RADHA AS FOUR MORE NAYIRAS

RADHA AS FOUR MORE NAYIRAS

As has been seen, Sanskrit literature – indeed all arts of Indian origin – portray romantic women in eight emotional moods and Jayadeva’s Radha is no exception to this. Throughout the moonlit night of passion during which she and Krishna, her adored lover, play out the sensual acts of love-making, Jayadeva describes her moods, her emotional upheavels and her eventual bliss of reunion with Krishna.

               Throughout the narrative, she illustrates the characteristics of all the anyikas. Somewhere, she is the Abhisarika, the bold wanton woman, who, heedless of snakes, wild animals and notwithstanding sparks of lightning in the frightening jungle. Radha too wanders like the Abhisarika in mysterious bowers and jungle clearings, anxious to unite her lover, Krishna.

            Radha is also the Vipralabdhc Nayika, whom her lover deserts for another woman. During the spring rite of love, Krishna too, wanders away to play the Raasleela, leaving Radha to pine for his return, too long for his seductive embrace.

          She is to some extent the Proshitbhartrika Nayika, where she does not know her lover has gone away. And finally, Radha is also the Kalahantarita Nayika, separated from her love because of quarrels Nayika, separated from her loner because of quarrels created by his infidelity portrayed by Jayadeva in the song Yahi Madhava, Yahi Keshava, in which she accuses him of infidelity and condemns him for the tell-tale love marks he has on his face.

        The Geeta Govinda has thus illustrated in an exemplary manner the Nayikabheda aspect of Sanskrit literature.

                                                                                (Bnart)