This selected translation of Āmuktamālyada strives to present the general reader with a continuous narration of the story of Goda Devi. I have also tried to convey some of Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s unique and imaginative style of poetic description. For a verse-by-verse analysis of the translated sections, see Appendix I. In the future I hope to produce a fully annotated translation of this great work.
THE POETICS OF IMAGERY
All Indian poems are crafted with alaṅkāras or poetic ornaments. The medieval literary theorists claim that like a beautiful woman adorned with glittering jewels, a well-written poem should be enhanced with poetic embellishments. The skillful usage of these alaṅkāras is the hallmark of fine writing, and although the tradition defines hundreds of such techniques, the primary and most important literary device for all Indian kāvya is the upama or simile. Marked in Telugu by words like ana ‘as if,’ aṭa ‘seemingly,’ or sari ‘equal to,’ similes are in fact a type of translation—a conveyance of image and feeling from one context to another. This mode of figurative description lies at the heart of the vivid imagery and emotional impact of all Indian verse.
By medieval times, the metaphors of Sanskrit literature where faces are like moons and eyes are like lotuses, seem to have lost almost all emotional force. The ornate court poetry of Telugu and other regional languages, however, represents a revitalized formulation of these standard conventions, and in the hands of a master poet like Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya, kāvya is again earthy, passionate and immediately evocative.
These poems come from a long oral tradition and are best enjoyed when recited, but for now a couple of written examples with metrical analysis will serve to illustrate how these ideas are constructed in Telugu. In addition, I hope the word-by-word glosses will provide some insight into the methods and challenges of translating these poems into literary English.
vevina meḍapai valabhi veṇika caṇṭa vahiñci vippagā
pūvulu goṭa mīṭu tari poyĕḍu teṭula mrota kāmi-śaṅ
kāvahamau kṛtābhyasanalauṭanu dantapu mĕṭla vĕmbaḍin
ce vaḍi vīṇa mīṭuṭayu cikk-ĕḍaliñcuṭayun sarimbaḍan I.62 (U.)
dawn roof on eaves braids breasts move to untying
flowers nail flick time going bees humming lustful doubt
imagining accomplished practitioners because ivory frets fitted
hand quickly lute playing hair unbraiding being equal to
I.62
At dawn, courtesans stand under rooftop eaves
and pull their black hair between their breasts
to untie their braids,
and as they flick away last night’s withered flowers
with their long trim nails, honey bees emerge and buzz away.
Lustful men see this scene and fantasize
that the courtesans are playing a double-gourded vīṇa,
a sweet tune rising as they quickly move their hands
across the ivory frets.
This kind of extended metaphor is typical of Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s vivid imagination. Each element of reality (hair, flowers, breasts, nails, bees) is carefully mapped onto an imagined conception (āvahamau) that becomes just as real, if not more so, than the physical truth itself. This emotional internalization of the natural world is the essence of good kāvya.
The stanza above also illustrates the poet’s mastery in creating dynamic tableaus. A single poem captures an entire scene, rich with imagery and emotional appeal. Here is another example, a playful vignette in which the metaphoric ideation is played out as a misconception in the minds of the poem’s characters.
tala pakṣacchaṭa grucci bātuvulu kedārampu kulyāntara
sthali nidrimpaga cūci yārĕkul uṣassnāta prayāta dvijā
vali piṇḍīkṛta śāṭikal-savi tat-āvāsambu cerpaṅga re
vula ḍiggan vĕsa pāruvāni kani navvun śāli gopyoghamul
I.65 (M.)
head feather-mass stick ducks paddy canal-inner-
place when go to sleep see,
watchmen dawn-bathed had gone brahman
group washed clothes thinking, their houses to take back
washing-place get down,
quickly fleeing-ones seeing laughing fields girl group
I.65
In the waterways of rich paddy fields,
ducks tuck their heads into their thick plumage and fall asleep.
The watchmen think, ‘These must be the clothes, squeezed dry
and left behind by the brahmans who bathed here in the morning!’
And as they dive into the water to fetch and return the clothes
the ducks scatter, while the girls,
huddled and watching from the fields
start to laugh.
This scene is in fact a metaphor for the experience of reading a poem. The girls are witnesses (readers), enjoying the internal metaphor that is played out in the minds of the watchmen. This kind of imagery is typical of Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s insightful, yet ever-playful imagination.
DIVINE REALISM
So far as language is mirror or counterstatement to the world, or most plausibly an interpretation of the reflective with the creative along an ‘interface’ of which we have no adequate formal model, it changes as rapidly and in as many ways as human experience itself.32
Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s poetry is marked with a great degree of realism and exacting detail about daily life in medieval South India. In his imagination, the mundane is made divine and the ordinary becomes extraordinary; the routine activities of daily life become expressive metaphors for celestial actions, while the exalted gods of heaven are brought down to earth and reimagined as real living persons. This ability to see divinity in the most commonplace activities (and vice versa), is an extension of the poet’s inner philosophy, the powerful Viśiṣṭha Advaita belief that god is everywhere, in everything, at all times. The expression of this ‘interface’ between the real and imagined world, imbued with a sense of the divine and ever-changing nature of life, is the core of Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s poetic endeavour. Take for example poems I.75 and IV.13 where the theme of harvesting rice is used to create two very different, but equally evocative images.
I.75
Drāviḍa girls sit and guard freshly harvested rice
laid out to dry in sun-filled courtyards.
Meanwhile, girls from the village arrive
carrying wicker baskets with lilies for sale
and as the girls begin to barter,
a spotted temple fawn starts to gobble up the rice
until the girls rush back to scare it away.
IV.13
With wonder, a host of demons and ghosts
came to see Lord Viṣṇu,
but as soon as they felt the rushing wind
from the Snake-Eater’s wings
they all fled in fear, flying away like pithless grains
beaten on a threshing floor, and scattered by a winnowing fan.
The expression of this divine reality is never taken to extremes; rather it is grounded in a keen attention to detail that conjures both moods and images that stay with the reader as a reminder of life’s beauty and wonder. As a last example of Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s creative realism, here is one of his many scrumptiously detailed descriptions of medieval cuisine:33
II.68
On a summer afternoon, expert epicureans
season sun-ripened mangoes in sizzling hot oil
and saute fresh cuts of fish taken from dried-out ponds.
And at sunset when they burp from the spice,
they stroll to shady groves
where they’ve buried coconuts in the sand
and ease their tummies with refreshing juice.
TELUGU PROSODY
A brief explanation of Telugu metrics will provide the reader with a sense of the rhythmic architecture that gives shape to these fluid verses. It will also serve as a transition to highli
ghting the many issues involved in translating these stanzas into literary English.
Just like the Telugu language, Telugu prosody is a beautiful blend of Sanskritic and Dravidian influences. Several metres found in classical Telugu poetry are taken directly from the classical Sanskrit vṛtta metres. These syllable-based (akṣara) metres employ a strict arrangement of short (laghu) and long (guru) syllables. The four most popular in this category are Śārdūlam, Campakamāla, Utpalamāla and Mattebham. Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya skillfully employs all four of these metres throughout his work, mostly for the sections that are filled with ornate descriptions and complex metaphors (see I.62 and I.65 above).
Unlike Sanskrit kāvya in which a particular metre is sustained for an entire canto, Telugu poets may switch metres at will, freely flowing with the flight of their imagination. Another unique feature of Telugu prosody is the idea of enjambment whereby words can flow across pādas or line breaks. These innovations provide the Telugu poet with a great ability to regulate rhythm, both within and between poems.
The Sanskritic metres are defined in the classical trika system by using eight gaṇas or tri-syllablic groupings. The so-called acca or pure Telugu metres, however, such as Āṭavĕladi, Teṭagīti and Sīsa, are based on a separate set of building blocks known as the Indra and Sūrya gaṇas. The final metre that finds common usage in classical Telugu literature is known as Kandam. It is a purely beat-based (mātra) metre and is made up of gaṇas that all equal four beats. The units used to create a Kanda stanza are very similar to the ner and nirai units that underlie all of Tamil prosody. For more information on these various metres, see Appendix II.
The non-Sanskrtic metres are unique to Telugu and often reflect the lilting flow of Dravidian folk idioms. They are often employed for dialogues or extended narrative passages where several of these stanzas can be strung together to create a flow that mimics the oral story-telling tradition that these metres seem to have evolved from. Take for example Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s dream in which Āndhra Viṣṇu speaks in pure Telugu metres (see I.15 above) or the long dialogic section in Chapter V that clearly resembles the spoken rhythms (and emotions) found in the akam poetry of Tamil Saṅgam literature.
tānu sura māuni nṛpa tanul dālci yakaṭa
kāminī tatin uḍikiñcukaṇṭĕn aṭṭĕ
gaṇḍĕyunu nalla dāsarigāḍu kiriyu
hariyun aipovuṭaya mañcid-anuyugambu V.41 (T.)
V.41
That Viṣṇu! Instead of becoming a god, a sage, or a king
and stirring the hearts of women,
it would’ve been better if he had stayed, just as he was, ages ago,
a fish, a turtle, a pig, or a lion!
I have provided these examples to show how important rhythm is, and how variable it can be in regard to Telugu poetry. And although I did not translate these metres directly, I always kept their rhythms firmly fixed in my mind as I composed in English. I have also refrained from adopting end-rhyme or Western metrical patterns that often produce contrived and unnatural sounding productions. Rhythm is essential to the translating process and I have followed the insightful advice of Ezra Pound when he says: ‘As regarding rhythm: to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in sequence of a metronome.’34 In essence, my use of free verse is an attempt to bring the musical flow of each Telugu poem into rhythmically dynamic English verse.
TRANSLATION
The English word ‘translation’ comes (via French) from the Latin word translatio meaning ‘to carry across’ and the Telugu word for translation (anuvādam) comes from the Sanskrit verbal root anu+vad, meaning to speak, imitate, resound or echo. From these derivations we may understand translation as a system of resonant conveyance—a process in which the writer is translating not just words, but ideas, beliefs and, most importantly, feelings and emotions.
Because words themselves are so inextricably embedded in culturally specific realities, a translator is challenged to express an entire culture with insufficient equivalencies, stilted metaphrases and inaccurate paraphrases. This being the case, translation seems like a bleak impossibility. The famous Italian maxim traduttore, traditore even makes the translator into a traitor, and yet, given all the difficulties and challenges, translation has flourished as a necessity for trans-cultural communication. The heart of any translation is that there is something universal underlying the outward expression of words—a deeper value, and in the case of poetry, an underlying set of feelings which resonates within each of us regardless of cultural background. In truth, this is why we translate literature, to feel the collective connectivity of human experience across both time and space.
There are more translations available now than in any other period of human history and the trend only seems to be increasing. In our ever-expanding global environment, there exists an immediate desire to know and understand. Poetry, however, is different. It requires time and care to both create and enjoy. Here I have endeavoured to translate Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s complex and imaginative Telugu into modern English. In the end, I wanted to produce a literary translation that would stand on its own as a poetic work; and in the process, I have strived to remain true and accurate to both the letter and spirit of the poet-king’s vision. In essence, I have tried to translate the ‘experience’ of these poems, to give the reader a window into the mind and world of a master South Indian poet.
Āmuktamālyada is just one of many beautiful poems written in Telugu. There still exists a great stock of rich literature that remains untranslated and understudied. I hope this translation will inspire further research into classical Telugu literature and encourage the support of such studies in India, America and elsewhere.
Notes
1Āmuktamālyada VI.140. For a discussion regarding the variant number of chapters in Āmuktamālyada, see TKR 2–3.
2This line is taken from Āmuktamālyada I.44, a poem in the vaṁśa-stuti (Praise of Lineage) that precedes the beginning of Chapter I. These poems that glorify the king and his ancestors are taken from the introduction to Allasāni Pĕddana’s Manu Caritramu.
3Today the ruins of Vijayanagaram can still be seen around the well-preserved town of Hampi in northern Karnataka.
4Sewell 278–9.
5Cf. Manu Caritramu I.13.
6A traditional list of the eight poets along with their major works: Allasāni Pĕddana (Manu Caritramu), Nandi Timmana (Pārijāta Apaharaṇamu), Mādayyagāri Mallana (Rājasékhara Caritramu), Dhūrjaṭi (Śrī Kāḷahasti Māhātmyamu and Śrī Kāḷahastīśvara Śatakamu), Ayyalarāju Rāmabhadra (Rāma Abhyudayamu), Piṅgaḷi Sūranna (Kaḷāpūrṇodayamu and Rāghava Pāṇḍavīyamu), Rāmarājabhūṣana (Vasu Caritramu) and Tĕnāli Rāmakṛṣṇa (Pāṇḍuraṅga Māhātmyamu).
7See NRS 9,166 and 178.
8Āmuktamālyada along with Allasāni Pĕddana’s Manu Caritram, Nandi Timmana’s Pārijāta Apaharaṇamu, Rāmarājabhūṣana’s Vasu Caritramu and Tĕnāli Rāmakṛṣṇa’s Pāṇḍuraṅga Māhātmyamu constitute the pañca-mahā-kāvyamulu, or five great ornate long poems of classical Telugu.
9Sewell 246–7.
10Tuḷu is a linguistic and cultural region of coastal Southwest India. It is considered by linguists to be the oldest known Dravidian language.
11Narayana Rao (1995) 25.
12Take for example the highly politicized 2008 decision to designate Telugu (and Kannada) as classical languages to be put alongside Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, and most recently, Tamil (2005).
13The etymology of the word tĕlugu is highly debated and scholars have offered several possible derivations from the Sanskrit tri-liṅga, Land of Three Liṅgams, or the Dravidian root tĕn meaning ‘south,’ or the Telugu word tenĕ meaning ‘honey.’
14Dravidian is from the Sanskrit draviḍa or drāviḍa referring to the people and language of South India. Etymologically it appears to be a back formation of the word tamil via the Pāli damiḷa.
15Telugu is classified as a Centra
l Dravidian language whereas Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada are grouped together in the Southern Dravidian branch.
16For more information, see Bhadriraju Krishnamurti’s exhaustive The Dravidian Languages (Cambridge University Press, 2003).
17Hart and Heifetz (1988) 26.
18From the introduction to Nannĕcoḍa’s Telugu Kumāra Sambhavamu, translated in NRS 69–70.
19Some scholars believe the poem to be the work of Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s poet laureate Allasāni Pĕddana. Although some poems from the Manu Caritramu (especially the vaṁśa-stuti section) appear in the king’s work, most literary critics believe that Āmuktamālyada is Śrī Kṛṣṇadevarāya’s own composition.
20The other two styles, progressively easier to savour are kadaḷī-pākam, the banana style and drākṣā-pākam, the grape style
21The name Āmuktamālyada is a translation of the Tamil cūḍikŏḍutta nācciyār.
22The world ālvār come from the Tamil verbal root āl meaning to immerse or sink.
23See I.56, I.84, V.89 and V.95.
24The word bhakti is derived from the Sanskrit root bhaj which can mean, among many other things, to love, share or experience. For an excellent essay on Vaiṣṇava bhakti see A. K. Ramanujan’s Afterword in Hymns for the Drowning.
25Nammālvār 6.9.5, translated in Ramanujan (1993) 21.
26The other two main Vedāntic schools are the Advaita Non-Dualism of Śaṅkara and the Dvaita Dualism of Madhva.
27On the variant number of chapters, see Introduction Note 1.
28The distinction between these two genres is not very clear. In the Telugu context, kāvya seems to apply more to works like Śrīnātha’s 15th century Naiṣadhīya Caritramu, which is based directly on Śrīharṣa’s Sanskrit original, whereas prabandha refers to the more original and highly stylized voices of later Golden Age poets.
The Giver of the Worn Garland KRISHNADEVARAYA'S AMUKTAMALYADA Page 3
