Much of Kalidasa’s life is surrounded by legend.
One of the most common stories about Kalidasa,
whose name means “servant of Kali,” is that he was
born a fool and begged the goddess Kali for wisdom
so that he could marry a cunning princess. In
reality, he is said to be the son of Pandit Sadasiva
Nyayavagisa (“pandit” means “scholar”) of Paundra,
India, and most scholars associate Kalidasa’s
life with the reigns of Chandragupta II and
Skandagupta in the fifth century.
Many consider Kalidasa, who was called one of
the nine gems for his expertise in poetry and
drama, the greatest Sanskrit writer of all time.
Most of his plays have happy endings, and most of
his works are about love. He uses five different
kinds of meter based on various patterns of long
and short syllables, as well as frequent alliteration
and assonance to express the sounds of nature.
Sanskrit poetry is a form of music, and Kalidasa’s
poems have the lilting rhythm and sensual
tone of many love songs. For example, in Ritusamhara
(The Seasons), a famous poem of 144
stanzas, Kalidasa relates nature to emotion:
Their cliffs are cloud-kissed by the midst of
lotus white, . . .
They’re spread with thick masses of dancing
peacock flocks;
They make the heart yearn, do these earthsupporting
rocks!
Another of Kalidasa’s poems is “Megha Duuta”
(“The Cloud Messenger”), an elegy divided into two
parts: The first 63 stanzas are called “Purva-megha”
(“The Former Cloud”), and the final 52 stanzas are
called “Uttara-megha” (“The Latter Cloud”). The
poem tells of Yaksha, a young man, and his sorrow
at being separated from his wife. In “The Former
Cloud,”Yaksha describes the cloud’s journey, and in
“The Latter Cloud,” Kalidasa tells us what Yaksha’s
message is and describes his wife. The poem is written
in the Mandakranta (“slow-stepping”) meter to
create a sense of the cloud’s movement (as the wind
blows it on its way) and sound (as rain pours forth
from it). In the following lines,Yaksha addresses the
cloud, praising it for its beauty:
While favouring breezes waft thee gently
forth,
And while upon thy left the plover sings
His proud, sweet song, the cranes who know
thy worth
Will meet thee in the sky on joyful wings
And for delights anticipated join their rings.
(ll. 41–45)
Such beauty and lyricism did not escape Kalidasa’s
plays, most of which are based on stories
told in the MAHABHARATA. His themes, however, are
love and courtship, and the plays were very popular
in the royal court. In his most famous play, The
Recognition of Sakuntala, Kalidasa tells the story of
Sakuntala and King Duhsanta. After Sakuntala is
cursed, the king loses his memory of her, and
Sakuntala must find a ring that he gave her to restore
his memory. In another story,Malavikagnimitra
(Malavika and Agnimitra), Kalidasa describes
how King Agnimitra falls in love with the picture
of an exiled servant girl named Malavika. In
Vikramorvashe (Urvashi Conquered by Valor), he
tells how King Pururavas falls in love with a celestial
nymph named Urvashi.
Kalidasa’s works were highly praised during his
time, and they continue to be popular today. For
many centuries after he wrote “The Cloud Messenger,”
so many poets imitated his style that their
Sanskrit poems were collectively called “Duuta
poems.” He was admired by the German poet
Goethe and imitated by Schiller (in his play Maria
Stuart, 1800). Later playwrights have written stories
about the legends surrounding Kalidasa’s life.
For example, Shri Mathura Datt Pandey’s play
Kalidasakavyasambhavam (1979), tells the origins
of “The Cloud Messenger,” a poem about which
scholar Arthur Berriedale Keith comments in A
History of Sanskrit Literature:
It is difficult to praise too highly either the brilliance
of the description of the cloud’s progress
or the pathos of the picture of the wife sorrowful
and alone. Indian criticism has ranked it
highest among Kalidasa’s poems for brevity of
expression, richness of content, and power to
elicit sentiment, and the praise is not undeserved.
Similar praise abounds for Kalidasa’s Sakuntala, as
critics continue to praise his language for its clarity,
his imagery for its power, and his verse for its
perfection.
English Versions of Works by Kalidasa
Kalidasa: Shakuntala and Other Writings. Translated
by Arthur W. Ryder. New York: Dutton, 1959.
Malavikagnimitram of Kalidasa. Translated by M. R.
Kale. Delhi:Motilal Banarsidass, 1985.
The Recognition of Sakuntala: A Play in Seven Acts.
Translated by W. J. Johnson. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2001.
The Seasons: Kalidasa’s Ritusamhara. Translated by
John T. Roberts. Tempe: Center for Asian Studies,
Arizona State University, 1990.
Works about Kalidasa
Singh, A. D., ed. Kalidasa: A Critical Study. Columbia,
Mo.: South Asia Books, 1977.
Thapar, Romila. Sakuntala: Texts, Readings, Histories.
London: Anthem Press, 2002.
Tilakasiri, J. Kalidasa’s Imagery and the Theory of Poetics.
New Delhi, India: Navrang Publishers, 1988.