf, yet fatally divided. Such at least was the
\nbelief suggested by its cry at night to the imaginative Aryans.
\nNothing can exceed the beauty, pathos and power with which this
\nallusion is employed by Kalidasa. Hear, for instance, Pururavas
\nas he seeks for his lost Urvasie,<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThou wild-drake when thy love,<\/font><\/p>\n

\nHer body hidden by a lotus-leaf,<\/font><\/p>\n

\nLurks near thee in the pool, deemest her far<\/font><\/p>\n

\nAnd wailest musically to the flowers<\/font><\/p>\n

\nA wild deep dirge. Such is thy conjugal<\/font><\/p>\n

\nYearning, thy terror such of even a little<\/font><\/p>\n

\nDivision from her nearness. Me thus afflicted,<\/font><\/p>\n

\nMe so forlorn thou art averse to bless<\/font><\/p>\n

\nWith just a little tidings of my love.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nAnd again in the Shacountala<\/i>, the lovers are thus gracefully
\nwarned:<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nO Chacravaque, sob farewell to thy mate,
\nThe night, the night comes down to part you.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nFable as it is, one who has steeped himself in Hindu poetry can
\nnever bring himself wholly to disbelieve it. For him the melancholy call of the bird will sound for ever across the chill dividing
\nstream and make musical with pity the huge and solemn night.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 240<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nBut when the Yaksha says to the cloud that he will recognise her
\nwho is his second life by her sweet rare speech and her loneliness
\nin that city of happy lovers, "sole like a lonely Chacravaque with me her
\ncomrade far away", the simile has no pathos to an English mind and even when explained would only seem "an artificiality common to the court-poetry of the Sanskrit age". I
\nhave therefore thought myself justified by the slightness of the
\nallusion in translating<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n"Sole like a widowed bird when all the nests are making",<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nwhich translates the idea and the emotion while suggesting a
\nslightly different but related image.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nI have indicated above the main principles by which I have
\nguided myself in the task of translation. But there still remains
\nthe question, whether while preserving the ideals one may not
\nstill adhere more or less closely to the text. The answer to this is
\nthat such closeness is imperative, but it must be a closeness of
\nword-value, not oneness of word-meaning; into this word-value
\nthere enter the elements of association, sound and aesthetic
\nbeauty. If these are not translated, the word is not translated,
\nhowever correct the rendering may be. For instance, the words salila<\/i>, āpah. <\/i>and
\njala<\/i> in Sanskrit all mean water, but if jala<\/i> may
\nbe fairly represented by the common English word and the more
\npoetic āpah<\/i> by "waters" or "ocean" according to the context,
\nwhat will represent the beautiful suggestions of grace, brightness,
\nsoftness and clearness which accompany salila<\/i> ? Here it is obvious that we have to seek refuge in sound-suggestions and verse-subtleties to do what is not feasible by verbal rendering. Everything therefore depends on the skill and felicity of the translator
\nand he must be judged rather by the accuracy with which he
\nrenders the emotional and aesthetic value of each expression than
\nbrought to a rigid [regard] for each word in the original. Moreover the idiom of Sanskrit, especially of classical Sanskrit, is too
\nfar divided from the idiom of English. Literal translation from
\nthe Greek is possible though sometimes disastrous, but literal
\ntranslation from the Sanskrit is impossible. There is indeed a
\nschool endowed with more valour than discretion and more<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 241<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nmetaphor than sense who condemn the dressing up of the Aryan
\nbeauty in English clothes and therefore demand that not only
\nshould the exact words be kept but the exact idiom. For instance
\nthey would perpetrate the following: "Covering with lashes
\nwater-heavy from anguish, her eye gone to meet from former
\npleasantness the nectar-cool lattice-path-entered feet of the moon
\nand then at once turned away, like a land-lotus-plant on a cloudy day not awake,
\nnot sleeping". Now quite apart from the execrable English and the want of rhythm, the succession of the
\nactions and the connexions of thought which are made admirably
\nclear in the Sanskrit by the mere order of the words, is here
\nentirely obscured and lost; moreover the poetic significance of
\nthe words prityā<\/i> (pleasantness) and abhre<\/i>, implying here rain
\nas well as cloud and the beautiful force of salilagurubhih<\/i> (water-heavy) are not even hinted at, while the meaning and application
\nof the simile quite apparent in the original needs bringing out in
\nthe English. For the purpose of immediate comparison I give
\nhere my own version: "The moon beams…."<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThis I maintain though not literal is almost as close and
\nmeets without overstepping all the requirements of good translation. For the better illustration of the method, I prefer however
\nto quote a more typical stanza:<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nŚabdāyante madhuramanilaih kīcakāh. pūryamānāh<\/i>, <\/i><\/font><\/p>\n

\nSamsaktābhistripuravijayo gīyate kinnarībhih<\/i>, <\/i><\/font><\/p>\n

\nNirhādī te muraja iva cet kandaresu dhvanih syāt<\/i><\/font><\/p>\n

\nSangītārtho nanu paśupatestatra bhāvī
\nsamagram<\/i><\/font>. 
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nRendered into literal English this is:<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe bamboos filling with winds are noising sweetly, the
\nTripour-conquest is being sung by the glued-together Kinnaries,
\nif thy thunder should be in the glens like the sound on a drum \u2014
\nthe material of the concert of the Beast-Lord is to be complete
\nthere, eh?<\/font><\/p>\n

\nMy own translation runs,<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nOf Tripour slain in lovely dances joined<\/font><\/p>\n

\n              And link\u00e8d troops the Oreads of the hill<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 242<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nAre singing and inspired with rushing wind<\/font><\/p>\n

\n              Sweet is the noise of bamboos fluting shrill;<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThou thundering in the mountain-glens with cry<\/font><\/p>\n

\n              Of drums shouldst the sublime orchestra fill.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe word Tripura means the "three cities", refers to the three
\nmaterial qualities of sattwa<\/i>, rajas<\/i> and tamas<\/i>, light, passion and
\ndarkness, which have to be slain by Shiva the emancipator before
\nthe soul can rejoin God; but there is no reference here to the
\ntheosophic basis of the legend, but possibly to the legend itself,
\nthe conquest of the demon Tripura by Mahadeva. There was no
\nmeans of avoiding the mythological allusion and its unfamiliarity had simply to be accepted. Tripuravijayo gīyate<\/i>, "of Tripour
\nslain are singing" requires little comment. Samsaktābhih<\/i>, meaning "linked close together in an uninterrupted chain" is here rendered by "joined in linked troops"; but this hardly satisfied
\nthe requirement of poetic translation, for the term suggests to
\nan Indian a very common practice which does not, I think, exist
\nin Europe, women taking each other’s hands and dancing as they
\nsing, generally in a circle; to express this in English, so as to
\ncreate the same picture as the Sanskrit conveys, it was necessary
\nto add "in lovely dances". The word Kinnaries presents a
\nserious initial difficulty. The Purana has, mythologising partly
\nfrom false etymology, turned these Kinnaras into men and
\nwomen with horse faces and the description has been copied
\ndown into all Sanskrit dictionaries. But the Kinnaries of Valmiki have little resemblance with these Puranic grotesques; they are beings of superhuman beauty, unearthly sweetness of
\nvoice and wild freedom who seldom appear on the earth, their
\nhome is in the mountains and in the skies; he speaks of a young
\nKinnar snared and bound by men and the mother wailing over
\nher offspring; and Kekayie lying on the ground in her passion
\nof grief and anger is compared to a Kinnarie fallen from the
\nskies. In all probability they were at first a fugitive image of the
\nstrange wild voices of the wind galloping and crying in the
\nmountain-tops. The idea of speed would then suggest the idea
\nof galloping horse and by the usual principle of Puranic allegory
\nwhich was intellectual rather than artistic, the head, the most<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 243<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nprominent and essential member of the human body, would be
\nchosen as the seat of the symbol. Kalidasa had in this as in many
\nother instances to take the Puranic allegory of the old poetic
\nfigure and new-subject it to the law of artistic beauty. In no case
\ndoes he depart from the Puranic conception, but his method is
\nto suppress the ungainly elements of the idea, often preserving it
\nonly in an epithet, and bring into prominence all the elements
\nof beauty. Here the horse-faces are entirely suppressed and the
\npicture offered is that of women singing with unearthly voices
\non the mountain-tops. The use of the word Kinnarie here would
\nhave no poetic propriety; to the uninstructed it would mean
\nnothing and to the instructed would suggest only the ungainly
\nhorse-face which Kalidasa here ignores and conflict with the
\nidea of wild and divine melody which is emphasised. I have
\ntherefore translated "the Oreads of the hills"; these spirits of the
\nmountains are the only image in English which can at all render
\nthe idea of beauty and vague strangeness here implied; at the
\nsame time I have used the apparently tautologous enlargement
\n"of the hills", because it was necessary to give some idea of the
\ndistant, wild and mystic which the Greek Oreads does not in
\nitself quite bring out. I have moreover transposed the two lines
\nin translation for very obvious reasons. The first line demands
\nstill more careful translation. The word śabdāyante<\/i> means literally "sound, make a noise", but unlike its English rendering
\nit is a rare word used by Kalidasa for the sake of a certain effect
\nof sound and a certain shade of signification; while therefore
\nrendering by "noise" I have added the epithet "shrill" to bring it
\nup to the required value. Again, the force and sound of pūryamānāh<\/i> cannot be rendered by its literal rendering "filled", and
\nanila<\/i>, one of the many beautiful and significant Sanskrit words
\nfor wind, \u2014 vāyu<\/i>, anila<\/i>, pavana<\/i>, samīra<\/i>, samīrana<\/i>, vāta<\/i>, prabha\u00f1jana<\/i>, marut<\/i>, sadāgati \u2014<\/i> suggests powerfully the breath and
\nflowing of wind and is in the Upanishad used as equivalent to
\nPrana, the breath or emotional soul; to render adequately the
\nword "inspired" has been preferred to "filled" and the epithet
\n"rushing" added to wind. Kīcakāh. pūryamānāh anilaih<\/i> in the
\noriginal suggests at once the sound of the flute, because the flute
\nis in India made of the hollow bamboo and the shrillness of the<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 244<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nword kicakāh<\/i> assists. The last two lines of the stanza have been
\nrendered with great closeness, except for the omission of nanu
\n<\/i>and the substitution of the epithet ‘sublime’ for paśupateh<\/i>. Nanu
\n<\/i>is a Sanskrit particle which sometimes asks a rhetorical question but more
\noften suggests one answered; the delicate shades suggested by the Sanskrit
\nparticles cannot be represented in English or only by gross effects which would
\nbe intolerably excessive and rhetorical. The omission of Pasupati, the name of
\nShiva as the Lord of Wild Life, though not necessary, is, I think,
\njustified. He is sufficiently suggested by the last stanza and to
\nthose who understand the allusion, by the reference to Tripura;<\/font> 
\n<\/font>the object of suggesting the wild and sublime which is served in
\nSanskrit by introducing this name is equally served in English
\nby the general atmosphere of wild remoteness and the insertion
\nof the epithet ‘sublime’.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThis analysis of a single stanza \u2014 ex uno disce omnes <\/i>\u2014
\nwill be enough to show the essential fidelity which underlies the
\napparent freedom of my translation. At the same time it would
\nbe disingenuous to deny that in at least a dozen places of each
\npoem, \u2014 more perhaps in the longer ones \u2014 I have slipped into
\nwords and touches which have no justification in the original.
\nThis is a literary offence which is always condemnable and always
\ncommitted. In mitigation of judgment I can only say that it has
\nbeen done rarely and that the superfluous word or touch is never
\nout of harmony with or unsuggested by the original; it has
\nsprung out of the text and not been foisted upon it.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe remarks I have made apply to all the translations but
\nmore especially to the Cloud-Messenger<\/i>. In the drama except
\nin highly poetical passages I have more often than not sacrificed
\nsubtlety in order to preserve the directness and incisiveness of the
\nSanskrit, qualities of great importance to dramatic writing, and
\nin the epic to the dread of diffuseness which would ruin the noble
\nharmony of the original. But the Cloud-Messenger<\/i> demands
\nrather than shuns the careful and subtle rendering of every effect
\nof phrase, sound and association. The Meghadūtam<\/i> of Kalidasa
\nis the most marvellously perfect descriptive and elegiac poem in
\nthe world’s literature. Every possible beauty of phrase, every
\npossible beauty of sound, every grace of literary association,<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 245<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nevery source of imaginative and sensuous beauty has been woven
\ntogether into a harmony which is without rival and without fault; for amidst all its wealth of colour, delicacy and sweetness, there
\nis not a word too much or too little, no false note, no excessive
\nor defective touch; the colouring is just and subdued in its richness, the verse movement regular in its variety, the diction simple
\nin its suggestiveness, the emotion convincing and fervent behind
\na certain high restraint, the imagery precise, right and not overdone as in the Raghuvamsha<\/i> and yet quite as full of beauty and
\npower. The Shacountala<\/i> and the Cloud-Messenger<\/i> are the ne plus
\nultra<\/i> of Hindu poetic art. Such a poem asks for and repays the
\nutmost pains a translator can give it; it demands all the wealth
\nof word and sound effect, all the power of literary beauty, of imaginative and sensuous charm he has the capacity to extract from
\nthe English language. At the same time its qualities of diction
\nand verse cannot be rendered. The diffuseness of English will
\nnot thus lend itself to the brief suggestiveness of the Sanskrit
\nwithout being so high-strung, nervous and bare in its strength
\nas to falsify its flowing harmony and sweetness; nor to its easy
\nharmony without losing close-knit precision and falsifying its brevity, gravity
\nand majesty. We must be content to lose something in order that we may not lose all.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t*<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nIn Kalidasa another very serious difficulty meets the unhappy translator beyond the usual pitfalls. Few great Sanskrit
\npoems employ the same metre throughout. In the dramas where
\nmetrical form is only used when the thought, image or emotion
\nrises above the ordinary level, the poet employs whatever metre
\nhe thinks suitable to the mood he is in. In English, however, such
\na method would result in opera rather than in drama. I have
\ntherefore thought it best, taking into consideration the poetical
\nfeeling and harmonious flow of Kalidasa’s prose to use blank
\nverse throughout varying its pitch according as the original form
\nis metrical or prose and the emotion or imagery more or less
\nexalted. In epic work the licence of metrical variation is not<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 246<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nquite so great, yet there are several metres considered apt to epic
\nnarrative, and Kalidasa varies them without scruple in different
\ncantos, sometimes even in the same canto. If blank verse be, as
\nI believe it is, a fair equivalent for the anustubh<\/i>, the ordinary
\nepic metre, how shall one find others which shall correspond
\nas well to the "thunderbolt" Sloka (Indravajrā<\/i>) or the "lesser
\nthunderbolt" Sloka (upendravajrā<\/i>), "the gambolling-of-the-tiger"
\nSloka (śārdūlavikrīdita<\/i>) and all those other wonderful and grandiose
\nrhythmic structures with fascinating names of which Kalidasa is so mighty a master ? Nor would such variation be tolerated by English canons of taste. In the epic and drama the
\ntranslator is driven to a compromise and therefore to that extent
\na failure; he may infuse good poems or plays reproducing the
\narchitecture and idea-sense of Kalidasa with something of his
\nspirit, but it is a version and not a translation. It is only when
\nhe comes to the Cloud-Messenger<\/i> that he is free of this difficulty;  for the Cloud-Messenger<\/i> is written throughout in a single and
\nconsistent stanza. This mandākrāntā<\/i> or "gently stepping" stanza
\nis entirely quantitative and too complicated to be rendered into
\nany corresponding accentual form. In casting about for a metre
\nI was only certain of one thing that neither blank verse nor the
\nroyal quatrain stanza would serve my purpose; the one has not
\nthe necessary basis of recurring harmonics; in the other the
\nrecurrence is too rigid, sharply denned and unvarying to
\nrepresent the eternal swell and surge of Kalidasa’s stanza.
\nFortunately, by an inspiration and without deliberate choice,
\nKalidasa’s lines, as I began turning them, flowed into the form of
\ntriple rhyme and that necessarily suggested the terza rima. This
\nmetre, as I have treated it, seems to me to reproduce with as
\nmuch accuracy as the difference between the languages allows,
\nthe spiritual and emotional atmosphere of the Cloud-Messenger<\/i>.
\n<\/i>The terza rima in English lends itself naturally to the principle
\nof variation in recurrence which imparts so singular a charm to
\nthis poem, recurrence in especial of certain words, images, assonances, harmonies, but recurrence always with a difference so
\nas to keep one note sounding through the whole performance
\nunderneath its various harmony. In terza rima the triple rhyme<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 247<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nimmensely helps this effect, for it allows of the same common
\nrhymes recurring but usually with a difference in one or more
\nof their company.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t*<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe prose of Kalidasa’s dialogue is the most unpretentious
\nand admirable prose in Sanskrit literature; it is perfectly simple,
\neasy in pitch and natural in tone with a shining, smiling, rippling
\nlucidity, a soft carolling gait like a little girl running along in a
\nmeadow and smiling back at you as she goes. There is the true
\nimage of it, a quiet English meadow with wild flowers on a
\nbright summer morning, breezes abroad, the smell of hay in the
\nneighbourhood, honeysuckle on the bank, hedges full of convolvuluses or wild roses, a ditch on one side with cress or forget-me-nots and nothing pronounced or poignant except perhaps a stray
\nwhiff of meadow-sweet from a distance. This admirable unobtrusive charm and just observed music (Coleridge) makes it run
\neasily into verse in English. In translating one has at first
\nsome vague idea of reproducing the form as well as the spirit
\nof the Sanskrit, rendering verse stanza by verse stanza and prose
\nmovement by prose movement. But it will soon be discovered that except in the
\ntalk of the buffoon and not always then Kalidasa’s prose never evokes its just echo, never finds its answering
\npitch, tone or quality in English prose. The impression it
\ncreates is in no way different from Shakespeare’s verse taken
\nanywhere at its easiest and sweetest:<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nYour lord does know my mind. I cannot love him,<\/font><\/p>\n

\nYet I suppose him virtuous, know him noble,<\/font><\/p>\n

\nOf great estate, of fresh and stainless youth;<\/font><\/p>\n

\nIn voices well divulged, free, learned and valiant;<\/font><\/p>\n

\nAnd in dimension and the shape of nature,<\/font><\/p>\n

\nA gracious person; but yet I cannot love him.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nHe might have took his answer long ago.\u00b9<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nOr again, still more close in its subtle and telling simplicity:<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\u00b9<\/font>Twelfth
\nNight<\/i>, Act I, Sc. 5.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 248<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nO1.                      What is your parentage?
\nVi.     Above my fortunes, yet my state is well.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n          I am a gentleman.
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\nO1.                       <\/b> Get you to your lord,<\/font><\/p>\n

\n          I cannot love him; let him send no more;<\/font><\/p>\n

\n          Unless perchance you came to me again<\/font><\/p>\n

\n          To tell me how he takes it.<\/font>\u00b9<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThere is absolutely no difference between this and the prose of
\nKalidasa, since even the absence of metre is compensated by the
\nnatural majesty, grace and rhythmic euphony of the Sanskrit
\nlanguage and the sweet seriousness and lucid effectiveness it
\nnaturally wears when it is not tortured for effects.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\u00b9Twelfth Night<\/i>, Act <\/b> I,<\/b> Sc. 5.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 249<\/font><\/p>\n

\t\t<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Translating Kalidasa   THE life and surroundings in which Indian poetry moves cannot be rendered in the terms of English poetry. Yet to give…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","wpcat-4-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}