Bhavakadevi (IAST: Bhāvaka-devī; fl. 12th century or earlier), also known as Bhavadevi, was a Sanskrit poet from present-day India. Her verses are included in early medieval Sanskrit anthologies, including Vidyakara's Subhashita-ratna-kosha,[1] Sadukti-karnamrita, and Kavindra-vachana-samuchchaya .[2]

Example verses

In the following verse, Bhavakadevi praises a woman's breasts using a political and military image (translation appears in Octavio Paz's In Light of India):[3]

Her breasts are two brother kings, equal in nobility,
looking out from the same heights, side by side,
sovereigns of the vast provinces they have won
in frontier battles, with a defiant hardness.

— Bhavakadevi

Alternative translation by Daniel H. H. Ingalls:[4]

Her breasts are brother kings, equal in nobility,
reared together till they have reached the same altitude of fame;
and from their border warfare these monarchs of vast provinces
have gained a cursed hardness.

— Bhavakadevi

Another verse expresses the feelings of a woman who becomes disillusioned with her lover after marrying him (translation by Daniel H. H. Ingalls):[5][6]

At first our bodies knew a perfect oneness,
but then grew two:
the lover, you,
and I, unhappy I, the loved

Now you are husband, I the wife.
What else should come of this my life,
a tree too hard to break,
if not such bitter fruit?

— Bhavakadevi

Alternative translation by R. Parthasarathy:[7]

How our bodies were one before!
Then they grew apart: you the lover,
And I, wretched one, the loved.

Now, you are the husband, I the wife.
A broken pledge is all that I'm left with -
A bitter fruit hard to swallow.

— Bhavakadevi

References

  1. ↑ Daniel H. H. Ingalls 1965, p. 13.
  2. ↑ Raj Pruthi et al 1999, p. 168.
  3. ↑ Octavio Paz 1998, p. 151.
  4. ↑ Daniel H. H. Ingalls 1965, p. 172.
  5. ↑ Eunice De Souza 1997, p. 2.
  6. ↑ Daniel H. H. Ingalls 1965, p. 13,219.
  7. ↑ TRS Sharma 2000, p. 492.

Bibliography

  • Daniel H. H. Ingalls, ed. (1965). An anthology of Sanskrit court poetry: Vidyākara's Subhāṣiaratnakoṣa. Harvard Oriental Series. Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674039506.
  • Eunice De Souza (1997). Nine Indian Women Poets: An Anthology. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-564077-9.
  • Octavio Paz (1998). In Light of India. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 0-15-600578-6.
  • Raj Pruthi; Rameshwari Devi; Romila Pruthi, eds. (1999). Encyclopaedia of Status and Empowerment of Women in India. Mangal Deep. ISBN 978-81-7594-040-6.
  • TRS Sharma, ed. (2000). Ancient Indian Literature: An Anthology. Vol. 2. Sahitya Akademi. ISBN 978-81-260-0794-3.
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