Bringing the God’s Down a Notch

David Smith’s take on Ratnakara’s Haravijaya was quite interesting to read as it offered me an alternative perspective for which to view the genre of Mahakavya.

At the core of the Haravijaya is a story of the merging of Siva and Parvati. Also, however, the author – Ratnakara – juxtaposes himself as a vital character in this story of the gods. He is the ocean. Ironically, his name actually means ‘ocean’!!!

What piqued my interest was Chapter 8: “The Gods and the Goddess”. Davis believes that kavya often adopts a neutral attitude towards the gods. That is to say, the gods are given almost a position of secondary importance, or that their heavenly statuses are neither fully expounded nor appreciated by the poet. One such example Davis cites come from the Meghaduta by Kalidasa, that was discussed in class a couple of weeks ago. In the Meghaduta, the intensity of the event surrounding Siva’s battle with the elephant is replaced with more mundane, gentler, sounds. The anxiety and pomp of the situation is tempered with the sound of a drum, rather than with the sound of thunder. The neutral attitude neutralizes the polarized situation (226).

Similarly, in Ratnakara’s poem, the author responds to the fierce entity of Siva’s skull-covered head that is dripping with blood, by juxtaposing it with a courtier who is chewing betel leaves. The reaction acts as water on the fire of an otherwise god-like awesome event. Davis asserts that this arrogance that bring the gods down a peg is inherent in kavya because in this mode, enthusiasm – even for the gods – is taboo (227). Hence, while kavya features the gods often, Davis maintains that “familiarity breeds neutrality” (228)…A sense of ‘been there done that’ that reeks of boredom and a lack of awe that the gods are otherwise awarded.

Kavya uses the gods as decorative figures – sprinkling the poem with bits of myths, serving as outlines for a greater plot line. Davis holds that kavya’s liberal use of these mythical outlines is in fact symptomatic of its greater disdain for the myth in its entirety – that is, by using snippets of the divine stories, the kavya is fulfilling it’s god-quota, while still managing to stay away from fully exalting the divine creatures within its poems.

Furthermore, Davis asserts that Ratnakara’s propensity to dispose of the divine is a manifestation of the inherent habit of mahakavya to dispose of reality and replace it, or supplement it, with a faux quality…Much like a drum is only fake thunder.