On 14th April, 2021, Vivekananda International Foundation organized a webinar titled ‘A Look at Sanskrit Literature’.
Welcome and opening remarks were given by Dr Arvind Gupta, Director VIF, in which he welcomed the participants and introduced the speaker, Ambassador Aditya Narayan Dhairyasheel Haksar (A.N.D. Haksar), a veteran diplomat belonging to the Indian Foreign Service. Adding to his introduction further, Dr Gupta mentioned that after a distinguished diplomatic career, Ambassador Haksar devoted his time to the translation of Sanskrit texts from Sanskrit into English and his contributions included 22 translated works from Sanskrit to English in the last two decades. Focusing on the talk, Dr Gupta regarded it as a very special address or discussion and described Ambassador Haksar as a very special and eminently qualified personality to deliver the concerned talk. Dr Gupta also highlighted the significance of Ambassador Haksar’s work by mentioning that his work not only has greater accessibility and a wider reach among the current generation but it also fills several gaps that does exist in both Sanskrit language and literature. He also added that discussion like this and Ambassador Haksar’s work which not only introduces Sanskrit and its richness but also our heritage and past achievements will inspire others to work in the same direction in the future. The objective behind drawing attention towards the importance of these works was that although Sanskrit is a rich ancient language and has contributed to our enormously rich heritage, it is not widely spoken and has been given a status of a ‘classical language’. He also added that India was witnessing a renaissance and we should all work towards it.
In the course of an hour and half lecture, many important aspects were discussed by the speaker. His initial remarks included about his discovery of new works during the span of two decades of his work of reading and translating of Sanskrit texts from Sanskrit into English. Sanskrit, in his words, is an ancient language and not only an ancient language but a continuing history right up to present times. To elaborate it further, Sanskrit literature and the Sanskrit literary conventions have continued over all these millennia right up to the present day. In the vast field of Sanskrit literature, religious and philosophical dimensions have always been well-known or well-studied. For instance, names such as the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Quran and philosophers such as Shankaracharya are quite well noted. Moreover, the tradition of translating these well-known Sanskrit texts has been going on for a long time. It was highlighted by the speaker that when modern studies of Sanskrit began around 200 years ago, the first Sanskrit works which was translated by them to English was from the religious and philosophical areas. The very first Sanskrit text translated into English was that of the ‘Bhagavad Gita’ just before the French Revolution in 1784. The first Indian to translate from Sanskrit into English was Raja Ram Mohan Roy and the first work that he translated was the Isha Upanishad. During the British rule, an East India Company Official Charles Wilkins was sent by the East India Company to learn Sanskrit. A breakthrough came with the translation of Shakuntala of Kalidasa by another East India Company Official as it made a huge impact on the European literary figures and in the words of the speaker opened the windows in Europe for a look at Sanskrit literature. Talking about his own involvement in the areas of philosophy and religion, around 20 years ago, the Speaker had prepared a text of the then best-known English translations from Sanskrit literature which was published by the Indian Council of Cultural Relations titled ‘A Treasury of Sanskrit Poetry’. This collection of poetry consisted of the very best of the numerous English translations of all kinds of Sanskrit poetry. Another important point that was highlighted by the Speaker is that the translation process of Sanskrit texts into English was supported by some well-known Indian sages of the time including Swami Vivekananda and Sri Aurobindo. Swami Vivekananda’s work included a beautiful translation of a poem of natural beauty from the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad whose English translation was titled ‘A Hymn of Sweetness’. This translated work of Swami Vivekananda has also been included in A Treasury of Sanskrit Poetry. The religious and philosophical areas of the Sanskrit literature have been explored to a large extent as compared to other areas. There are many other areas and dimensions in the field of Sanskrit literature which deserve more attention during the present times. Making this the central point of the talk, the speaker focussed on three dimensions of the literature which are comparatively less known today. Those are:
This is A look at Sanskrit literature from the speaker’s perspective.
The Webinar then proceeded with a long Question and Answer session.
There are some important points which were raised through the talk by the Speaker which was also highlighted by Dr Gupta. Dr Gupta spoke of two important points which included:
The closing remarks were made by Dr Sreeradha Datta, Centre Head and Senior Fellow at VIF, who on the behalf of VIF thanked the speaker Ambassador Haksar for an inspiring talk and for his contributing work towards Sanskrit language and literature.
Links:
[1] https://www.vifindia.org/event/report/2021/may/24/a-look-at-sanskrit-literature
[2] https://www.vifindia.org/author/Heena-Samant
[3] http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?title=A look at Sanskrit literature&desc=&images=https://www.vifindia.org/sites/default/files/image (5)_0.jpg&u=https://www.vifindia.org/event/report/2021/may/24/a-look-at-sanskrit-literature
[4] http://twitter.com/share?text=A look at Sanskrit literature&url=https://www.vifindia.org/event/report/2021/may/24/a-look-at-sanskrit-literature&via=Azure Power
[5] whatsapp://send?text=https://www.vifindia.org/event/report/2021/may/24/a-look-at-sanskrit-literature