Kalidasa

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Kalidasa ( Sanskrit , m., कालिदास, Kālidāsa , literally: servant of the goddess Kali ) was an Indian poet who probably lived at the end of the 4th / beginning of the 5th century at the time of the Gupta Empire . He is described as one of the nine "jewels" at the court of Vikramaditya and, along with Amaru and Bhartrihari, is considered to be the main representative of Indian Sanskrit poetry .

Act

Kalidasa put various women in the foreground in his love poetry, such as the faithful hermit daughter Shakuntala in the drama of the same name, Shakuntala , the emotional Urvashi and the slave girl Malavika, who loves her king. His artistic epic Kumarasambhava (German 1913 as The Birth of the God of War ) deals with the story of the passionate love of the gods Shiva and Parvati . In the epic Raghuvamsha (German 1914 as Raghus tribe ) criticism of the ruler sounds like. The lyrical poem Meghaduta (German 1847 as Der Wolkenbote ) depicts the pain and longing of a separated couple.

Kalidasa's Shakuntala was one of the first works of Indian literature to become known in the West. It was translated into English by William Jones in 1789 and from English into German by Georg Forster in 1791 . Goethe , Herder and Schiller were fascinated by Shakuntala , the poet Arthur William Symons called it the most beautiful drama in the world. Another German translation of Shakuntala was made by Friedrich Rückert in 1854. Rolf Lauckner published a revision in 1924 .

The Latvian poet Aspazija chose two lines from the section The Summer from the cycle of seasons Ritusanhàra in the translation by Peter von Bohlen as the motto for the 2nd section ( Pusdienas karstumā - In the heat of midday) of her first volume of poetry Sarkanās puķes ( The red flowers).

Works

The attribution of the dramas is not certain, as there are several authors of the same name.

Dramas

Artepen

Poems

expenditure

Because of the tradition in various reviews, the position of the text is particularly difficult and there are numerous different editions. The Devanagari Review is included in:

  • Adrian Scharpé: Kalidasa-Lexicon , Vol. I, Part 1-4: Basic Text of the Works and Vol. II, Part 1-2: References and Concordance of Quotations. De Tempel, Bruges 1954–1975 (= “Works uitgegeven door de faculteit van de letteren en wijsbegeerde”, Vol. 117, 120, 122, 134, 159, 160).

Translations into German and English

There is no complete translation of his works into German. Partial translations have appeared in the following editions:

  • Works. Translation [of the three dramas and the two poems Meghaduta and Ritusamhara ], epilogue and explanations by Johannes Mehlig . Reclam, Leipzig 1983
  • Sakuntala . Drama in seven acts. Introduction, translation from Sanskrit and Prakrit and notes by Albertine Trutmann . Ammann, Zurich 2004, ISBN 3-250-10465-5
  • Sakuntala, a play by Kalidasa , translated and edited. by Ernst Heinrich Meier , Stuttgart 1852 ( digitized from Google Books )
  • Ritusanhàra id est Tempestatum cyclus Carmen sanskritum, Kâlidâso adscriptum, edidit, latina interpretatione, germanica versione metrica atque annotationibus criticis instruxit P. a Bohlen. Otto Wigand, Leipzig 1840 (Sanskrit - Latin - German; digitized at Google Books)
    • Different first version of the German adaptation : The Seasons of Kâlidâsa. Translated from Sanskrit by P. v. Planks. In: Morgenblatt für educated Readers No. 264–266 from 4. – 6. November 1839 and No. 270 of November 11, 1839 ( digitized from Google Books)

The English translation of Kalidasa's three dramas in:

English translations of Sakuntala and the poems Meghaduta and Ritusamhara in:

  • Kalidasa: The Loom of Time. A Selection of His Plays and Poems. Penguin, 2006, ISBN 0-14-045521-3 .

literature

  • Dorothy Matilda Figueira: Translating the Orient: The Reception of Sakuntala in Nineteenth Century Europe . State University of New York Press, 1991, ISBN 0-7914-0327-0 (English).
  • Manohar Laxman Varadpande: History of Indian Theater. Classical Theater. Abhinav Publications, New Delhi 2005, pp. 93–148

Web links

Wikisource: Kalidasa  - Sources and full texts
Commons : Kālidāsa  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The story of Shakuntala is also dealt with in the Mahabharata and the Puranas , but not in this stylistic mastery.
personal data
SURNAME Kalidasa
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kalidas (कालीदास)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Indian poet
DATE OF BIRTH around 400
DATE OF DEATH 4th century or 5th century