“Bouquet of Rasa” and “River of Rasa”

Bhanu is probably the most famous Sanskrit poet that no one today has ever heard of. His “Bouquet of Rasa” and “River of Rasa,” composed in the early sixteenth century, probably under the patronage of the Nizam of Ahmadnagar in western India, attracted the attention of the most celebrated commentators in early modern India. Some of the greatest painters of Mewar and Basohli vied to turn his subtle poems into pictures. And his verses, such as this one,

You stayed awake all night and yet
it’s my eyes that are throbbing;
you were the one who drank the rum
and yet it’s my head that’s splitting;
and in the bower buzzing with bees
it was you who stole beauty’s fruit,
yet I’m the one the Love God wounds
with his arrows that burn like fire

were prized by poets everywhere: Abu al-Fazl, the preeminent scholar at Akbar’s court, translated it into Persian, and, Kshetráyya, the great Andhra poet of the next century, adapted it into Telugu. Many writers have described the types of heroines and heroes of Sanskrit literature (the subject of the “Bouquet of Rasa”) or explained the nature of aesthetic emotion (that of the “River of Rasa”), but none did so in verse of such exquisite and subtle artistry.

442 pp.  |  ISBN-13: 978-0-8147-6755-9  |  ISBN-10: 0-8147-6755-9  |  Co-published by New York University Press and JJC Foundation

“River of Rasa,” The Fourth Wave: “Description of the Involuntary Physical Reactions” (pp. 188–99)
(19 pp, 0.58mb)

Download Excerpts (pdf)
Download CSL Front Matter (pdf)
Order Now