The Plays and Poetry of Kalidasa: Sanskrit Courtly Literature in Translation

3 credits · Undergraduate

Kalidasa is the most celebrated poet and playwright in all South Asian history, and his compositions have been taken as the prime exemplars for Sanskrit poetry and drama for nearly 1500 years. This course approaches Kalidasa within a Religious Studies framework, seeking to understand him as an architect and modeler of classical Hindu values through a close study of two of his plays (the Malavikagnimitra and the Abhijñanasakuntalam) and two of his poems (the Raghuva?sa and the Kumarasambhava) in English translation. Our concern will be to identify and understand the social, gender and religious values that inform Kalidasa's literary creations, and to examine how he configures the relationship between divinity, humanity and nature in his works. No knowledge of Sanskrit is required. PREREQUISITES: One of the following: RELS 1600.03/CLAS 1600.03; RELS 2600.03/CLAS 2600.03; RELS 2011.03; RELS 2509.03/HIST 2509.03; RELS 2510.03/HIST 2510.03; RELS 3101.03; RELS 3111.03; RELS 3113.03; RELS 3600.03/CLAS 3600.03; RELS 4600.03/CLAS 4600.03 FORMATS: Lecture