The Sanskrit drama : $b in its origin, development, theory and practice — John Shaqi
The Sanskrit drama : $b in its origin, development, theory and practiceKeith, Arthur Berriedale
History
The Sanskrit drama : $b in its origin, development, theory and practice
Keith, Arthur Berriedale
Sanskrit drama -- History and criticism
Since Windisch wrote, the extent of Greek influence on India before and
after the Christian era has been the subject of much investigation,
which has yielded its richest fruits in the sphere of art. That India
borrowed the incitement to the art of Gandhāra from Greece as its
ultimate source is undeniable, and it is equally clear that the
Buddhist adoption of the practice of depicting the human form of the
Buddha, in lieu of merely indicating his presence by some symbol such
as his seat, was due to Greek artistic influences. The extent to which
the rise of the Mahāyāna school of Buddhism was furthered by the influx
of religious and philosophical ideas from the west is still uncertain;
but it is noteworthy that Professor Lévi, [115] who most strongly
opposed the theory of Windisch, has himself attributed to western
influences the development of the new spirit in Buddhism which he
traces in Açvaghoṣa, whom he places in the entourage of Kaniṣka, dating
the former in the first century B.C. If this were the case, there would
be decided difficulties in maintaining any chronological objections
such as Professor Lévi [116] originally urged to the theory of
Windisch; when he attacked that theory he could place the earliest
Sanskrit dramas preserved, those of Kālidāsa in his view, five or six
centuries A.D. But now we have dramas of about A.D. 100 which are
certainly not the earliest of their type, and it is impossible to deny
that the Sanskrit drama came into being during the period when Greek
influence was present in India. The highest point of that influence
politically was doubtless attained under Menander; in the middle of the
first century B.C., roughly a century after Menander’s conquests, the
Greek princes were on the verge of being absorbed by new influences
culminating in the establishment of the Kuṣana [117] domination, but
there is nothing chronologically difficult in assuming the influence of
Greek drama on the drama in India.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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