{"id":98,"date":"2013-07-13T01:25:54","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=98"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:25:54","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:25:54","slug":"35-minor-characters-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\/35-minor-characters-vol-03-the-harmony-of-virtue-volume-03","title":{"rendered":"-35_Minor Characters.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\nIII. MINOR CHARACTERS<\/b><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nN<\/b><\/font>othing more certainly distinguishes the dramatic artist from the
\npoet who has trespassed into drama than the careful pains he
\ndevotes to his minor characters. To the artist nothing is small;<\/font><\/p>\n

he bestows as much of his art within the narrow limit of his small
\ncharacters as within the wide compass of his greatest. Shakespeare lavishes life
\nupon his minor characters; but in Shakespeare it is the result of an abounding creative energy; he makes
\nliving men as God made the world, because he could not help it,
\nbecause it was in his nature and must out. But Kalidasa’s dramatic gift, always suave and keen, had not this godlike abundance;<\/font><\/p>\n

it is therefore well to note the persistence of this feature of high
\nart in all his dramas. In the Urvasie<\/i> the noble figure of Queen
\nAushinarie is the most excellent evidence of his fine artistry;<\/font> 
\nbut even slight sketches like the Apsaras are seen upon close
\nattention to be portrayed with a subtle and discriminating design;<\/font><\/p>\n

thought has been bestowed on each word they speak, an observable delicacy of various touch shows itself in each tone and
\ngesture they employ. A number of shining figures crowded into
\na corner of the canvas, like in meaning, like in situation, like in
\nnature, they seem to offer the very narrowest scope for differentiation; yet every face varies from its sister, the diction of each
\ntongue has its revealing individuality. The timid, warm-hearted Rumbha easily despondent, full of quick outbursts of eagerness
\nand tenderness is other than the statelier Menaca with her royal
\ngift of speech and her high confidence. Sahajanya is of an intenser, more silent, less imaginative, more practical type than either
\nof these. <\/b> It is she who gives Pururavas the information of the
\nroad which the ravisher has taken, and from that point onward
\namid all the anxious and tender chatter of the sisters she is silent
\nuntil she has the practical fact of Pururavas’ disappearance to
\nseize upon. This she is again the first to descry and announce.
\nHer utterance is brief and of great point and substance; from the
\nfew words she has uttered we unconsciously receive a deep impression of helpfulness, earnestness and strength. We know her
\nvoice, are ready and recognize it again in the Fourth Act. Her<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 282<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nattitude there is characteristic; she will not waste time over vain
\nlamentation, since she cannot help. Fate has divided the lovers,
\nFate will unite them again; so with a cheerful and noble word of
\nconsolation she turns to the immediate work in hand.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nChitraleqha, more fortunate than the other Apsaras,
\nobtaining through three Acts a large canvas as the favourite and
\ncomrade of Urvasie, suffers dramatically from her good fortune,
\nfor she must necessarily appear a little indistinct, so near to the
\nsuperior light of her companion. Indeed, dramatic necessity
\ndemands subdued tones in her portraiture lest she should deflect
\nattention from Urvasie; richness of colour and prominence of line therefore are
\nnot permissible. Yet in spite of these hampering conditions the poet has made
\nher a sufficiently definite personality. Indeed, her indulgent affection, her playful kindliness,
\nher little outbreaks of loving impatience or sage advice, \u2014 the
\nneglect of which she takes in excellent part, \u2014 her continual half-smiling surrender to Urvasie’s petulance and wilfulness and her
\nwhole half matron-like air of elder-sisterly protection, give her
\na very sensible charm and attractiveness; there is a true nymph-like and divine grace, tact and felicity in all that she says and
\ndoes. Outside the group of Apsaras the Hermitess Satyavatie is
\na slighter but equally attractive figure, venerable, kind, a little
\nimpersonal owing to the self-restraint which is her vocation, but
\nwith glimpses through it of a fine motherliness and friendliness. The perpetual
\ngrace of humanness, which is so eminently Kalidasian, forming the atmosphere of all his plays, seems to deepen
\nwith a peculiar beauty around his ascetics, Kanwa, Satyavatie,
\nthe learned and unfortunate lady of the Malavica. The "little
\nrogue of a tiring woman" Nipounica, sly and smooth-tongued,
\nthough with no real harm in her beyond a delight in her own slyness and a fine sense of exhilaration in the midst of a family row,
\npleasantly brings up the slighter of these feminine personalities.
\nThe masculine sketches are drawn in even more unobtrusive
\noutlines and, after Kalidasa’s manner, less individualized than
\nhis women. The Charioteer and the Huntsmen are indeed hardly
\ndistinct figures; they have but a few lines to utter between them and are only
\nremarkable for the shadow of the purple which continual association with Pururavas has cast over their manner of<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 283<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nspeech. Manavaca and Ayus need a larger mention, yet they are
\nless interesting in themselves than for their place, one in the history of Kalidasa’s artistic development, the other among the
\nfinest evidences of his delicacy in portraiture and the scrupulous
\neconomy, almost miserliness, with which he extracts its utmost
\nartistic utility, possibility, value from each detail of his drama.
\nThe Chamberlain again, fine as he is in his staid melancholy, his
\naged fidelity, his worn-out and decrepit venerableness and that
\ncontinual suggestion of the sorrowfulness of grey hairs, is still
\nmainly the fine Kalidasian version of a conventional dramatic
\nfigure. The one touch that gives him a personal humanity is the
\nsad resignation of his, "It is your will, Sire", when Pururavas,
\nabout to depart to asceticism in the forests, commands the investiture of his son. For it is the last and crowning misfortune that
\nthe weary old man must bear; the master over whose youth and
\ngreatness he has watched, for whose sake he serves in his old
\nage, with the events of whose reign all the memories of his life
\nare bound up, is about to depart and a youthful stranger will
\nsit in his place. With that change all meaning must go out of the
\nold man’s existence; but with a pathetic fidelity of resignation
\nhe goes out to do his last bidding uttering his daily formula, \u2014
\nnow changed in its newly acquired pathos from the old pompous
\nformality, "It is your will, Sire."<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n2<\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe age of childhood, its charm and sportive grace and
\ncandour, seems to have had a peculiar charm for Kalidasa’s imagination; there is an exquisite light and freshness of morning and
\ndew about his children; an added felicity of touch, of easy and
\nradiant truth in his dramatic presentation. Kalidasa’s marvellous
\nmodesty of dramatic effect and power of reproducing ordinary,
\nhardly observable speech, gesture and action, magicalising but
\nnot falsifying them, saves him from that embarrassment which
\nmost poets feel in dealing dramatically with children. Even
\nShakespeare disappoints us. This great poet with his rich and
\ncomplex mind usually finds it difficult to attune himself again
\nto the simplicity, irresponsibility and na\u00efve charm of childhood.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 284<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nArthur, whom the Shakespeare-worshipper would have us
\nregard as a masterpiece, is no real child; he is too voulu<\/i>, too eloquent, too much dressed up for pathos and too conscious of the
\nfine sentimental pose he strikes. Children do pose and children do sentimentalise, but they are perfectly na\u00efve and unconscious
\nabout it; they pose with sincerity, they sentimentalise with a sort of passionate simplicity, indeed an earnest business-likeness
\nwhich is so sincere that it does not even require an audience. The greatest minds have their limitations and Shakespeare’s
\noverabounding wit shuts him out from two Paradises, the mind of a child and the heart of a mother. Constance, the pathetic
\nmother, is a fitting pendant to Arthur, the pathetic child, as insincere and falsely drawn a portraiture, as obviously dressed up
\nfor the part. Indeed throughout the meagre and mostly unsympathetic list of mothers in Shakespeare’s otherwise various and
\nsplendid gallery there is not even one in whose speech there is
\nthe throbbing of a mother’s heart; the sacred beauty of maternity is touched upon in a phrase or two; but from Shakespeare we expect something more, some perfect and passionate
\nenshrining of the most engrossing and selfless of human affections. To this there is not even an approach. In this one respect
\nthe Indian poet, perhaps from the superior depth and keenness of the domestic feelings peculiar to his nation, outstripped
\nhis
\ngreater English compeer.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nKalidasa, like Shakespeare, seems to have realised the instinct of paternal tenderness far more strongly than the
\nmaternal; his works both dramatic and epic give us many powerful and emotional expressions of the love of father and child to which
\nthere are few corresponding outbursts of maternal feeling. Valmiki’s Cowshalya has no parallel in Kalidasa. Yet he expresses
\nthe
\ntrue sentiment of motherhood with sweetness and truth if not
\nwith passion.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nAyus and Urvasie in this play were certainly not intended
\nfor
\nthe dramatic picture of mother and child. This mother has abandoned her child to the care of strangers; this child is new to
\nthe
\nfaces of his parents. Such a situation might easily have been made harsh and unsympathetic, but for the fine dramatic tact
\nof the poet which has purified everything that might repel and<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 285<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nsmoothed away all the angles of the
\nincident. But here the circumstances excuse it, not justify Urvasie. Acting under hard
\nconditions, she has chosen the lesser of two evils; for by keeping
\nAyus she would have lost both her child and Pururavas; by
\ndelivering him into wise and tender hands, she has insured his
\nwelfare and for her part only anticipated the long parting which
\nthe rule of education in ancient India demanded from parents as
\ntheir sacrifice to the social ideal; but it is not from maternal insensibility that she bears quietly the starvation of the mother
\nwithin her. Knowing that the child was in good hands she solaces
\nherself with the love of her husband. When he returns to her,
\nthere is a wonderful subdued intensity, characteristic of her
\nsimple and fine nature, in the force with which that suppressed
\npassion awakes to life; she approaches her son, wordless, but
\nher "veiled bosom heaving towards him and wet with sacred
\nmilk"; in her joy over him she forgets even the impending separation from the husband to avert which she has sacrificed the
\nembrace of his infancy. It is this circumstance, not any words,
\nthat testifies to the depth of her maternal feeling; her character
\nforbids her to express it in splendours of poetic emotion such as
\nwell spontaneously from the heart of Pururavas. A look, a few
\nordinary words are all; if it were not for these and the observation of others, we should have to live with her daily before we
\ncould realise the depth of feeling behind her silence.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nAyus himself is an admirable bit of dramatic craftsmanship.
\nThere is a certain critical age when the growing boy is a child on
\none side of his nature and a young man on the other and of all
\npsychological states such periods of transitional unstable equilibrium are the most difficult to render dramatically without
\nmaking the character either a confused blur or an ill-joined piece
\nof carpenter’s work. Here Kalidasa excels. He has the ready tact
\nof speech-gradations, the power of simple and telling slightness
\nthat can alone meet the difficulty. By an unlaboured and inevitable device the necessary materials are provided. The boy
\ncomes straight from the wild green and ascetic forest into the
\nsplendours of an Oriental court and the presence of a father and
\nmother whom he has never seen; a more trying situation could
\nnot be easily imagined; he inevitably becomes self-conscious,<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 286<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nembarrassed, burdened with the necessity of maintaining himself against the oppression of his surroundings. He attempts
\ntherefore to disguise his youthful nervousness behind the usual
\nshield of an overdose of formal dignity, a half unconscious pompousness and an air of playing the man. We are even conscious
\nof a slight touch of precocity, etc. Confronted with all these new
\nfaces making claims upon him to which his past consciousness
\nis an alien, the whole adult side of his nature turns uppermost.
\nBut fortunately for our comprehension of his true state of mind,
\nsomething of the green forest which is his home has come with
\nhim in the person of his fostermother Satyavatie. With her he
\nfeels as a child may feel with his mother. When he turns to her or speaks to
\nher, he is again and instinctively in manner, utterance and action the child who ran by her side clutching the skirts
\nof her dress in the free woodland. He speaks like a child, thinks
\nlike a child, acts docilely at her bidding like a child. Nothing
\ncould be more finely artistic in execution or more charmingly
\nfaithful to nature in its conception.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nVasuluxmie in the Malavica<\/i> does not even appear on the
\nstage, yet in that urbane and gracious work there is nothing more
\ncharming than her two fateful irruptions into the action of the
\nplay. They bring up a picture of the laughing light-hearted and
\ninnocent child, which remains with us as vividly as the most
\ncarefully-drawn character in the piece. The scene of the child
\nplaying with the lion’s cub in the Shacountala<\/i> has the same inevitable charm; ninety-nine poets out of a hundred would have
\nhopelessly bungled it, but in Kalidasa’s hands it becomes so admirably life-like and spontaneous that it seems as natural as if
\nthe child were playing with a kitten.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nManavaca on the other hand is an element of weakness
\nrather than of strength. I have already spoken of the progressive
\nattenuation of the traditional buffoon part which keeps pace with Kalidasa’s dramatic development. Gautama in the Malavica
\n<\/i>is a complete and living personality who has much to say to the
\naction of the plot; witty, mischievous, mendacious and irresponsible, he adds to the interest of the play even independently
\nof this functional importance. But in the Urvasie<\/i> to have made
\nthe main action of the plot turn in any way on the buffoon<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 287<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nwould have been incongruous with the high romantic beauty
\nof the drama and therefore a serious dramatic error. The function
\nof Manavaca is accordingly reduced to that of an interlocutor;<\/font><\/p>\n

he is there because Pururavas must have somebody to confide
\nin and talk with, otherwise his only dramatic purpose is to give
\nrise by his carelessness to the episode of Aushinarie’s jealousy
\nand self-subdual. Nevertheless his presence affects the composite tone of the picture. He is other than the buffoons of the
\nMalavica<\/i> and Shacountala<\/i>, far more coarse in the grain, far less
\ntalented and high-spirited than Gautama, yet not a stupid block.
\nHe has, along with the stock characteristics of gluttony, ugliness
\nand cowardice, an occasional coarse humour, infertile and broad,
\nand even a real gift of commonsense and rather cynical practicality, to say nothing of that shadow of the purple flung across the
\nspeech of all those who associate habitually with Pururavas; he
\nis at the same time low in mind, unable to understand characters
\nhigher than his own. His best virtue is perhaps the absence of
\nall pretensions and readiness to make a gibe on himself. Such a
\nfigure necessarily tends to set off by its drab colour and equal
\ndimensions the lyric idealism of Pururavas, the radiant charm of
\nUrvasie and the pale loftiness of the Queen. But it is by his place
\nin the picture and not what he is in himself that he justifies his
\nexistence. He does not attract or interest, indeed he at times
\nonly just escapes being tiresome. At the same time he lives.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nAmong all these minor figures who group themselves around
\nthe two protagonists and are of purely accessory interest, there is
\none who stands out and compels the eye by her nobler proportions and her independent personality. Queen Aushinarie has
\nno real claim by any essentiality in her action on the large space
\nshe occupies in the play; her jealousy does not retard and her
\nrenunciation sanctifies rather than assists the course of Pururavas’ love for Urvasie. The whole episode in which she figures
\nfits more loosely into the architecture of the play than can be
\nexampled elsewhere in Kalidasa’s dramatic workmanship. The
\ninterest of her personality justifies the insertion of the episode rather than the episode that justifies the not inconsiderable space
\ndevoted to her. The motif of her appearance is the same conventional element of wifely rivalry, the jealousy of the rose-in-bloom<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 288<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nagainst the rose-in-bud that has formed the whole groundwork
\nof the Malavica<\/i>. There the groundwork, here its interest is brief
\nand episodical. And yet none of the more elaborated figures in
\nthe earlier play, not even Dharinie herself, is as fine and deep a
\nconception as the wife of Pururavas. Princess of Kashie, daughter of the Ushinars, acknowledged by her rival to deserve by right
\nof her noble majesty of fairness the style of Goddess and of
\nEmpress, we feel that she has a right to resent the preference to
\nher even of an Apsara from heaven and the completeness of
\nPururavas’ absorption in Urvasie gives a tragic significance to
\nher loss which is not involved in the lighter loves and jealousies
\nof Vidisha. The character is more profoundly and boldly conceived. The passion of her love strikes deeper than the mere heyday of youth and beauty and the senses in Iravatie, as the noble
\nsadness of her self-renunciation moves more powerfully than
\nthe kind and gentle wilfulness of Queen Dharinie. And in the
\nmanner of her delineation there is more incisiveness, restraint
\nwith a nobler economy of touch. The rush of her jealousy comes
\nwith less of a storm than Iravatie’s but it has fierier and keener
\nedge and it is felt to be the disguise of a deep and mighty love.
\nThe passion of that love leaps out in the bitter irony of her self-accusal:<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n                                                                                   Not yours the guilt, my lord. I am in fault<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                  Who force my hated and unwelcome face<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                   Upon you.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nAnd again when in the very height of her legitimate resentment
\nshe has the sure consciousness of her after-repentance:<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nAnd yet the terror<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                    Of the remorse I know that I shall feel<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                     If I shun his kindness, frightens me.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nAnger for the time sweeps her away, but we are prepared for the
\nrepentance and sacrifice in the next act. Even in her anger she
\nhas been imperially strong and restrained and much of the
\npoetic force of her renunciation comes from the perfect sweet-<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 289<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nness, dignity and self-control with which she acts in that scene.
\nThe emotion of self-sacrificing love breaks out only once at the
\nhalf-sneering reproach of the buffoon:<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n                 Dull fool!<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                  I with the death of my own happiness<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                 Would give my husband ease. From this consider<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                 How dearly I love him.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nPutting gently but sorrowfully away from her the king’s half-sincere protestations of abiding love, she goes out of the drama,
\na pure, devoted and noble nature, clad in gracious white and sylvanly adorned with flowers, her raven tresses spangled with
\nyoung green of sacred grass; yet the fragrance of her flowers,
\nof sacrifice and the mild beauty of the moonlight remain behind
\nher. She does not reappear unless it is in the haste of Urvasie to
\nbring her recovered child to his "elder mother". This haste with
\nits implied fullness of gratitude and affection is one of Kalidasa’s
\ncareful side-touches to tell us better than words that in spirit
\nand letter she has fulfilled utterly the vow she made on the moonlit terrace under seal of<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n                                                                                 The divine wife and husband, Rohinie<\/font><\/p>\n

\n                                                                                 And Mrigalanchan named the spotted moon.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe deepening of moral perception, the increase in power and
\npathos, the greater largeness of drawing and finer emotional
\nstrength and restraint show the advance Kalidasa has made in
\ndramatic characterisation. Grace, sweetness, truth to life and
\ncharacter, perfect and delicate workmanship, all that reveals the
\npresence of the artist were his before; but the Urvasie<\/i> reveals a
\nriper and larger genius widening the scope, raising mightier vans
\nbefore yet it takes its last high and surpassing flight.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage <\/font>
\n\u2013 290<\/font><\/p>\n

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

III. MINOR CHARACTERS   Nothing more certainly distinguishes the dramatic artist from the poet who has trespassed into drama than the careful pains he devotes…<\/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-98","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\/98","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=98"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}