ARTS & ARTISTS

Svapnavasavadatta : Mnemonic Interludes

If indeed this was a dream,

it would be fortunate not to wake up again;
Or, if this should be error,
then may I long be in error.

Be it heroes, idealists or kings, one question which has tormented since ages has been the
question of balancing the conflicting claims of personal life with the larger interests of the
nation/society. In this attempt to strike a balance, the victim in most cases is the suffering
individual, unwillingly submitting to the exigencies of his exalted position. Be it Valmiki's Rama
or Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, the dilemma that confronts the hero is essentially one of
choice—between the personal and the public. Resolution in Western drama is usually tragic
and often comes in the form of death, whereas in Sanskrit drama, we have a happy resolution.
Because the aim of Sanskrit drama was the establishment of the spectator's harmony with the
universe; the theater was meant to be "a hall of healing and joy."

Bhasa, perhaps the greatest Indian dramatist who lived sometime before Kalidasa, is
presumably the author of 13 short works. Svapnavasavadatta (The Vision of Vasavadatta)—
Bhasa's masterpiece—is a play based on the legend of King Udayana and Vasavadatta. The
main theme of this highly celebrated play is the sorrow of Udayana for his wife Vasavadatta,
believed by him to have perished in a fire. Udayana passes through a prolonged period of
sorrow and suffering, because of his deep and sincere love for his queen. In keeping with the
metaphysical nature of Sanskrit drama, here too we are confronted by notions of time,
memory, reality, and illusion.

King Udayana's kingdom of Vatsa is invaded at a time of weakness and only an alliance with
Magadha can save it. Yaugandharayana, the wily Chief Minister of Udayana, is therefore
anxious that his master should wed Padmavati, sister of the King of Magadha. But Udayana is
too deeply attached to Vasavadatta to entertain any such proposal. To contrive this politically
needed marriage, the devious minister spreads a report that he and Vasavadatta have
perished in the fire that consumed the village of Lavanaka. They leave the village and arrive at
a hermitage where Padmavati happens to come. Yaugandharayana, disguised as a religious
mendicant, leaves Vasavadatta (in the garb of a lady of Avanti) in the charge of Padmavati.
Udayana is finally induced to visit Magadha and is seen by Vasavadatta, though she remains
for most of the time out of his own vision. The unhappy Vasavadatta secretly remains near
and has to watch her husband drawn into a marriage with Padmavati.

Having renounced her happiness by going into hiding for the sake of her husband's restoration
to his kingdom, Vasavadatta, the selfless, devoted wife, undergoes a bitter emotional trial. We
are awestruck by "the complete self-abnegation of the noble queen, who suffers martyrdom
for the sake of her lord with cheerful resignation," as also her self-sacrifice, self-restraint,
serenity and dignity. Her only consolation is that Udayana is unable to forget her even in the
midst of a new marriage. This is her reward for suffering that without being seen, she
overhears him confess to the jester: "A deeply-rooted passion is hard to abandon; by constant
recollection the pain is renewed. This is the way of the world that the mind must cancel its
debt with tears to gain tranquility." It was chiefly out of political motives that Udayana married
Padmavati. He never ceases to mourn for Vasavadatta as he is perpetually haunted by her
memory.

In this play that celebrates the power extraordinaire of human memory, even inanimate things
have a life of their own. Udayana's sorrow for Vasavadatta becomes almost uncontrollable on
the discovery of the lute Ghosavati, her beloved companion: "My passion, for a long time
dormant, has been awakened by the lute, but the queen, who loved this lute, I cannot see."
The central scene, giving the play its title, is the vision that Udayana gets of Vasavadatta while
sleeping in the Sea Room. The vision is the result of his agitated state of mind, haunted by the
agonizing thought of her supposed loss; he thinks that he beholds Vasavadatta in a vision
when he has viewed her in actuality. In this otherworldly scene, the boundaries between past
and present, illusion and reality are almost blurred. In her fear of upsetting
Yaugandharayana's plan by a premature disclosure, Vasavadatta rushes out of the room; he
sees her and suddenly rises and runs after her, but knocks into a doorway and stops
bewildered. He is afterwards persuaded by the jester that it was only a dream. But as the
"series of worldly fortunes revolves with the march of time like the spokes in a wheel," we are
eventually led to a happy and surprising resolution—the restoration of Vasavadatta as
Udayana's queen.

- Nirmala PG