Memory, Metaphor and Mysticism in Kalidasa’s AbhijnanaSakuntalam

Review of an ancient literary text.

A study of AbhijnanaSakuntalam has to situate the contexts in ancient through medieval Indian literature and scholarship before it comes to the colonial and the contemporary. In epistemological privileging, this text has become either a Hindoo play in the colonial, Hindu drama in the Hindutva and a love story in the Western theoretical paradigms of scholarship. The essays in Memory, Metaphor and Mysticism in Kalidasa’s ‘AbhijnanaSakuntalam attempt to restore contexts, especially philosophical contexts, for reading this play.