the Sanskrit Rasa-Dhvani Theory

14 Pages·2016·4.25 MB·English

by  Charan Sukla, Ananta

A
R
U
T
L
U
C
CULTURA
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL
OF PHILOSOPHY OF CULTURE
CULTURA AND AXIOLOGY
Founded in 2004, Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of
2016
2016 Vol XIII No 2
Culture and Axiology is a semiannual peer-reviewed journal devo- 2
ted to philosophy of culture and the study of value. It aims to pro-
mote the exploration of different values and cultural phenomena in
FY
OG
regional and international contexts. The editorial board encourages Y O
HL
the submission of manuscripts based on original research that are PO
OXI
judged to make a novel and important contribution to understan- LOSD A
ding the values and cultural phenomena in the contempo rary world. HIN
A
OF PRE
U
L T
AL
NU
RC
U
O
J
L
A
N
O
TI
A
N
R
E
T
N
I
ISBN 978-3-631-71562-8
www.peterlang.com
CULTURA 2016_271562_VOL_13_No2_GR_A5Br.indd 1 14.11.16 KW 46 10:45
A
R
U
T
L
U
C
CULTURA
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL
OF PHILOSOPHY OF CULTURE
CULTURA AND AXIOLOGY
Founded in 2004, Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of
2016
2016 Vol XIII No 2
Culture and Axiology is a semiannual peer-reviewed journal devo- 2
ted to philosophy of culture and the study of value. It aims to pro-
mote the exploration of different values and cultural phenomena in
FY
OG
regional and international contexts. The editorial board encourages Y O
HL
the submission of manuscripts based on original research that are PO
OXI
judged to make a novel and important contribution to understan- LOSD A
ding the values and cultural phenomena in the contempo rary world. HIN
A
OF PRE
U
L T
AL
NU
RC
U
O
J
L
A
N
O
TI
A
N
R
E
T
N
I
www.peterlang.com
CULTURA 2016_271562_VOL_13_No2_GR_A5Br.indd 1 14.11.16 KW 46 10:45
CULTURA
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF
PHILOSOPHY OF CULTURE AND AXIOLOGY
Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology
E-ISSN (Online): 2065-5002
ISSN (Print): 1584-1057
Advisory Board
Prof. Dr. David Altman, Instituto de Ciencia Política, Universidad Catolica de Chile, Chile
Prof. Emeritus Dr. Horst Baier, University of Konstanz, Germany
Prof. Dr. David Cornberg, University Ming Chuan, Taiwan
Prof. Dr. Paul Cruysberghs, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
Prof. Dr. Nic Gianan, University of the Philippines Los Baños, Philippines
Prof. Dr. Marco Ivaldo, Department of Philosophy “A. Aliotta”, University of Naples “Federico II”, Italy
Prof. Dr. Michael Jennings, Princeton University, USA
Prof. Dr. Maximiliano E. Korstanje, University of Palermo, Argentina
Prof. Dr. Richard L. Lanigan, Southern Illinois University, USA
Prof. Dr. Christian Lazzeri, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense, France
Prof. Dr. Massimo Leone, University of Torino, Italy
Prof. Dr. Asunción López-Varela Azcárate, Complutense University, Madrid, Spain
Prof. Dr. Christian Möckel, Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany
Prof. Dr. Devendra Nath Tiwari, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India
Prof. Dr. José María Paz Gago, University of Coruña, Spain
Prof. Dr. Mario Perniola, University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, Italy
Prof. Dr. Traian D. Stănciulescu, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University Iassy, Romania
Prof. Dr. Steven Tötösy de Zepetnek, Purdue University & Ghent University
Editorial Board
Editor-in-Chief: Co-Editors:
Prof. dr. Nicolae Râmbu Prof. dr. Aldo Marroni
Faculty of Philosophy and Social- Dipartimento di Lettere, Arti e Scienze Sociali
Political Sciences Università degli Studi G. d’Annunzio
Alexandru Ioan Cuza University Via dei Vestini, 31, 66100 Chieti Scalo, Italy
B-dul Carol I, nr. 11, 700506 Iasi, Romania [email protected]
[email protected] PD Dr. Till Kinzel
Englisches Seminar
Technische Universität Braunschweig,
Bienroder Weg 80,
38106 Braunschweig, Germany
[email protected]
Editorial Assistant: Dr. Marius Sidoriuc
Designer: Aritia Poenaru
Cultura
International Journal of Philosophy
of Culture and Axiology
Vol. 13, No. 2 (2016)
Editor-in-Chief
Nicolae Râmbu
Guest Editors:
Asunción López-Varela
and Ananta Charan Sukla
Bibliographic Information published by the Deutsche
Nationalbibliothek
The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the
Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is
available in the internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de.
Cover Image: © Aritia Poenaru
ISSN 2065-5002
ISBN 978-3-631-71562-8 (Print)
E-ISBN 978-3-631-71635-9 (E-PDF)
E-ISBN 978-3-631-71636-6 (EPUB)
E-ISBN 978-3-631-71637-3 (MOBI)
DOI 10.3726/b10729
© Peter Lang GmbH
Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften
Frankfurt am Main 2016
All rights reserved.
Peter Lang Edition is an Imprint of Peter Lang GmbH.
Peter Lang – Frankfurt am Main · Bern · Bruxelles · New York ·
Oxford · Warszawa · Wien
All parts of this publication are protected by copyright. Any
utilisation outside the strict limits of the copyright law, without
the permission of the publisher, is forbidden and liable to
prosecution. This applies in particular to reproductions,
translations, microfilming, and storage and processing in
electronic retrieval systems.
This publication has been peer reviewed.
www.peterlang.com
CROSS-CULTURAL INTERMEDIALITY:
FROM PERFORMANCE TO DIGITALITY

CONTENTS

Asunción LÓPEZ-VARELA AZCÁRATE 7
Introduction: Performance, Medial Innovation and Culture

Ananta Charan SUKLA 13
Indian Intercultural Poetics: the Sanskrit Rasa-Dhvani Theory

Krishna PRAVEEN and V. Anitha DEVI 19
Kathakali: The Quintessential Classical Theatre of Kerala

Jinghua GUO 27
Adaptations of Shakespeare to Chinese Theatre

Cyril-Mary Pius OLATUNJI and Mojalefa L.J. KOENANE 43
Philosophical Rumination on Gelede: an Ultra-Spectacle Performance

María VIVES AGURRUZA 53
The Cultural Impact of the Nanking Massacre in Cinematography:
On City of Life and Death (2009) and The Flowers of War (2011)

Qingben LI 67
China’s Micro Film: Socialist Cultural Production in the Micro Era

Annette THORSEN VILSLEV 77
Following Pasolini in Words, Photos, and Film, and his Perception
of Cinema as Language

Adile ASLAN ALMOND 83
Reading Rainer Fassbinder’s adaptation Fontane Effi Briest

Yang GENG and Lingling PENG 103
The Time Phenomenon of Chinese Zen
and Video Art in China: 1988-1998
Carolina FERNÁNDEZ CASTRILLO 125
Lyric Simultaneities: From “Words in Freedom” to Holopoetry

Janez STREHOVEC 137
Digital Art in the Artlike Culture and Networked Economy

Stefano CALZATI 153
Representations of China by Western Travellers in the Blogsphere

Horea AVRAM 173
Shared Privacy and Public Intimacy: The Hybrid Spaces
of Augmented Reality Art
10.3726/CUL2016-2_13
Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology 13(2)/2016: 13–18

Indian Intermedial Poetics:
the Sanskrit Rasa-Dhvani Theory

Ananta CHARAN SUKLA
Sambalpur University, Odisha, India
[email protected]

Abstract. Rasa, Dhvani and Rasa-Dhvani are the major critical terms in Sanskrit
poetics that developed during the post-Vedic classical period. Rasa (lit. juice) is used
by a sage named Bharata (c. 4th C. B.C. – 1st C. A.D.) to denote the aesthetic
experience of a theatrical audience. But Anandavardhana (9th C. A.D.) and
Abhinavagupta (10th C. A.D.) intermedialize this experience by extending it to a
reader of poetry. They argue that rasa is also generated by a linguistic potency called
dhvani. Some critics like Bhoja (11th C. A.D.) also proposed generation of rasa by
pictorial art, and further, some modern critics propose to trace dhvani property in
non-verbal arts such as dance and music pleading thereby that these non-verbal arts
also generate rasa. The present essay examines these arguments and concludes that
generation of rasa is confined to only the audio-visual and verbal arts such as the
theatre and poetry, and, dhvani as a specific linguistic potency, is strictly confined to
the verbal arts. Its intermedialization is a contradiction in terms.
Keywords: Rasa, Dhvani, Rasa-Dhvani, post-Vedic texts, Sanskrit poetics.

INTRODUCTION

Rasa as a critical term is used first by a mythical sage named Bharata
(4th C. B.C. – 1st C. A.D.) in his treatise on dramaturgy titled Näöyaçāstra.
The term connotes a specific kind of pleasure that one experiences in
perceiving a dramatic performance. Bharata borrows this term from a
Vedic text titled Taittiréyopaniñad (II.7) where the nature of ultimate
Reality (Brahman) is explained in terms of gustatory delight (änanda). The
text reads: “That (Brahman) is certainly Rasa (literally, both “juice” and
the act of tasting this juice); he who attains (tastes) it is delightful
(änandé).” In this way, ontology is explained in terms of non-linguistic
(yato väcä nivartante) phenomenological epistemology.
The use of the word rasa in the Taittiréyopaniñad Vedic text originates in
a sacrificial ritual where the juice of a creeper named soma was offered to
the Vedic gods. Soma is the Vedic name for the moon-god, famous for
bestowing mental strength, lustre, happiness, and soma rasa is therefore
considered an elixir (amåta) that bestows immortality. The ancient Indian
13
A. Charan Sukla / Indian Intermedial Poetics: the Sanskrit Rasa-Dhvani Theory

dramaturgist and musicologist Bharata Mini uses the term in his
theoretical treatise Natya Shastra (composed between the 3rd century
BCE and the 1st-century CE), referring to the delight experienced by the
audience during a dramatic performance. This occurs by means of the
unification of emotion (bhäva), as it is manifested in the action (anubhāva)
of a character within necessary environment(s) (vibhāva). Rasa is, thus, the
self-manifestation of an emotion in the action (both physical [anubhäva]
and mental [vyabhicārībhäva]) of a character(s). In its experiential form¸
rasa is a phenomenological phenomenon, not a material object, and
music and dance are its necessary corollaries, involving visual, auditory
and verbal signs: dramatic dialogue, music (both vocal and instrumental)
dance and the action of the actors. Thus, the core of Bharata’s theory is
the manifestation of an emotion (bhava) by means of an audio-visual
performance, relished as rasa by the audience. Bharata therefore states
that bhäva and rasa are interdependent, they manifest each other; rasa is
nothing but an emotion relished by the audience – äsvädya: (VI, prose after
31 and 34-37) the tasted emotion. Rasa is not produced on the stage by
the performance of the actors, but in the (perceptual) experience of the
audience; not again any kind of audience, but only a properly qualified
sahådaya (like-hearted/sensitive) audience, as stated by Abhinavagupta
(c. 950 – 1020 CE), the celebrated commentator on Bharata’s treatise.

MANIFESTATION OF EMOTIONS ON STAGE

Acording to Abhinavagupta, the manifestation of emotion on the stage
(abhinaya) is constituted by three factors: (1) vibhäva, which externalizes
permanent emotions (sthäyé) enacted by the actors and the scenic
elements; (2) the physical gestures and postures (anubhäva) that express
emotions, and (3) the drifting feelings or moods (vyabhicäré/saïicäré bhävas)
associated with permanent emotions, as expressed by the facial
movements. Permanent emotions and mental states are love, laughter,
sorrow, anger, heroism, fear, distress and wonder, and appear externally
in accordance with their relevant stimulants as eight rasas respectively –
Śrringära, Karuëa, Häsya, Raudra, Véra, Bhayänaka, Vébhatsa and Utsäha. In
these manifestations there might be several rasas at a time, though with a
leading or dominating one as the plot and situations of a play demand.
Different commentators offer their different views on the process of
generation of rasa. The major issue is the identity of the emotion that is
14