Introduction

The Waste Land appeared as a book on fifteenth December

1992 published by Bony and Liveright in an edition of 4'

thousand copies with notes as an appendage to the slim

edition. The poem became an instant literary sensation

evoking vehement responses and contradictory evaluations.

In October 1923, Charles Powell reviewed the poem in the

Planchester Guardian with the comment that it was meant for

"anthropologists and literati," and not for the ordinary

reader to whom it appeared as "so much waste paper."' In

November the same year the New York Times Book Review

reported that Eliot was conferred the prestigious Dial award in recognition of his great work that "had established new

currents among young poets. "2 This was the situation before

academics like John Crowe Ransom, Allen Tate, Edmund Wilson, J

I.A. Richards, and F.R. Leavis took over with their

discordant but perceptive insights into the structural and

thematic problems of The Waste Land. The history of the

critical exegesis of the poem had been a veritable instance

of concordia discord ever since. One of the reasons for

such a mixed response was the immense suggestiveness sthat

the poem possessed, effecting a profound emotional impact on

the reader's sensibility.

Though there are many schools of criticism in Sanskrit

like ~ F t i , ~lamkzra, Vakrokti, Aucitya, Guna, and Anumzna,

the most important among them is the Rasadhvani school. 3

J The tertiary./;evel of meaning called dhvani, and the

ultimate L s t h e t i c experience called B a s a are two

fundamental concepts of Indian Aesthetics. Aphorisms like

"dhvanyatmakam kavyam" and "vakyam rasztmakam kavyam" have /

become entrenched in the Indian mind by tradition.

Suggestion operating at the vastu, alamkara, and bhzva level

should cohere into an intense "emotional image" in the

poetic medium so that the "intuited feeling" of the poet

should become the "felt feeling" of the sahrdaya. This

unhindered and intense emotive communication between the

poet and the reader through the poetic medium is the

ultimate criterion of judgement in poetry according to the

rasadhvani theorists.

An analytical evaluation of The Waste Land in the light

of the established precepts of the rasadhvani theory will be \

a rewarding experiment at three levels. Firstly, it will ,'

help us verify the extent of applicability of the conceptual

systems of the rasadhvani theory on Western literary models

like The Waste Land, unhindered by questions related to

their ethos and milieu. Secondly, such a study will give us

a better insight into the working of the Indian and Clestern I I

aesthetic concepts related to literariness, figuration, and

the balance between authorial intention and readar response 3'

in literary works. Lastly, such studies can contribute

atleast a little to the evolving of "an Indian centre from

which to look at works of art" which academics like C.D.

Narasimhaiah and Krishna Rayan have often exhorted Indian

scholars to do as a belated first step in ackno~iledging our

critical identity and cultural heritage. In the Kesari

Balakrishna Pillai Hemorial Lecture for 1989, C.D.

Narasimhaiah remarked :

We have been too long and too much looking to

western sources, not for stimclus, which is

desirable, but to let them do all the thinking for

us, so much so that our criticism has been largely

derivative which, considering our own rich

critical heritage, must be very distressing. 7

The rasa theory begins with Bharata's Natyasastra, a

theoretical work on the theatre belonging to the pre-epic

period. Bharata'~ model of rasa involves nine sth?iyibhavSs

capable of invoking nine rasas. There are thirty three

saficarins which function as accessories in the evocation of

rasa. The evocation of rasa takes place in the presence of /

vibhava, anubhzva, and saficarins. Chapter six of the

Natyasastra gives the siitra related to the evocation of rasa

which reads as follows: " v i b h ~ v ~ n u b h ~ v a v y a b h i c ~ i s a m y o g ~ d

rasani~pattih." Eminent theoreticians like Dandin, Lollata,

Sankiika, Nayaka, Anandavardhana, and Abhinavagupta applied

Bharata's rasa model to the analysis of poetic discourse

linking it with the concept of dhvani operating at the

vastu, alamkara, and bhava levels of poetry. - Anandavardhana's DhvanyZloka and Abhinavagupta's

Abhinavabharati are two important treatises on the

rasadhvani theory.

When we apply the theory of rasadhvani to The Waste

Land, we will have to use a new set of aesthetic priorities

different from those available in the contemporary /

hermeneutical readings of the poem in the West. The search

for the different levels of poetic suggestion operating in

the text will give us a hierarchical'pattern of suggestive I , devices such as the mythical'sub-text, figures like rupakam,

( upama, and utpreksa, and a conglomeration of vibhSvas, i anubhzvas, and saficarins. The mythical sub-text operates at

the level of arthantarasamkramita v2icya dhvani. Apart from

the direct use of upama, utpreksa, riipaka, samasokti, and

udztta in the different sections of the poem, we find a

functional parallelism between Eliot's use of symbols and

images and the figural effect of aprast~ta~ras'amsa. At the J

bhava level we find the evocation of a variety of rasds like

sringara, bhayanaka, karuna etc. through' innumerable i

vihhavas and the corresponding anubhavas and sascsrins.

!.!ltjm?~t.r?Ly, :he total emotional impact of the poem coheres

into !-he maharasa of blbhatsa, creating a centralised -- -

---.----

emotional focus for dhvani at the vastu, alamkzra, and bhava

levels. Viewed from an Indian centre of aesthetic

evaluation, The Waste Land is likely to present the picture

of a great<dhvani-kzvyain the mind of the sahrdaya, who will

feel relieved to dispense with the Western hermeneutical

obsessions related to the structure and theme of the poem.

The design of the study is as follows:

The introduction presents the thematic and structural

difficulties involved in evolving a credible exegesis of - The

Waste Land and stresses the necessity of evolving "an

Indian centre" for our critical evaluations. The synoptic /

outline of the various sections of the thesis has also been

incorporated in this prefatory note.

Chapter I focusses on the histordal evolution of the

theory of rasadhvani and discusses the relevance of the

/" established theoretical positions held by hetors like

Bharata, Xnandavardhana, and Abhinavagupta. Reference has

/ also been made to the different aesthetic perspectives

evolved in the treatises of ha ma ha, Dandin, Bhatta Nayaka,

and Lollata in order to evolve a broad theoretical base for

the analysis. /'

J Chapter I1 consolidates the major critical perspectives

/ evolved over seven and half decades of critical and academic

evaluation of The Waste and. Apart from the discussion of

the major trends in the contemporary hermeneutical readings

/' of the poem, there is an updated evaluation of the Indian

response to T.S. Eliot's poetry, drama, and criticism from Y /'

the thirties onwards with more emphasis on a response and

influence analysis. J

Chapter I11 analyses the suggestive devices of the

poetic text at the vast6 level. It discusses the consistent C -

\ use of arthantarasamkramita vacya dhvani as a structural - - - St. ,- Ir device in the mythical sub-text of the poem so as to evoke a

- . contrastive and sometimes complemeAtary effect in the

placing of the mythical contexts in the contemporary

background. This chapter also assesses how the

arthantarasamkramita context shift contributes to the total

emotional effect and appeal of the poem.

/ Chapter IV takes up the linguis6ic and semantic aspects

r , of the Eastern and Western concepts of figurality and makes +

a comparative study of the functional aspects of the figural

devices used in The Waste Land as contributing to the -!* / <

alamkaradhvani of the poem. The figural devices have been

evaluated taking the concept of "oucitya" as a major -. .

' . , - , . Y t* '.. , criterion of judgement.

Chapter V analyses the various vibhZvZs, anubhZvSs, and

%.,, sa6c;iirins in the poem as operating on the mythical and - i figural. leve:l.s, evokidq the emotional experience as rasa.

Thc anubhavas to the various vibhavas in the Bharata model I have been considered from the angle of the narratological 1 m i

J persona Tiresias on the one hand, and from that of the

/ various /$esters, sinners, and suf ferersNf iguring as the

-- - -- I inhabitants of the mythical landscape of the poem on the

other. The emotional centre of the poem where the vastu,

alamkara, and bhava levels of suggestion cohere, consummate,

and communicate as a mahzrasa has been identified and

assessed according to the precepts of the rasadhvani theory.

The conclusion consolidates the fi~dings of the

analysis and makes a comparative evaluation of the

I contrastive and complementary aspects of the Indian and 1

i ' Western theoretical positions held by literary theorists

regarding concepts like /literariness, f iqurality, authdrial

intention and reader response, as part of the search for

evolving a comprehensive but basically Indian critical

perspective.

Notes

Charles Powell, "Manchester Guardian Review," T.S.

Eliot: The Waste La&: A Ca~eboqk, eds. Cox and ~inchliffe - - - _-- (1968; London: Macmillan, 1988) 30.

Tapan Kumar Basu, "T.S. Eliot: In His Time and in

Ours," T.S. Eliot: An Anthology of Recent Criticism, ed.

T.K. Rasu (Delhi: Pencraft, 1993) 13.

3 Bimal Krishna Motilal, "The Word and the World,"

Indian Aesthetics, ed. V.S. Sethuraman (Madras: Macmillan, A'

1992) 373-74.

V.K. Chari, Sanskrit Criticism (Delhi: Motilal

Ranarsidass, 1993) 239.

In his lecture on "Literary Theory and Indian

Critical Practice" Krishna Rayan has referred to some

significant points of convergence between Western critical

theories and traditional Indian Aesthetics. The modernist

concern for literariness, figurality, authorial intention,

and reader response leads us to the aesthetic priorities of

traditional Tndian rhetors according to Rayan.

Krishxrd Rayan, "Literary Theory and Indian Critical

Practice," The David McAlpin and Sally Sage McAlpin Lecture,

Bombay,1988.

Scholars like C.D. Narasimhaiah and Krishna Rayan

have always argued for an essentially Indian point of view

in our critical practice. The pro-Western literary

scholarship has always overlooked the merits o f our critical

heritage. Narasimhaiah in The Kesari Memorial Lecture for

1989, and Rayan in The McAlpin Lecture for 1988, have made

the "Indian centre" for criticism a significant point of

debate and discussion.

' C.D. Narasimhaiah, "Loka Prajna and Lokottara," The

Kesari Memorial Lecture, University of Kerala, 1989.