Sakoontala; Or, The Lost Ring. Kalidasa

The fact that the following translation (first published in 1855) of India's most celebrated drama has gone through seven editions, might reasonably have absolved me from the duty of revising it.

Three years ago, however, I heard that Sir John Lubbock had thought '[S']akoontalá' worthy of a place among the hundred best books of the world, and had adopted my version of the original. I therefore undertook to go through every line and once again compare the translation with the Sanskrit, in the hope that I might be able to give a few finishing touches to a performance which, although it had been before the public for about forty years, was certainly not perfect. The act of revision was a labour of love, and I can honestly say that I did my best to make my representation of Kálidása's immortal work as true and trustworthy as possible.

Another edition is now called for, but after a severely critical examination of every word, I have only detected a few minor unimportant points—and those only in the Introduction and Notes—in which any alteration appeared to be desirable. Indeed it is probable that the possessors of previous editions will scarcely perceive that any alterations have been made anywhere.

Occasionally in the process of comparison a misgiving has troubled me, and I have felt inclined to accuse myself of having taken, in some cases, too great liberties with the Sanskrit original. But in the end I have acquiesced in my first and still abiding conviction that a literal translation (such as that which I have given in the notes of my edition of the Sanskrit text) might have commended itself to Oriental students, but would not have given a true idea of the beauty of India's most cherished drama to general readers, whose minds are cast in a European mould, and who require a translator to clothe Oriental ideas, as far as practicable, in a dress conformable to European canons of taste.

And most assuredly such a translation would never have adapted itself to actual representation on a modern stage as readily as it now appears that my free version has done. It has gratified me exceedingly to find that youthful English-speaking Indians—cultured young men educated at the Universities of Calcutta, Madras and Bombay—have acted the [S']akoontalá, in the very words of my translation with the greatest success before appreciative audiences in various parts of India.

And lest any one in this country should be sceptical as to the possibility of interesting a modern audience in a play written possibly as early as the third or fourth century of our era (see p. xvi), I here append an extract from a letter received by me in 1893 from Mr. V. Padmanabha Aiyar, B.A., resident at Karamanai, Trivandrum, Travancore.

'SIVEN COIL STREET, TRIVANDRUM,

'May 1, 1893.

'The members of the "Karamanai Young Men's Mutual Improvement Society" acted your translation of "[S']akoontalá" on the 3rd and 5th of September last year, in the Government Museum Theatre, Trivandrum.

'It was acted in two parts. On the first day Acts I to IV were acted, and on the second the remaining three Acts.

'All our chief native officials and many Europeans and their ladies honoured the occasion with their presence. We acted it a second time at the special request of H.H. the Second Prince of Travancore, in the Palace of His Highness' mother, the Junior Ránee.

'The public were kind enough to pronounce it a success. In many cases the applause given was not so much for the acting as for the beauty of your translation. The Hindús have a great liking for this play, and not one of the enlightened Hindú community will fail to acknowledge your translation to be a very perfect one. Our object in acting Hindú plays is to bring home to the Hindús the good lessons that our ancient authors are able to teach us. If there is one lesson in these days more than another which familiarity with the fountains of Western literature constantly forces upon the mind, it is that our age is turning its back on time-honoured creeds and dogmas. We are hurrying forward to a chaos in which all our existing beliefs, nay even the fundamental axioms of morality, may in the end be submerged; and as the general tenor of Indian thought among the educated community is to reject everything that is old, and equally blindly to absorb everything new, it becomes more and more an urgent question whether any great intellectual or moral revolution, which has no foundations in the past, can produce lasting benefits to the people.

'"I desire no future that will break the ties of the past" is what George Eliot has said, and so it is highly necessary that the Hindús should know something of their former greatness.

'The songs in [S']akoontalá, one in the Prologue and another in the beginning of the fifth Act, very easily adapted themselves to Hindú tunes.'

Towards the end of his letter Mr. Aiyar intimated that he himself took the part of Má[T.]Havya. He also mentioned that a few modifications and additions were introduced into some of the scenes.

In a subsequent letter received from Mr. Keshava Aiyar, the Secretary of the Society, I was informed that my version of the Play was acted again at Trivandrum in 1894.

These descriptions of the successful representation of the [S']akoontalá in Travancore justified me in expressing a hope that, as Kálidása has been called the Shakespeare of India, so the most

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