Comments on: Denigrating Indian Culture: Eroticising Mricchakatika

By: TracerBullet

TracerBullet — Tue, 27 May 2008 09:54:13 +0000

Am replyingn very late. I agree with your analysis. As an aside do you know any place where an english + sanskrit version of Mrichcha katika is available?

By: rishav

rishav — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 15:37:10 +0000

i felt glad visiting here

By: rajee

rajee — Wed, 01 Mar 2006 08:14:51 +0000

v enlightening indeed.
seeing the movie utsav, i used to actually think that 5th century india was really quite depraved!
pls suggest some english translations of early indian plays/ stories.
i’ve read Raja gopalachari’s mahabharata and found it v nice indeed.

By: pruthvi

pruthvi — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 06:07:47 +0000

this is store was a nice

By: pavan

pavan — Fri, 30 Dec 2005 08:36:59 +0000

Excellent, and divulging the true essence of Mricchakatika .

By: nilagriva

nilagriva — Fri, 03 Jun 2005 11:40:02 +0000

A nice analysis of Utsav vs shUdraka’s work. I haven’t read mRucChakaTika in its original and hence can’t comment on it. But I’ve also seen that Karnad’s presentations of several stories seem to be purposefully perverse.

For example, I don’t remember any part in the original yayAti story where the daughter-in-law implores yayAti to satisfy her craving. Many things like these have been done in the name of poetic license. Even though they can be tolerated as such, these tend to misguide the lay person who doesn’t have the time or depth to study a work such as the mahAbhArata.

Agni mattu maLe - even the name causes me to shudder (why not benki mattu maLe or agni mattu vRuShTi ?) - is a big misrepresentation of the original mahAbhArata story. The movie was pathetic.

In my opinion, he is the least deserving kannaDa recipient of the jnAnapITha. Somebody I know refers to such unworthy awardees as “jnAnapitthigaLu” ;-)!

But, just as we have the freedom to air our views, Karnad should definitely have the freedom to air his own.

But again, people who read should be able to correctly estimate the literary worth of Karnad - which IMHO, is not even in the same graph as the first four kannaDa jnAnapITha awardees (Kuvempu, Bendre, kAranta and Masti) and several others including Bhyrappa, DVG, Adiga, KSNa. AnantamUrti,IMO, is another one in Karnad’s class and we see that they are good comrades.

He is a good actor, though!

PS: Excellent set of blogs! Came across this via Rajeev Srinivasan and Secular Right.

By: Niranjan

Niranjan — Fri, 20 May 2005 04:45:01 +0000

Comprehensive, informative and well worded! Thanks for the insight, Sandeep. My notion of Karnad had been based entirely on what has been written about him in the media, and so these series of articles were enlightening. I dwell in an ignorance of a different kind having not read the original works or the ones by Karnad but now am definitely motivated ’bout the former.

By: shiva

shiva — Sat, 14 May 2005 21:59:20 +0000

Excellent posts Sandeep. I have read Karnad’s Hayavadana in college and found it mediocre. Karnad decided it seems to catch wind of the times and take a free ride. Reminds me of Dharamvir Bharati’s poem “Raste ke Patte” about a clump of leaves swept up by a passing car and thrown some distance away remarking to themselves, “Hamme bhi tarakki hai”. Non-filmi cultural activities and the humanities in India are a sarkari affair and driven by the enforcers of the Nehru-Gandhi khaandaan. Where would these people be if not for sarkari patronage. I was amused by Romila Thapar’s decision to decline the Padma sammaan this year on the grounds that she would not accept sarkari awards but academic awards were OK. Where would this third rate hisorian of ancient India beif not for sarkari patronage. Where else in the world could a person achieve eminence in ancient hostory without any knowledge whatsoever of the langiages of that culture?