Folio from the Khamsa of Amir Khusrau. Metropolitan Museum of Art Accession Number 13.228.33.
In this session, we will look at forms of love in the lyrics of prominent Sufi poets of the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries, concentrating on the works of Amir Khusrau (1253-1325) and Abdul Quddus Gangohi (1456-1537). Read more
Satsaī of Biharidas, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Accession Number 1977.440.6.
Text:
बिहारीदास : सतसई (चुने हुए दोहे), जगन्नाथ ‘रत्नाकर’ के संस्कारण (१९२५ ई.) से
In this session, we will explore the different interactions, situations, and rasas elicited by the nāyikā, nāyak, sakhīs, sakhās, sautans, and the other characters of early Hindi romantic poetry in the context of the seventeenth-century court poet Biharidas’s compact dohās.
Detail from a folio of the Rasikapriyā of Keshavdas. Ca. 1610. Metropolitan Museum of Art, No. 18.85.5b.
Text:
केशवदास : रसिकप्रिया, १.२२-२३.
In this session we will look at examples of love poetry by the poet Keshavdas that cast Krishna and Radha in the roles of nāyak and nāyikā.
We will also dip our toes into the pool of paleography, meaning in this case the reading of pre-colonial manuscripts. Our case study will be an illustrated copy of the Rasikapriyā of Keshavdas copied circa 1610 (Acc.#18.85.5b), and held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: Read more
Metropolitan Museum of Art Accession Number 13.228.33.
Texts:
भिखारीदास : रस-सारांश, १.८-१५
केशवदास : रसिकप्रिया, १.२१-२३
What are the parts of the aesthetic theory or rasa (रस)? In this session we will explore be introduced to the essential parts of this theory, and discuss how they work, in the context of Bhikharidas’s Ras-Sārāś. We will also begin reading through examples used to illustrate aspects of this theory from Keshavdas’s Rasikapriyā (1591). Read more
Detail from nāyikābhed text. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
In this session, we will read about and discuss the concept of love as it was imagined in early Hindi literature. As discussed earlier in the course, śṛṅgār (शृंगार) or erotic love carried specific meanings and involved specific conventions in the world of early Hindi poetry. Not just any situation could be romantic; the characters, setting, situation, dialogue, and details had to follow particular rules in order to bring about the desired effect (and affect) in the listener or reader. Read more
Today’s dohā is from Kabir, the famous saint-poet of Banaras who lived in either the fifteenth or sixteenth century.
Detail from painting by Mir Kalan Khan, c. 1770-1775. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
चलती चक्की देख के दिया कबीर रोय ।
दो पतन के बीच आ साबित गया ना कोय ।।
— कबीर
Rasikapriyā of Keshavadas. Metropolitan Museum of Art, Acc. 37815.
In pre-modern South Asia, not just any rhymed text could be poetry, and not just any language could be a language of literature. In this session, we will discuss notions of literature (काव्य) and notions of literary language in pre-modern (or rather pre-colonial) Hindi. You’ll probably notice as you read through the materials for this session that Hindi or ‘भाषा’, and its literature did not exist in isolation, but rather within a complex ecology of languages (constituting a ‘language order’ or ‘schema’, according to Andew Ollett, who adapts the concept from Naoki Sakai). Read more
In this course, we will investigate three (seemingly) simple questions:
How will we attempt to answer these questions? We will look at a variety of materials- including poetry, prose, film, music, advertisements, and news articles- using a variety of techniques falling within the realm of philology.
Folio from the Satsaī (Seven Hundred Verses) of Bihari, ca. 1785. Metropolitan Museum of Art.