Truths. Prodosh Aich

       CHAPTER 5

       LEARNING SANSKRIT IN GERMANY IN GENERAL AND AT LEIPZIG IN PARTICULAR

      All students, bright or less bright need orientation in the beginning at universities identifying subjects of interest and identifying sympathetic teachers. The phase of orientation may take even two semesters. In his second semester, Friedrich Maximilian Müller comes to know that Hermann Brockhaus, a new professor at Leipzig, offers Sanskrit Grammar for the very first time at Leipzig University. Before he decides upon his preferences, he attends Hermann Brockhaus as well out of curiosity. Orient, Oriental literature and Oriental languages are progressively becoming attractive not only in Germany. With general “philology”, i.e. Greek and Latin languages, and with German literature he is more or less familiar.

      In fact, Friedrich Maximilian Müller could learn only that much of Sanskrit Grammar that Hermann Brockhaus knew and could teach in three months. We did not check whether Hermann Brockhaus ever continued with his grammar course in the following semesters. We know for sure that Friedrich Maximilian Müller’s knowledge of Sanskrit Grammar was restricted to this three-months-course given by Hermann Brockhaus. How many grammar courses do we need learning our vernacular?

      From his 3rd. Semester onwards Friedrich Maximilian Müller attended, as dealt in details in the Chapter 4, the following five semester-courses offered by Hermann Brockhaus:

      1 Nala Hermann Brockhaus

      2 Probodha Chandrodaya Hermann Brockhaus

      3 History of Indian Literature Hermann Brockhaus

      4 Soma-Deva Hermann Brockhaus

      5 Hitopadesa Hermann Brockhaus

      It goes without saying that these courses were on narrated episodes and on secondary literature in the Sanskrit language. These courses were at best based on Hermann Brockhaus‘s three-months-grammar-course. And he lectured in the German language. After completing these courses Friedrich Maximilian Müller comes to the conclusion that Hermann Brockhaus’s knowledge was exhausted. In addition, he felt, that was not enough for him. Therefore, he decides to go to Berlin and learn more of the Sanskrit language and more of Sanskrit literature. Franz Bopp happened then to be the topmost Sanskrit scholar, not only in Germany.

      Whatever else Max Müller narrates in his autobiography regarding Friedrich Maximilian Müller’s Sanskrit knowledge and love for Sanskrit does not correspond to facts. Moreover, Max Müller contradicts himself. We recall:

       “I found little that could rouse my enthusiasm for Greek and Latin literature, and I always required a dose of that to make me work hard. Everything seemed to me to have been done, and there was no virgin soil left to the plough, no ruins on which to try one’s own spade.”

      We recall also: “I began to feel that I must know something special, something that no other philosopher knew, and that induced me to learn Sanskrit, Arabic and Persian.”

      All this does not sound like a love for the Sanskrit language. Does it? We are caught up again with the cute story presented by Max Müller regarding Friedrich Maximilian Müller’s “first love, Sanskrit and the rest” (p. 109-111). Friedrich Maximilian could not have “remained true to (his) first love, Sanskrit and the rest” before he ended his third semester for the simple reason that Hermann Brockhaus dealt with a Sanskrit text in Summer 1842 only. And whatever Friedrich Maximilian could know about “Sanskrit and the rest”, it has come to him through Hermann Brockhaus.

      In the chapter “University” in “My Autobiography” by Max Müller one can read lectures delivered by Max Müller on languages, on Sanskrit, on etymology of words, on ancient gods, on Aryans, and what not. Obviously Friedrich Maximilian could have known nothing of all these from Hermann Brockhaus. The reason is rather simple. We apologise for looking a little ahead. Hermann Brockhaus himself could not have known all these topics, as we shall know in a while.

      We get into the biography of Hermann Brockhaus to trace when, where, from whom and for how long he had learnt his Sanskrit language. He was born in 1806 in Amsterdam. He studied “Oriental languages” at the Universities of Leipzig, Göttingen and Bonn. The Universities of Leipzig and Göttingen did not teach the Sanskrit language at that time. In Bonn he was a student of August Wilhelm von Schlegel (1767–1835), who was holding a professorship for European Literature. Later he was celebrated as the founder of “German Indology”, who is also said to have known the Sanskrit language. Therefore, we shall have to apply the same method as we applied in the previous case. Whatever Hermann Brockhaus could know about “Sanskrit and the rest”, it came to him through August Wilhelm von Schlegel only. We extend our search to check now the ability of teaching the Sanskrit language of Hermann Brockaus’s teacher. There is no other way out.

      August Wilhelm von Schlegel is the elder of the Schlegel brothers. He came to Paris while Franz Bopp was learning “Sanskrit” there. It is handed down that Franz Bopp and August Wilhelm von Schlegel learnt the Sanskrit language together in Paris. We look now into his vita.

      August Wilhelm von Schlegel is educated at the Hannover Gymnasium and studies philology at the Göttingen University. As a philologist, he gets engaged in an “ardent study of Dante, Petrarch and Shakespeare”. From 1791 to 1795, he is tutor in a Dutch banker's family at Amsterdam. In 1796, soon after his return to Germany, he settles down in Jena, following an invitation of the German poet Friedrich Schiller. He is now 29 years old.

      In Jena, he makes critical contributions to Schiller's journal for literature “Horen”. He translates also from Dante and Shakespeare. These works establish his literary reputation and gain for him an “extraordinary professorship” at the University of Jena in 1798 at the age of 31. With his younger brother Friedrich von Schlegel (1772–1829), he founds Athenaeum, the organ of the Romantic School of literature in Germany.

      After divorcing his wife Karoline, in 1804, he is now 37, he travels with Madame de Staël as adviser in her literary work in France, Germany, Italy and other countries and as tutor to her sons as well. Until he is 46 years old, he remains adviser to her and tutor to her sons. From 1813 to 1817, he acts as secretary of the Crown Prince of Sweden, through whose influence his family gets back the title “von Schlegel”. In 1817, he is 50 years old.

      He joins again the household of Mme. de Staël as advisor until her death in the same year. Thereafter he gets a professorship for Literature at the University