Nature of the Event
Kaavyaalaap
Speaker
Naresh Keerthi
Assistant Professor, School of Linguistics and Literary Studies, Chinmaya University, Kochi.
Organised by
Event date
12 January 2021
Other details
A member of an elite circle of tenured scholars from 17th century Kumbhakonam, Vāñcheśvara Dīkṣita wrote a poem called the Mahiṣaśataka (MS) – a hundred verses ostensibly in praise of his buffalo. Composed in literary Sanskrit, often deploying complicated puns and other figures, the text is a mine of details about the social and administrative climate of early modern Tamil Nadu. While such a text is of obvious value for cultural historians, the Mahiṣaśataka (and some of its congeners) poses peculiar questions within the received framework of Sanskrit poetics. The talk will reflect on the poem, its congeners, and their aesthetic salience.
Event Programme