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Kalidasa

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If a professor thinks what matters most
Is to have gained an academic post
Where he can earn a livelihood, and then
Neglect research, let controversy rest,
He's but a petty tradesman at the best,
Selling retail the work of other men.

Kālidāsa (Sanskrit: कालिदास Kālidāsaकालिदास, "Servant of Kali"; fl. 4th–5th century AD) was a Classical Sanskrit author who is often considered ancient India's greatest poet and playwright. His plays and poetry are primarily based on Hindu Puranas and philosophy. His surviving works consist of three plays, two epic poems and two shorter poems.

Quotes

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  • न रत्नमन्विष्यति मृग्यते हि तत्
    • A jewel is sought after and has not to seek.
    • Kumārasambhava, canto 5 (tr. M. R. Kale, 1917)
  • If a professor thinks what matters most
    Is to have gained an academic post
    Where he can earn a livelihood, and then
    Neglect research, let controversy rest,
    He's but a petty tradesman at the best,
    Selling retail the work of other men.
  • There in the fane a beauteous creature stands,
    The first best work of the Creator's hands;
    Whose slender limbs inadequately bear
    A full orbed bosom, and a weight of care;
    Whose teeth like pearls, whose lips like Bimbas show,
    And fawn-like eyes still tremble as they glow.
  • O my good fortune, please subdue the anguish of your Soul. Nobody is destined only to happiness or to pain. The wheel of life takes one up and down by turn.
    • Meghadūta (tr. C. R. Devadhar, 1984)
      No trust in Fortune's favour should'st thou feel,
      When least expected, lo! she whirls her wheel. (tr. H. H. Wilson, 1814)
  • God Shiva and his mountain bride,
    Like word and meaning unified,
    The world's great parents, I beseech
    To join fit meaning to my speech.
  • O thou who didst create this All,
    Who dost preserve it, lest it fall,
    Who wilt destroy it and its ways—
    To thee, O triune Lord, be praise.
  • Though many different paths, O Lord,
    May lead us to some great reward,
    They gather and are merged in thee
    Like floods of Ganges in the sea.
    • Raghuvaṃśa, canto 10 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912) — the incarnation of Rama

Abhijñānaśākuntalam

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(The Sign of Shakuntala)
  • We have watered the trees that blossom in the summer-time. Now let's sprinkle those whose flowering-time is past. That will be a better deed, because we shall not be working for a reward.
    • Act 1 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • A thought is as vivid as an act, to a lover.
    • Act 1 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • Did the great Creator first draw her in a masterpiece,
    And then touch life into his art?
    Or did he make her in his mind alone,
    Drawing on beauty’s every part?
    No—considering her singular perfection
    And her maker’s true omnipotence,
    I suppose her some quite unique creation
    In femininity’s treasure house.
    • Act 2 (tr. W. J. Johnson, 2001)
  • A blossom yet unsmelt,
    A tender shoot unpinched,
    A gem uncut,
    Untasted, fresh-fermented honey-wine,
    The fruit of proper actions
    Still intact—
    A beauty without fault or flaw.
    • Act 2 (tr. W. J. Johnson, 2001)
  • Grief must be shared to be endured.
    • Act 3 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • What is intended to be said, if left unsaid, becomes a matter of regret later.
    • Act 3 (tr. Chandra Rajan, 1989)
  • Be brave, and check the rising tears
    That dim your lovely eyes.
    • Act 4 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • A bee may be born in a hole in a tree, but she likes the honey of the lotus.
    • Act 4 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • May lily-dotted lakes delight your eye;
       May shade-trees bid the heat of noonday cease;
    May soft winds blow the lotus-pollen nigh;
       May all your path be pleasantness and peace.
    • Act 4 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • Because your heart, by loving fancies blinded,
       Has scorned a guest in pious life grown old,
    Your lover shall forget you though reminded,
       Or think of you as of a story told.
    • Act 4 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • The mind of age is like a lamp
       Whose oil is running thin;
    One moment it is shining bright,
       Then darkness closes in.
    • Act 5 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • अनुभवति हि मूर्ध्ना पादपस्तीव्रमुष्णं ।
    शमयति परितापं छायया संश्रितानाम् ॥
    • For the tree bears the intense heat on its head while it allays by its shade the scorching heat of those seeking its shelter.
    • Act 5 (tr. L. V. Ramachandra Iyer, 1905)
  • It is just such women, selfish, sweet, false, that entice fools.
    • Act 5 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • I cannot taste the sweet, and cannot leave it.
    • Act 5 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • To be a king, is to be a disappointed man.
    • Act 6 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • A good man never lets grief get the upper hand. The mountains are calm even in a tempest.
    • Act 6 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • I treated her with scorn and loathing ever;
       Now o’er her pictured charms my heart will burst:
    A traveller I, who scorned the mighty river,
       And seeks in the mirage to quench his thirst.
    • Act 6 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • A graceful arch of brows above great eyes;
    Lips bathed in darting, smiling light that flies
    Reflected from white teeth; a mouth as red
    As red karkandhu-fruit; love’s brightness shed
    O’er all her face in bursts of liquid charm—
    The picture speaks, with living beauty warm.
    • Act 6 (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)
  • The tear drop that once stood
    trembling on your lower lip
    —and I watched uncaring, lost in delusion—
    while it still clings to your gently-curving lashes,
    I shall now wipe away, my beloved,
    to free myself of remorse.
    • Act 7 (tr. Chandra Rajan, 1989)
  • May kingship benefit the land,
    And wisdom grow in scholars’ band;
    May Shiva see my faith on earth
    And make me free of all rebirth.
    • Act 7, last lines (tr. Arthur W. Ryder, 1912)


Disputed

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  • The autumn comes, a maiden fair
       In slenderness and grace,
    With nodding rice-stems in her hair
       And lilies in her face.
    In flowers of grasses she is clad;
       And as she moves along,
    Birds greet her with their cooing glad
       Like bracelets' tinkling song.


Misattributed

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  • Listen to the Exhortation of the Dawn!
    Look to this Day!
    For it is Life, the very Life of Life.
    In its brief Course lie all the
    Varieties and Realities of your Existence:
    The Bliss of Growth,
    The Glory of Action,
    The Splendour of Beauty;
    For Yesterday is but a Dream
    And Tomorrow is only a Vision;
    But Today well lived makes
    Every Yesterday a Dream of Happiness,
    And every Tomorrow a Vision of Hope.
    Look well therefore to this Day!
    Such is the Salutation of the Dawn!

Translations

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Quotes about Kalidasa

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  • Where find a soul that does not thrill
       In Kalidasa’s verse to meet
    The smooth, inevitable lines
       Like blossom-clusters, honey-sweet?
  • Kalidasa, the immortal poet and playwright, is a peerless genius whose works have won world-wide fame. The matchless qualities of his work have been lavishly praised both by the ancient Indian critics and modern scholars. ... In modern times the translations of Kalidasa's works in numerous Indian and foreign languages have spread his fame all over the world and now he ranks among the few topmost poets and playwrights of the world.
    • Ram Gopal, Kālidāsa: His Art and Culture (1984)
  • Goethe seems to have taken from Kalidasa the idea of a prologue for Faust.
    • Will Durant, Our Oriental Heritage (1935)
  • The first time I came upon this inexhaustible work, it aroused such enthusiasm in me and so held me that I could not stop studying it. I even felt impelled to make the impossible attempt to bring it in some form to the German stage. These efforts were fruitless but they made me so thoroughly acquainted with this most valuable work, it represented such an epoch in my life, I so absorbed it, that for thirty years I did not look at either the English or the German version. It is only now that I understand the enormous impression that work made on me at an earlier age.
    • Goethe, Letter to A. L. de Chezy, 9 October 1830, in praise of Shakuntala. M. von Herzfeld and C. A. M. Sym (eds.) Letters from Goethe (New York: Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1957) p. 514, no. 568
  • Wouldst thou the young year’s blossoms, and the fruits of its decline,
    And all by which the soul is charmed, enraptured, feasted, fed;
    Wouldst thou the Earth and Heaven itself in one sole name combine?
    I name thee, O Shakuntala! and all at once is said.
    • Goethe, as quoted in Will Durant, Our Oriental Heritage (1935)
  • In the whole world of Greek antiquity there is no poetical representation of beautiful love which approaches even afar.
    • Friedrich Schiller, letter to Wilhelm Humboldt, in praise of Sakuntala. Damodar P. Singhal, India and World Civilization (Calcutta: Rupa and Co., 1993) p. 230
  • I cannot easily find a product of human mind more pleasant than this [Shakuntala] ... a real blossom of the Orient, and the first, most beautiful of its kind! Something like that, of course, appears once every two thousand years.
    • J. G. Herder, as quoted in N. L. Gupta, An Introduction to Eastern Ways of Thinking (2003)
  • I advance an opinion that we have few specimens either in classical or modern poetry of more genuine tenderness or delicate feeling.
    • H. H. Wilson, on Kalidasa's Megha Dutt (Cloud Messenger), quoted in W. Ibn, Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said's 'Orientalism' (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2009)
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