fj
The plot is the story of the love of Dushyanta for Sakuntala and its vicissitudes. The piece consists of seven acts and forms an example of a Nataka. Kalidasa borrowed his plot from the account given in the Mahabharata, and deviated from the original in three important places. No curse of Durvasas is mentioned in the Mahabharata, and Kalidasa apparently brought in the curse to justify the conduct of Dushyanta which would otherwise have been incompatible with his high moral tone. It is expressly stated in the Sakuntala-Upakhyana of Mahabharata that the King deliberately refused to accept Sakuntala as Hs bride, having full reminiscence of his marriage with the forest maiden. In another place Kalidasa represents
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Inferior enjoyment in heaven is not an object of desire to the more enthusiastic of the Hindus as it is but finite and .after its cessation the individual is born again in the world and exposed to the calamities of a frail existence. The grea| aim of devotion is union with the Supreme Spirit, in *
which case the soul no more assumes a perishable shape* The character of theNandi indicates the author's belonging to that modification of the Hindu* aith, in which the abstract deism of Vedanta is qualified by Identifying the Supreme invisible spirit with a delusive form, which was the person of Rudra or Siva. It is more practical, therefore, than grave Vedantism and it is equally different from both the metaphysical and theistical Sankhya.
His works. — The general current of opinion ascribes to f the Sakuntala the first place among Kalidasa's productions, V The popular saying runs : — "' ?esented as devoted to Siva and' his Consort.—H. H. Wilson.ata.' |^ ^ 499) because he displays a knowledge of scientific astronomy borrowed from the Greeks.cter, whose approach is unannounced, J£ considered to be.